Professional Excellence Research Articles

Teaching and research in mid-career management education

The apparent disconnect between teaching and research has implications for both curricular content and pedagogic practice and has particular salience in the field of mid-career education. To overcome this disconnect, faculty endeavour to integrate teaching and research. Pressure to do so stems from many sources. Benchmarks of professional excellence as well as the scholarship of teaching and learning champion such synergy. Institutions advocate teaching that is informed by research and research that is relevant to students. This article explores the conceptual and instrumental arguments for linking research and teaching. It discusses the benefits of such linkages and the challenges in effecting them. The exploration provides a conceptual base for other contributions in the volume which demonstrate specific research–teaching synergies in the Public Administration/Public Management classroom.

What Athletic Achievement Can Teach About Ethics

Athletic achievement exemplifies the nature of classical ethical virtue. Aristotelian virtue grows from self-mastery combined with intentionally learned skills of practice and striving with others to achieve a common purpose. Virtue expresses itself through judgment and action that flow from the integration of cognitive, emotional, perceptual, physical, and relational attributes into pattern recognition and coordinated activity to achieve a purpose. Athletic excellence embodies such integrated judgment and action. Personal, professional, and athletic achievement all express similar structural virtues. Such intentional and virtuous action grows not only from self-discipline but also from self-knowledge and the cognitive commitment to study, learn, and master complex skills. It manifests as the integrated cognitive, emotional, and physical ability to sacrifice and overcome obstacles. Athletic excellence further requires serious commitment to social community and its norms. Athletic achievement demonstrates how the virtues of self-mastery, sacrifice, courage, truthfulness, curiosity and learning, and honor and loyalty unite to support high levels of professional excellence. As a form of virtue, athletics possesses ethical worth that deserves respect and emulation.

What Athletic Achievement Can Teach About Ethics

Athletic achievement exemplifies the nature of classical ethical virtue. Aristotelian virtue grows from self-mastery combined with intentionally learned skills of practice and striving with others to achieve a common purpose. Virtue expresses itself through judgment and action that flow from the integration of cognitive, emotional, perceptual, physical and relational attributes into pattern recognition and coordinated activity to achieve a purpose Athletic excellence embodies such integrated judgment and action. Personal, professional and athletic achievement all express similar structural virtues. Such intentional and virtuous action grows not only from self-discipline but self-knowledge and the cognitive commitment to study, learn, and master complex skills. It manifests as the integrated cognitive, emotional and physical ability to sacrifice and overcome obstacles. Athletic excellence further requires serious commitment to social community and its norms. Athletic achievement demonstrates how virtues such as self-mastery, sacrifice, courage, truthfulness, curiosity and learning, and honor and loyalty among others unite to support high levels of professional excellence. As a form of virtue, athletics possesses ethical worth that deserves respect and emulation.

Becoming a Trustworthy Profession: Doing Better Than Doing Good

Social work is a relationship-based profession. For this reason, social work professionals need to be perceived as trustworthy by those with whom we work. This address outlines the nature and importance of trustworthiness and the specific issues the social work profession faces in relation to the question of trustworthiness. I argue that scandals in human services and faith-based institutions as well as pressures associated with new public management create further challenges to achieving trustworthiness. The address discusses how the profession can enhance its trustworthiness through increasing our capacity to articulate professional purpose, committing to professional excellence and to being courageous in speaking out about abuses of power that impact on the lives of people who use our services.

The Call to Excellence—No Room for Complacency

The call of the nurse is to promote, protect, and support health in all areas of life. Christian nurses are further called to imitate Jesus Christ. Yet, complacency is a common attitude among nurses. With new national standards of collecting and publicly reporting patient perceptions of care, positive nursing attitudes and excellent care are imperative to successful outcomes. What does it mean to seek professional excellence?

