Contacts & References

last update: 2017 Apr [3 new papers added - see Google drive link at bottom].

I ('M') am happy to deliver talks about Values Intelligence/Human Behaviour & any aspect of the Values Journey to large or small groups/seminars/educational organizations wherever I am in Australia area free or, if sponsored, anywhere in the world. I'm sure Dr Dave could be tempted too 8-D

Contacts:

If you want more information on the values journey or more, please...

email Dr Dave Robinson, Principal [Lecturer/Consultant/Mentor/Facilitator], Academy of Business Acumen, Queensland, Australia.

Academy of Business Acumen BLOG

email "M" Goleby [site editor/owner], Lecturer/Consultant/Mentor/Facilitator [T/A: Strategic Thinking and Responses [STaR] goleby.strategic@gmail.com] or phone

Australia +61 403 79 3240 [somewhere on the Australian seaboard on SV Bacchanalia - a 16m ketch]

Robinson, DA (2008) ‘Keeping pace with change in SMEs: creating and maintaining congruence and consistency in SMEs in transition economies’, Int. J. Entrepreneurship and Innovation Management, Vol. 8, No. 3, pp.272–285.

Robinson, DA, Goleby, M, & Hosgood, N (2007), Why Orange doesn’t fit well inside Blue – can the corporate entrepreneurship oxymoron be tamed?, for presentation at the European Foundation for Management Development (EFMD) 37^th Entrepreneurship, Innovation and Small Business (EISB) Conference – Ljubljana 12 -14 September 2007

David Robinson, Michiel Erasmus, and Michael Schaper (2007) Making Sense of Dollars and Cents: A problem-based learning entrepreneurial business management simulation, Journal of Training and Management Development Methods

Business finance has become increasingly sophisticated and today there is a wide range of ratios that can be used as management tools. Recent evidence, however, suggests most business owner-managers are absorbed in the day-to-day running of their business, with little knowledge of how financial analysis can be practically applied to help them choose appropriate future strategies. This paper introduces a simulation exercise that can be used to help educate participants how to use limited financial information to decide which business strategies will be most effective as part of an ongoing process of business improvement.

David A. Robinson, Michael Harvey, and Mark Yupitun (2007) Destructive leadership in family businesses: Modelling social exchange between generations

David A. Robinson and Kuang S. Yeh (2007) Managing Ethical Dilemmas in Non-Profit Organizations

Robinson, DA, Davidson, P, van der Mescht, H & Court, P (2006), How entrepreneurs deal with ethical challenges – an application of the Business Ethics Synergy Star (BESS) technique, Journal of Business Ethic, Volume 71, Issue, Issue 4, pp. 411-423

David Robinson (2005) Resolving Dilemmas in Closely Held Businesses, International Journal of Coaching in Organizations, volume 3, issue 2, pp22-26

The closely held organisation is defined in its simplest form as one where the owner-manager role is vested in the same person or persons. This means that it is often difficult to discern where business ends and family starts, and vice versa. Owners-managers of closely held organisations are frequently faced with dilemmas under circumstances where they are compelled to make choices between alternatives, when none appear appropriate, or when more than one appears equally desirable. When a business imperative demands one course of action and their personal ethic, principles or values, demand another, owner-managers may find themselves 'between a rock and a hard place', so to speak. This article explores some of the dilemmas they face and offers a way of articulating a dilemma and resolving it, by using what is known as The Business Ethics Synergy Star (BESS).

David Robinson, Hennie van der Mescht, and Jonathan Lancaster (2003) Ethics beyond the code of conduct –understanding the ethical dilemmas of entrepreneurs, Meditari Accountancy Research, Volume 11, 2003, pp. 113-128

Conference Papers

Dave Robinson & Mark Boulle (2012?), Overcoming Organizational Impediments to Strong Sustainability Management, Honolulu conference [?]

