The central theoretical argument of this paper is that educational leadership and organisational development and change in educational institutions in developing countries will not be effective unless school leaders are aware of the challenges posed by contextual factors that might have an impact on their professional activities. The article…

We explored the relationships between social contexts and factors that promoted and inhibited curriculum change at two universities. Thirty interviews were analysed using a general inductive approach to identify factors and forces in three social contexts (lecturer, departmental, and institutional). Curriculum change was characterised by six…

New Zealand, like many countries, faces the challenge of building and sustaining an educated population. Particular challenges are posed by the need to educate an increasing proportion of the population to higher levels in order to support the growth of a modern skills and knowledge economy, as opposed to an economy built on low-cost labour and…

Using quantitative data from school principals (SPs) and after-school program directors (ASDs) in 37 primary schools and after-school programs (ASPs) in Switzerland, this study examines the Perceived Professional Culture of Collaboration (PPCoC) as an aspect of school culture and professionalism of educational staff. The group comparisons confirm…

Purpose: This study intends to investigate the extent to which the Sri Lanka Army can be described as a learning organization. Design/methodology/approach: The main tool of analysis used was the Dimensions of the Learning Organization Questionnaire (DLOQ) developed by Marsick and Watkins, with the exclusion of the sections on financial and…

Everybody wants quality teachers in schools. How are such teachers developed? In this article a model is presented that describes four contexts crucial to the preparation of teachers: the personal, the university, the practicum and the employment contexts. The ways in which these different contexts can and should work together in the education and…

Faculty development has been evolving in focus and form over the past five decades. Originally organized around sabbatical leaves, faculty development now offers a wide array of programs and involves a growing body of highly professional, deeply dedicated professionals. As both faculty members and faculty developers with over fifty collective…

The purpose of this article is to present a specific approach to the practice of action research "in complex organisations". Clearly, there are many approaches to the challenge of doing action research in organisations; approaches that are, and also must be, quite context dependent and specific. But my purpose is neither to give an…

This article reports on an investigation of the impact of shared leadership on organizational citizenship behaviour among faculty members in Jordanian public universities. A sample of 558 faculty members employed by three public universities in Jordan participated in the study. The results indicated that shared leadership is moderately practised…

Purpose: The aim of this article is to challenge the concept of "the learning organization" as unproblematic and inherently good. Design/methodology/approach: The research looked at how teachers--as an example of public sector professionals in a work organization that claims to be a learning organization--view their conditions for…

Background: Professional commitment from teachers requires more than contractual compliance as personal and professional values are integral to teaching practice. Secondary school teachers are expected to act as role models and demonstrate positive attributes and attitudes in an evolving educational context. Little is known about how they…

This account tells the story of the development of an action learning culture in the BBC between 2002 and 2007. From its early beginnings as a sporadic, unsystematic intervention with a small number of leaders scattered throughout the organisation, action learning has now become embedded in our approach to the way we develop our leaders. In this…

The last decade identity is often and very fruitfully conceptualized as "narrative identity." Neither for individuals nor for groups is identity a given beforehand anymore. On the contrary, identity has to be constructed in an inductive way continuously. Three qualitative research methods are applied to explore in an inductive way the…

Distributed leadership (DL) is an emerging form of power distribution in schools which extends authority and influence to groups or individuals in a way which is at least partly contrary to hierarchical arrangements. In this article, the author presents the findings of his study that aimed to answer two questions: (1) What do headteachers do to…

Purpose: This paper seeks to explore claims about the changing nature of careers by focusing on how information technology (IT) workers enact careers in the context of Nigeria. The theoretical framework guiding this research is that societal context (social structure and institutions) has an influence on the career patterns exhibited by…