Se faire un nom. Les ressorts de la singularisation des critiques gastronomiques

How does one become a well-known food critic? From the study of the careers of food journalists who have achieved professional recognition at different times, this article demonstrates the existence of two main strategies for making a reputation. The first is to propose a new gastronomic aesthetic, in other words a new way of conceiving “good cooking”; the second is to emphasise professional excellence as a journalist. In both cases, it is the individual's position as an intermediary between the gastronomic and journalistic worlds that makes these strategies possible. Nonetheless, success demands work to construct the critic's singularity and have it recognised. The forms of this process differ depending on the type of distinctiveness sought: naming, theorising and disseminating, in the case of a new aesthetic; highlighting and polishing the style, when the aim is to demonstrate journalistic excellence.

O SECRETÁRIO EXECUTIVO COMO MEDIADOR DE CONFLITOS

This article aims to lead your readers to reflect on the performance of professional Executive Secretariat - SE, as a mediator in negotiation and conflict resolution in order to mitigate the existing disagreements. The problematic of search is to spread the range of action of the Executive Secretary, highlighting their professional features, including the negotiation and mediation of conflicts. Conduct that is consistent with the everyday perspectives of all business environment, because in many cases it is necessary to the intervention a professional able to appease the differences that may arise. The rationale of this study is to direct the Executive Secretary to this performance, due its multiplicity of operations, providing a reflection on the commitment that these professionals have, by their level of expertise, skill, attitudes, and productivity in the services performed , strategic inputs that affect the organizational success. About the methodological procedures adopted in this study, we opted for the deductive-explanatory method, trying to identify what factors were instrumental in its development. It concludes that the current situation in which organizations compete is necessary for professionals to meet the global market expectations, always seeking to maintain professional excellence. Thus, the SE should be empowered to act in different labor circumstances in view of the prerequisites required by the organization, planning and strategically managing the goals to be achieved.

Diversity and professionalism in the Big Four firms: Expectation, celebration and weapon in the battle for talent

The Big Four accounting firms play a crucial role in the social construction of professional identity. This study focuses on their response to the diversity agenda. We analyse the image of the new, contemporary diverse accountant that is emerging in social media spaces in the UK, US and Canada. Adopting an institutional logics approach, we examine the interplay between multiple logics, with different loci of responsibility that frame public messages about diversity, equality and inclusivity. A traditional favouring of homogeneity is giving way to heterogeneity as integral to professional success. The value of diversity, and its celebration, is growing visibly. However, the containment of diversity discourses to the language of productivity, as a branding opportunity, a client expectation, a battle for diverse talent, and successful networking raises queries about the extent of any deep change in professional logics. Rather, diversity has been institutionalised through its attachment to traditional, commercial, professional discourses and motifs. These discourses do little to indicate a rupture in the power of firm hegemony. Explicit messages strategically position diversity as an economic good and an aspect of a commercially relevant professional excellence. Implicit messages point to ambiguities and certain conditions that are attached to the new image of the diverse accountant. Public interest logics presenting diversity as a social good, prompting self-reflection by firms about behaviours, are less prominent. The findings of this study contribute to understandings of how diversity is perceived and enacted in professional settings.

E-Learning for Elementary Students: The Web 2.0 Tool Google Drive as Teaching and Learning Practice

It is a well-known fact that during recent years, the new economic and technological environment, which hasemerged from the dynamic impacts of globalization, has given rise to the increased development of information andcommunication technologies that have immensely influenced education and training all over Europe. Within thisframework, there is an ever growing need for educators worldwide to effectively prepare their students for theassociated technological and social challenges; something that in reality will constitute the springboard towardsachieving future employment and social welfare. It thus becomes evident that technology in the new pedagogies ispervasive and is used as a means for discovering and implementing the deeper learning goals, namely those relatingto the creation of new knowledge in the world. In relation to the above, the present study focuses on the impact of theNew Pedagogies as perceived through the 21st century skills prism which are highly relevant to students’ futureacademic progress so as for them to achieve, on a long-term basis, personal and professional excellence. Specifically,in the context of creating new knowledge by using the power of digital tools, a case study which explores theexploitation of the web 2.0 Google Drive tool in 6th graders’ classes (elementary school) within Project-basedlearning (PBL) framework is examined. The research is expected to prove that the involved German educator isgoing to assist her students via a promising PBL activity so as for them to realize the value of ICT in the learning process.