With frequent corporate collapses and global market failures, the financial and economic systems of the Western world are coming under ever increasing scrutiny. These events, and a deeper introspection, call into question the roles played by firms in embracing sustainability practices. A firm's resources are combined to apply its unique capabilities to the challenges of the external environment, industry forces and its competitors. In so doing firms must meet the twin strategic objectives of maximizing shareholder returns to create a sustainable future (for the firm) AND maintaining a responsible approach to sustainable development in areas impacted by the firm.

Whereas resources may be classified as tangible or intangible, it is the intangible resources, including the firm's reputation, organizational effectiveness, and innovation propensity that comprise the foundation for sustainable competitive advantage. The development of business-level culture has been portrayed as a six-step journey (Robinson, 2007). Systemic constraints may inhibit the development of organizational culture just as personality disorders may afflict individuals. It is asserted that the so-called big five individual personality traits (McCrae and Costa, 2003) can be related to three categories of organizational pathology (Robinson, 2010), which in turn impede effective sustainability management practices.

Additionally, it is proposed that sustainability practices in firms may take one of three forms, namely non-sustainability, weak sustainability, and strong sustainability. Whilst it is clear that all firms ultimately need to embrace a culture that supports and encourages strong sustainability, to date very few have managed to do so, being either unwilling or unable to go beyond the non-sustainable or weak sustainability levels.

This paper relates the importance of organizational wellness as a prerequisite for strong sustainability. In so doing it forms a bridge across the fields of organizational psychology and business sustainability by relating the problems encountered in firms as they face the challenges of consistently having to align day-to-day managerial practices in such a way as to form business cultures that are congruent with strong sustainability. Inconsistency or mal-alignment of practices, over-emphasis on the negative aspects of management style, and/or an unwillingness to adapt are impediments to the adoption of an effective sustainability strategy.

David Robinson & Mark Boulle (2012) Levels of sustainability, corporate decision making and the value of culture in organisations. Paper submitted at Gold Coast Sustainability Conference [?] 2010

This paper relates the importance of CEO decision making and healthy culture as a prerequisite for sustainability in the organisation. Further, it is argued an excessive fixation on the accumulation of company profits can lead an unsustainable course for organisations and the broader community.

Three levels of sustainability are identified: non-sustainability, weak sustainability and strong sustainability. The challenge is for companies to meet two strategic objectives: maximising shareholder returns to create a sustainable future for the entity, and maintaining a responsible approach to sustainable development in areas impacted by the firm.

Key to the direction an organisation takes and its position on sustainability, are the decisions made by senior management and influential chief executive officers (Robinson & Boulle 2012) in particular. This article draws on secondary research from a survey of 56 Australian CEO’s in The Weekend Australian newspaper (Durie 2011), to gain an insight into the areas of concern forefront in their minds.

In particular, evidence is sought for CEO attention to financial, growth, sustainability, environmental and societal issues. As hypothesised, financial considerations were the most mentioned responses, thus indicating a focus on the bottom line. Further, this paper discusses the influence of CEO characteristics on organisational culture, as well as the influence of culture on developing sustainability practices.

Dave Robinson and Brad Nikolic (2011), A Stairway to the Stars: Monitoring Sustainability Performance in SMBs. A paper submitted to the Westlake Conference on SMBs, Hangzhou, China. October 2011.

This article proposes a framework that can be used, or modified for use, as a mechanism to measure, evaluate and monitor progress in business sustainability. It draws upon previous change management models, such as ‘Management by Objectives’ (Lynch, 1977; Felix and Riggs, 1983) and ‘Balanced Scorecard’ (Kaplan and Norton, 1995), proposing a conceptual framework for the monitoring of business sustainability. The framework allows sustainability improvement to be monitored by means of a composite sustainability index derived from specific metrics appropriate to a range of prioritised strategic objectives. It then discusses the necessity for such a mechanism to be sufficiently robust in respect of seven contextual issues. It recommends that a firm’s choice of sustainability performance measures and their relative priorities should be aligned with global, societal, external, industry, organisational, leadership and individual-personal contexts.

