This review paper argues that the institutions and sites of professionalization projects and regulatory processes matter. The institutions and locations where regulation takes place affect both the ...outcome of the regulatory process and the legitimacy of the rules and practices produced. Changes in regulatory processes affect opportunities for democratic control and legitimacy. A common position in the accounting literature is to examine both the process of professionalization and accounting and audit regulation within and around professional associations and related organizations, such as standard setting bodies and regulatory agencies. We argue that professional firms are increasingly important in professionalization and regulatory processes and have not received the attention that they warrant: an examination of the multi-national professional service firms (currently known as the Big 4) can enhance an understanding of professionalization and professional regulation. We suggest that these are important sites where accounting practices are themselves standardized and regulated, where accounting rules and standards are translated into practice, where professional identities are mediated, formed and transformed, and where important conceptions of personal, professional and corporate governance and management are transmitted.
This paper traces the main lines of evolution of the organization of professional work. The argument is illustrated with material on the case of doctors and hospitals. While market and hierarchy ...principles have become progressively more salient in professional work, we argue that, in parallel, the community principle has been growing more influential, too. We further argue that professional community is mutating from a Gemeinschaft, craft guild form, via Gesellschaft forms, toward a new, collaborative form. This evolution, however, is a difficult one, and the outcome is uncertain. We identify some implications for future research.
This article examines practice diffusion in an environment where competing logics exist, specifically investigating how trustee and performance logics that were rooted in different locations (Boston ...and New York) led to variation in how mutual funds established contracts with independent professional money management firms. This focus on competing logics redirects institutional research away from isomorphism and the segregation of institutional and technical forces and toward an appreciation of how multiple forms of rationality underlie change in organizational fields. Implications for the dominant two-stage institutional model of diffusion and for research on institutions, organizations, and professions are discussed.
► We examine the residential preferences of the ‘creative class’ in Dublin. ► We critique the focus on ‘soft’ amenity-based factors within the ‘creative class’ thesis. ► We illustrate the continued ...importance of classic location factors. ► We highlight the importance of factors such as dwelling costs and proximity to place of employment. ► We also show the continued relevance of the life-cycle in residential choice.
The desire for ‘vibrant’, ‘bohemian’ neighbourhoods forms a focal point of the amenity preferences of Richard Florida’s ‘creative class’ thesis. Here, a vibrant street culture, which includes cafes and restaurants spilling onto the pavement, is implied as being of key importance in the selection of a residential area for creative and knowledge workers. Drawing on quantitative and qualitative data, this paper examines the residential preferences of the ‘creative class’ in Dublin, Ireland. The results illustrate the continued importance of classic factors in residential decision-making, including housing cost, accessibility and travel-time to place of employment. Moreover, the results also illustrate how changes in the life-cycle, including the decision to have a family, have a direct influence on residential location choice. While there is a tendency for younger workers to select the city centre, older workers predominantly opt to live in suburban areas with good transport connections to the city centre or their place of employment.
This study examines the differences in mental health experiences of workers in professional and non-professional roles, with a particular focus on the influence of gender. We examine: i) the ...perceived mental health of a subset of professional workers including accounting, academia, dentistry, medicine, nursing, and teaching, chosen because they represent different gender composition and sectors; and ii) work stress and work absences. Statistical analyses were applied to data from the Canadian Community Health Survey and a related Mental Health and Well-Being survey. Those in the selected professions reported better mental health, higher job satisfaction, and a lower prevalence of mental disorders, but higher self-perceived life and work stress compared to workers in non-professional roles. Workers in these professions reported higher job security and higher job control, but also higher psychological demands. Women in these professions showed significantly higher physical exertion and lower job authority and higher rates of work absences.
Offering an integrated framework, we sought to explain why and how professionals who self-initiate expatriation repatriate. We measured host country "pull" and "push," home country pull, "shocks," ...and the intention to repatriate of 546 Australians and, a year later, their home country job search during the preceding year and whether they had repatriated. We found that host country pull (weak embeddedness), home country pull, and shocks explained their intention to repatriate and that shocks also played a key role in explaining job search and repatriation. The mediation of host country embeddedness, home country pull, and shocks by intention, and of intention by job search, explained how repatriation occurred.
This study of full-time managers and professionals examined whether variables selected from theories of the psychology of gender as well as identity, boundary, and role theories explained effects of ...sex on work-to-family conflict and "positive spillover." Women experienced higher positive spillover than men, primarily because they were higher in femininity. Although women did not experience different levels of conflict than men, individuals who scored higher on measured family role salience, which was positively related to femininity, experienced lower levels of conflict. Role segmentation not only reduced conflict but also had the unintended consequence of reducing positive spillover.