A New Year—Time for Reconciliation

JCPH – Vol. 68, no 1 – janvier–fevrier 2015 96 major venue for dissemination of information related to patient-centred pharmacy practice in hospitals and other collaborative health care settings in Canada and throughout the world.” The Board’s decision to publish CJHP in an electronic-only format reconciles the journal’s focus on achieving its mission to be “an academic journal that focuses on how pharmacists in hospitals and other collaborative health care settings optimize safe and effective drug use for patients in Canada and throughout the world” with reducing the economic burden of printing and postage costs. Importantly, this reconciliation of academic excellence and finances resulting in elimination of the print journal will not unsettle the significant efforts of the Editorial Board toward their plan for successful application for MEDLINE indexing in the future. In these times of economic and resource constraint, the CSHP Board continues to work diligently to provide the professional leadership and programming excellence that are important to its members. During this time, we encourage all members to get involved, to have their voices heard, and to help shape the positive changes that will occur within the organization in the future. Although we all need to reconcile ourselves to accept change, I hope everyone will consider how they can help contribute to the process of making the mission, vision, and values of CSHP compatible with the realities of our current economic and professional environment.

Clinical Leadership as a Corollary for Professional Practice andPatient Safety

The purpose of this study is to highlight the importance of clinical leadership in the overall improvement of healthcare delivery. In this paper it was argued that the leadership needed to transform the performance of hospitals and health systems must emanate predominantly from clinicians whether or not they play formal management roles. The study attempted to describe clinical leadership in a pragmatic manner, and emphasize the proof of its immense positive impact on healthcare performance. Clinical leadership has witnessed a significant modification from the previous viewpoint about leadership which represented an authority relationship to a process of influencing followers for whom one is responsible, by inspiring them, or pulling them towards the vision of organization and also the follower’s personal goal. This model of leadership is referred to as transformational leadership because such leaders transform followers. The study recommended that to enhance clinical leadership and management capacity of the clinicians in strengthening the health sector it is imperative to organize a staff/ organisational appraisal/ performance assessment of clinicians in managed care organizations as perceived by policy makers and stakeholders. Clinical leadership is yet to attain its full potential and integration in most health systems. However, it is an essential model to adopt, for both clinicians and their patients. It assures to make available a stable and reliable framework of professional excellence.

The End of Law Schools

Law school as most of us know it is doomed. Law school today – which is but a gloss on Langdell’s Harvard – attempts to prepare students to practice general law in an 1870s world. Students learn a bit about criminal law, a smattering of contracts, a little about torts, a smidgeon of property law, some of the essentials about how cases are moved through a court system. When they emerge, they typically can read and analyze cases, and are told they have learned to “think like a lawyer.” In a way, they have.But, at least in the typical required curriculum, they haven’t been taught how to negotiate, they haven’t been taught how to build teams or work within organizations, and they haven’t been taught how to work with clients. They don’t learn project management techniques and wouldn’t know how to discuss modern information management technologies. It would be considered declasse at most schools to suggest that they should learn how to market themselves, either within the organizations they will join or to the general public. They haven’t been shown how to build a balanced life in the law, one where they can achieve professional excellence and yet have a satisfying personal life. In short, they haven’t been taught how to “think like a lawyer” in many of the core areas that define successful lawyers today, and will increasingly define them tomorrow. But that’s not why law schools are doomed. Law schools are doomed for a more fundamental reason: law schools train only lawyers. Like a zombie, law schools stagger forward reliant on a vision from a past life, ignoring today’s diverse world of legal services and the pervasive changes wrought by the rise of the administrative state. To live, legal education needs to be connected to law as it is experienced today. New institutions should be designed based not on what best serves law students or legal educators, but on what best serves the needs of today’s society.This article explores why such successor institutions now make sense, and examines in broad strokes what their offerings might look like.