Dr David Robinson (2010) ‘Systemic Constraints in the Development of Business-level Culture for Strategic Sustainable Competitive Advantage’. ResearchExpo 2010 Gold Coast, Australia

DA Robinson (2008) Entrepreneurial ethics – a great mozaic (Conceptual Paper) presented at World Ethics Conference in Hong Kong (Dec. 2008)

Investigating the ethical paradigms and presenting an Ethical Algorithm for leaders

DA Robinson (2008) Sad, Bad or Mad: Common Personality Disorders in Firms, (Presented at Asia Pacific Conference on Personality and Individual Differences [ACPID], November 2008)

Robinson, D. A. 2010. The mad, the bad and the sad - personality disorders in firms. In R. Hicks (Ed.), Personality and Individual Differences: Current Directions. Varsity Lakes: Bond University Press.

Personality disorders in individuals present as inappropriate thinking patterns, behaviours and emotional responses. The same may be true for firms in which day-to-day practices are mal-aligned and incongruent with their phase of development. A firm’s journey to maturity entails six steps, each relying on the alignment of ten dimensions. Personality disorders occur when the firm harbours practices from the first two steps, thereby limiting its effective transition. The way to prevent personality disorder in the firm (organizational wellness) is to have a clearly articulated aspirational vision for the firm’s future, and then constantly monitor the firm’s practices to ensure that they adhere to the articulated values and apply corrective measures as and when needed to maintain congruency and consistency.

David Robinson and Mahesha Goleby (2008) Values bottlenecks: Are you strangling your own corporate vision? (A paper for presentation at West Lake International Conference on Small-Medium Business on 25-28 October, 2008).

Entrepreneurial activities require congruency of the deep-seated and often implicit values within organizations to their vision. This paper investigates the effect of incongruency and inconsistency of worldviews at different developmental stages of business practice and ways of identifying the issues found for rectification.

David Robinson and Mahesha Goleby (2007) Why Orange doesn’t fit well inside Blue – can the corporate entrepreneurship oxymoron be tamed? (for presentation at the European Foundation for Management Development (EFMD) 37^th Entrepreneurship, Innovation and Small Business (EISB) Conference – Ljubljana 12 -14 September 2007)

Leadership paradigms affect the way leaders go about defining their roles as leaders and applying themselves to the responsibilities of leadership. Entrepreneurship may be seen as one type of leadership orientation, namely that of leading a business venture. Modern day business is underpinned by a particular set of values, which in their turn are associated with ways of thinking, world views, or paradigms. The intersection of the two paradigms – values and leadership – creates a psychological ‘space’ or ‘new paradigm’ in which entrepreneurship may be situated. The paper questions:

1. In what ways does the entrepreneurial organization differ from a corporate one?

2. How does the entrepreneurial culture evolve and sustain?

David Robinson and Michael Harvey (2007) Global Leadership in a Culturally Diverse World

Robinson, D. A. & Harvey, M. 2008. Global leadership in a culturally diverse world. Management Decision, 46(3): 466-480.

The acceleration of globalization has created a chaotic state of change as businesses struggle to adapt to new paradigms of leadership. The established tried and tested approaches may no longer be effective in a global context. Globalization demands new approaches and the challenge is to find the appropriate leadership imperatives in response to the changing problems of existence. This article addresses the research question: What new skills should be adopted by business leaders to empower them to deal with these new multicultural challenges occurring during globalization. The relationship between follower and leader is critical during these transitional phases. A model is introduced that integrates psycho-social elements of leadership and organizational effectiveness, such as conditioning, power, duty, dependence, and ethics. The model then provides a basis for developing appropriate leadership practices that support and enhance corporate culture. The development of values within the organization, that is to say its culture, can be plotted, as it progresses through the identifiable value stations, governed by an essential stepwise progression. Leadership effectiveness demands the pre-emption of subsequent steps and facilitation of followers’ ability to adapt. These imperatives have given rise to the formulation of a values-based leadership algorithm (VBLA).