Academic I.D. in jeopardy: the erosion of time, professional values, and physician satisfaction.

The American public entrusts academic medicine with a varied portfolio of critical responsibilities: the thoughtful mentoring of future generations of doctors, the engagement of cutting edge discoveries, and the empathic treatment of patients with complicated illnesses. The erosion of time to perform these duties has led to an estrangement of our key professional values and thus a loss of public trust, the inability to recognize new diseases, reduced communication in our ranks, and physician dissatisfaction. Much of this is driven by an unbalanced focus on the business model of medicine, highlighting rapid patient transactions linked to professional income with financial incentives for high-volume care. Reversing the current trends requires a new type of leadership committed to long-held professional values and a recognition of what drives professional excellence. As internists and infectious diseases specialists without procedures in our practice, we are especially vulnerable to these trends.

Mentorship in Developing Transformational Leaders to Advance Health Policy: Creating a Culture of Health

Historically, mentoring in nursing has focused primarily on either moving novice nurses to a more advanced level of expertise in the clinical setting, assisting advanced practice nurses to reach professional excellence, or mentoring students and junior faculty researchers to expand evidence-based practice in nursing for colleges of nursing and nursing science. These efforts have achieved success at the individual and organizational level; however, nursing has yet to achieve a culture of mentorship within the profession.1–4 Nowhere is this gap more pronounced than in mentorship of future nurse leaders with the specific intent to develop the knowledge, skills, and political savvy to advance health policy and create better systems of care. The nursing profession is the largest segment of the nation's healthcare workforce, yet nurses remain grossly underrepresented in major leadership positions within the healthcare system and within those organizations empowered to develop and implement health policy.5,6 In order to ensure that nurses are ready to assume these leadership roles, leadership development and mentoring programs need to be made available for nurses at all levels.

Celebrating Professional Excellence: The 2015 TMS Awards

Celebrating Professional Excellence: The 2015 TMS Awards

Uses and Application of Positive Psychology in Management Education Delivery

Positive Psychology is the scientific study of what goes right in life from birth till end and at all stages in between. It is a branch of psychology which enquires into those things which make life worth living. It focuses on areas of experience mainly at three levels namely a) subjective level (subjective 'states' and positive emotions b) Individual levels (study of positive behaviours and traits which go to make what is known as 'character strength') and c) group or societal level. Study of 'what goes right' and what 'makes life worth living' must be the core of all teaching in general and management education in particular. The heart of education is education of heart itself. For management educators, exposure to Positive Psychology is almost inescapable. It deals with several concepts and techniques that help make delivery close to heart, mind and psyche of students. Positive Psychology as developed by Martin Seligman and Christopher Peterson is relatively a young science. Every teacher needs to be trained on these lines as a part of faculty development. Martin Seligman and Christopher Peterson have identified 24 virtues which make for 'character strength'. An understanding and application of at least few of those virtues will help teachers rise above the ordinary mass. Teachers who are exposed to Positive Psychology will be better equipped in dealing with their students in terms of coaching, mentoring and building muscles of responsibility. Positive psychology forays into institution building exercises too. It addresses issues like development of civic virtues, creation of healthy families, study of healthy working environments and positive communities. It helps teachers understand importance of developing the flow in themselves and the students, identifying positive emotions, positive affectivity, happiness, and so on. The full paper deals with these issues and many other and seeks to provide an insight into positive psychology for personal growth, professional excellence and organizational commitment and responsibility.