Robinson, DA 2007, Exploiting Market Opportunities and Conquering Threats using the Strategy Star technique, (Paper prepared for presentation at the 2007 ICSM Conference on Strategic Management – Entrepreneurial Strategy Innovation and Sustainable Development, Sichuan University, ChengDu, P.R. China. April 19 to 20, 2007.)

Strategies are developed to guide an organisation toward its goal. Sometimes the organisation adopts tried and tested strategies and thereby simply does more of the same year after year. When major strategic change is eventually required to keep pace with the competitive nature of the market-place or in the light of new technology, generic strategies might not always suffice. What is then needed is a way to transcend the existing paradigms of strategy development, i.e. a process by which management effort can be focussed upon using the firm’s established strengths to exploit perceived market opportunities and conquer external threats, while concurrently improving its internal weaknesses.

Dimitrios Efthimiou and David Robinson (2006) Creating Disruptive Strategies For Small and Medium Businesses using the 'Terms' Technique (Presentation delivered at the 8th

West Lake International Conference on Small and Medium Business held in Hangzhou, China, 15-17 October 2006.)

It is now well-recognized that in addition to the traditional industry-based view of competitive advantatge (Porter 1980) and resource-based view of competitive advantage (Penrose 1959, Barney 1991, Dollinger 1999), there exists the disruptiion-based view of entrepreneurial strategy leading to competitive advantage (Hamel & Prahalad 1989, Hamel & Prahalad 1994, D’Aveni 1994, Eisenhardt (1989). This is based on the seminal notion of ‘creative destruction’ (Schumpeter 1939). According to this strategy, an economically-destabilising industry strategy may changes the rules of the game so that a Small and Medium Businesses (‘SMB’) can grow to overtake the largest players. Whilst some scholars have explored the value creation potential of entrepreneurial management of resources for firms (Barney & Arikan 2001, Barney 1991), few have developed a framework for systematic formulation. ‘Creative destruction’, inherently requires creativity. Hence, creativity enhancing techniques should assist in developing such strategy.

David Robinson (2006) Resolving Ethical Dilemmas in Small Business (Pre-publication print of a presentation delivered at the 8th West Lake International Conference on Small and Medium Business held in Hangzhou, China, 15-17 October 2006.)

Managers and small business owners are often at a disadvantage when faced with an ethical business dilemma. Whereas their corporate counterparts may be guided by a company code or an established corporate culture that safeguards them from having to make morally significant decisions alone, the small business owner-manager has no such backstop. At the very least, corporate managers have a person higher up the hierarchy that they can refer to, but the small business owner-manager must often face the stark reality of a dilemma all alone. Under circumstances of intense competition and the need for expediency, conflicting priorities arise and the entrepreneur may be faced with certain dilemmas. It may even be that entrepreneurial managers may sometimes inadvertently overlook the ethical elements of business decisions, or worse still, choose to ignore them. Recognising a business ethical dilemma requires a certain basic awareness of ethics. Dealing confidently with a dilemma requires far more, namely the assurance that one is able to concisely define the dilemma and then resolve it appropriately and amicably. In seeking to do so, entrepreneurs must usually rely on their own judgment to determine an appropriate outcome for all concerned.

Since moral choices have a significant impact on business decisions, and given the fact that entrepreneurs usually have to make those choices without advice from people well-versed in ethics, it is important to provide them with a technique that can be used effectively in a wide range of circumstances. Hence, this paper illustrates the use of the ‘Business Ethics Synergy Star (BESS)’ (Robinson, 2006) as a tool to help define and resolve ethical dilemmas in small business. This research paper examines how entrepreneurs experience and deal with these dilemmas. The research is based on interviews with seven entrepreneurs in established service-oriented ventures, which gave rise to twenty-six dilemmas.

David Robinson (2006) The Ethical Orientations of Entrepreneurially-inclined Managers

The entrepreneurially-inclined manager is defined as one who is an established manager and who has entrepreneurial inclinations, whether already realised or not. This means either that they are currently managing their own business or considering entrepreneurship as a future endeavour. Either way, they are self-proclaimed entrepreneurs in the psychological and/or behavioural sense of the term.

As business-related responsibilities typically remain his/her priority at all times there is usually little time for any matters that fall outside of the realm of business ownership and management. This usually results in the entrepreneur being totally absorbed by work-related issues, which makes it difficult to discern where business ends and other aspects of his/her life fit in.

As entrepreneurs continuously pursue opportunity, they may be faced with opportunities where they are compelled to make choices between alternatives. They typically face aggressive competition in the marketplace and extra-ordinary financial risks. Sometimes none of the choices appear appropriate to them, or more than one appears equally desirable. In addition, they are usually unable or unwilling to consult with others about the decision, so they must rely on their own judgment to determine ‘what is right’.

It is hypothesised that entrepreneurially-inclined managers will tend to be more biased toward consequentialism than deontology as a basis for ethical decision. The research furthermore wishes to gauge the significance of virtues and personal values in the decision process, and to consider the effect of cultural differences on ethical orientation.

David Robinson and Jieru Zhou (2006) Are traditional Western ethical theories still relevant in a cross-cultural and entrepreneurial business world? (Pre-publication print of a conference presentation, World Business Ethics Forum 2006 held in Hong Kong and Macau, 1-3 November 2006.)

Ethics is an area of business largely left to the imagination. Typically, managers are guided by the company code or culture, or at least have a person higher up the hierarchy that they can refer to when faced with a decision containing ethical dimensions. Entrepreneurial managers, being opportunistic and often working alone, may overlook or even ignore the ethical elements of business decisions.

Under circumstances of intense competition and the need for expediency, conflicting priorities arise and the entrepreneur may be faced with certain dilemmas. In seeking to resolve these, entrepreneurs must usually rely on their own judgment to determine ‘what is right’.

Since moral choices have a significant impact on business decisions, and given the fact that entrepreneurs usually make those choices without requesting advice from people well-versed in ethics, it is important to know whether or not they are likely to have ethical bias or particular orientation.

Traditional Western ethical theories recognise three bases for ethical choice, namely virtues, rules and/or consequences. This paper assesses the ethical orientations of managers with entrepreneurial intentions by means of a questionnaire administered to Master of Business Administration candidates in China and Australia, who either have or do not have the intention to become entrepreneurs.

David A. Robinson, Mahesha Goleby, and Neville Hosgood (2006) Entrepreneurship as a Values and Leadership Paradigm (Pre-publication print of a presentation delivered at the Fourth AGSE International Entrepreneurship Research Exchange, held 7 to 9 February 2007 at Queensland University of Technology.)

Paradigms are ontological orientations that influence the way we construct our realities. Leadership paradigms therefore affect the way leaders go about defining their roles as leaders and applying themselves to the responsibilities of leadership. Entrepreneurship may be seen as one type of leadership orientation, namely that of leading a business venture. As such, the entrepreneurial process relates to a particular leadership paradigm. In addition, modern day business is underpinned by a particular set of values, which in their turn are associated with ways of thinking, world views, or paradigms. The intersection of the two paradigms – values and leadership – creates a psychological ‘space’ or ‘new paradigm’ in which entrepreneurship may be situated. The paper aims to position entrepreneurship within a leadership and values paradigm, thereby providing a view of the emergent discipline that may be seen as complementary to traditional economic models. It is envisaged that an increased understanding of the psychological tensions that exist in entrepreneurial firms will equip emergent and nascent entrepreneurs, corporate managers wishing to evoke a more entrepreneurial culture, and academics who teach and research in the fields of entrepreneurship, with the ability to nurture entrepreneurial talent

David Robinson and Jeremy Hayllar (2005) Assessing the team role preferences of would-be entrepreneurs (December 2005 Pre-print publication of a presentation delivered at Third AGSE International Entrepreneurship RESEARCH Exchange held in Auckland, New Zealand, 7-10 February 2006.)