Pre-Service Physical Education Teachers’ Discourses on Learning How to Become a Teacher: [Re]Constructing a Professional Identity Based on Visual Evidence

Identity has been used as an analytical tool to capture how teachers work, learn and develop professionally. This paper takes chiefly Gee’s [1] discursive notion of identity to examine the discourses that pre-service physical education teachers used about themselves and others in discussing their teaching practices in the context of their practicum training in school. More specifically, this study aims to identify and characterize the situations of concern [roles, individuals, groups, events, meanings] to the pre-service teachers when learning to be a physical education teacher and when [re]constructing their professional identity through a dialogic relation between talk and images. Nine preservice teachers from the Faculty of Sport, University of Porto participated in this study. Data were gathered using photo elicitation interview technique: photographs and videos, produced by the participants, were used as prompts for discussion in two focus group sessions [2, 3]. We adopted an inductive approach to thematic analysis based on the Grounded Theory coding principles [4, 5], supplemented by a situational analysis [6] to map visual discourses and construct photo-essays [7] upon them. The images portrayed the participants in situations of classroom practice, learning-to-teach resources, social recognition and teachers’ mission. Their discourses upon those photographs and videos recognized the physical education teacher as a type of teacher who: [i] cares for planning duties, carefully prepares their lesson and complies with institutional roles, as planning and teaching; [ii] constantly searches for professional excellence and updates their knowledge [e.g. transferring pedagogical strategies fromother contexts]; [iii] individually/collectively reflects upon their practice, learns and shares knowledge with their colleagues, is in constant development, and builds their identity in allegiance with others [e.g. class observations and mentoring meetings]; and [iv] extends their school practice beyond the instruction tasks and has the power to project and exercise higher roles [e.g. extracurricular roles].

Nursing and philanthropy: a partnership to advance professional excellence and exceptional care.

Michelle A. Janney, PhD, RN, NEA-BC, 2013 AONE President, Senior Vice President, and Wood-Prince Family Chief Nurse Executive at Northwestern Memorial Hospital, discusses the impact of engaging institutional leadership in nursing philanthropic and strategic priorities and the importance of developing a culture of philanthropy that permeates the organization and encourages participation from all levels. The article highlights key outcomes of Northwestern Memorial Hospital's collective efforts to build a culture of philanthropy that prioritizes nursing as consequential to the mission of the organization. The outcomes demonstrate how such a culture provides a critical platform for creating opportunities that enable nurses to be indispensable partners in a shared commitment to the highest-quality, scientifically driven, personalized care.

Making it better

Purpose – The purpose of this article is to describe how a leading medical centre used an industrial methodology to develop employees, improve operational effectiveness and reduce costs. Design/methodology/approach – It presents a case study describing the journey undertaken by the University Medical Centre Groningen (UMCG) in the Northern Netherlands as – in partnership with IBIS uVA – it embedded Lean Six Sigma (LSS) as an integral part of the hospital’s culture, structure and procedures. Findings – Back in 2007, the UMCG knew they had problems that were beyond their control: the growing demands of an ageing population; fewer nurses; increasing costs of medical materials; and financial cuts made by the Dutch government. In spite of these difficulties, they were determined to maintain and improve service delivery to patients, academia and research. To do this, they collaborated with IBIS UvA – part of the Amsterdam Business School. The idea was to train staff in the implementation of the LSS process – something IBIS has been doing for more than 20 years – in industry and in healthcare. Practical implications – It shows how an evidence-based approach to reviewing and improving procedures not only resulted in more efficient use of resources, but also improved the patient experience. Social implications – It draws attention to the potentially unsettling effects of widespread changes in working practices on employees. It also explains how a comprehensive communication strategy was used to deal with this risk. Originality/value – It highlights the use of a methodology traditionally associated with cost reduction in industry as a way to achieve professional development and operational excellence in healthcare.

The Arab Society for Forensic Sciences and Forensic Medicine ( ASFSFM ) : Bringing Together Regional and International Expertise

Naif Arab University for Security Sciences (NAUSS) is dedicated to the advancement and dissemination of academic and professional excellence across all disciplines of security sciences in the Arab world. The University has made great advances in the successful development and refinement of the knowledge and skills of Arab security personnel in these disciplines – and most importantly in the field of forensic sciences.