Dr. Meredith Belbin’s textbook ‘Making teams work’ identifies nine distinct team role types. Although all team role types are present in every individual, each person has a natural preference for one or more team role. Much has been written about the personality traits of ‘would-be entrepreneurs’, but little is said about their team role preferences. As Dr. Belbin has determined a set of norms that depict the spread of team role preferences across theUnited Kingdom, it is now possible to analyse individuals’ team role preferences and then compare individuals against those norms.

Robinson, D, van der Mescht, H & Lancaster, J 2003, ”Ethics beyond the code of conduct –understanding the ethical dilemmas of entrepreneurs”, Meditari Accountancy Research, Volume 11, 2003, pp. 113-128

Entrepreneurs choose a particular way of life with the dual aim of maximising profit and gaining a sense of self-satisfaction. In these endeavours, entrepreneurs typically live with the threat of competition and the risk of business failure, while attempting to do their best within the limitations of their resources. This qualitative study first examines existing theories of ethics and ways of applying business ethics and thereafter investigates entrepreneurs’ actual experiences by means of in-depth interviews and the use of phenomenology. It finds that entrepreneurs are not guided by any specific code of conduct, and must decide for themselves what is right. It describes the entrepreneurial business ethic, some of the types of dilemmas that they experience and the methods that they have developed to deal with the dilemmas

Books

David A Robinson (2010) The Synergizing Principles, First published in Australia by Free Ride Surfing, 2010 - available via Amazon

We are the energy we are living. Energy is as infinite as the possibilities it inhabits. It is us; it connects us and engulfs us. All that is required is that we be an authentic conduit for the universal energy we carry and inhabit – no more, no less. Trying to be something we are not is futile – we cannot fool the Universe. Continuous change is inevitable, but not pre-destined. We choose, and our choices have consequences, beyond the constraints of this time and space. Yet the Universe is at once evolving and self-correcting, by the sanction of the seven secrets revealed to you in this book.

Have you ever wondered why things don’t go your way, why you sometimes seem to be working so hard for such little reward, or why people react to you in ways that don’t seem to make sense to you? If so then you are entirely normal, because the key to these and other anomalies doesn’t lie in human understanding but in something far greater.

This book will reveal to you the universal principles that drive and guide everything that happens in the world, including all the things we cannot see, feel, hear, smell or taste. If you are one of the people that intuitively knows that a world exists beyond the limitations of our physical senses, this book is for you. If you’ve never quite fathomed the rhyme or reason behind life and death, or if you’ve experienced any confusion or religious pre-conditioning, this book represents an opportunity for you to see life from another perspective. While it is a perspective that only the Universe, in its greatness, actually experiences in totality, it is one in which we are integral participants, perhaps willingly or perhaps not, and probably unwittingly.

Truth exists not in that which we acquire by indoctrination, but that which we intuitively feel. It is that which connects us unwaveringly to the source of all life, the source of all matter, the source of all that we sense and don’t sense. It is, unashamedly, Energy. The reader should decide upfront not be limited by the things you think you already know, and be willing to consider something new, if you truly want to discover the universal principles governing everything we think, say and do.

David Robinson (2010) The Seven Secrets of Synchronicity, first published in Australia by Free Ride Surfing, 2010 - available via Amazon

David Robinson (2008) Glimpses: A reflective look at life through a series of short stories (released as an e-book)

There once lived a soul, who journeyed on this planet.

He was a learned man, through his own sweat and toil over the many years he had been a student of life. Yet he was reluctant to leave the world of his youth, a world of dreams, of sunshine and surf.

His was a world where thoughts filled every moment, where the occasional respites of physical inactivity served to usher in waves of choices, as endless debates, internal dialogues, were fuelled by indecision combined, paradoxically, with an innate sense of urgency. This goal-oriented achiever seemed compelled to pause every now and then as if needing to explore whatever options appeared before him, like a marathon-running, hundred metre sprinter, pausing to smell the roses.

And he questioned life itself, and its meaning. And as he questioned, he formed opinions that were different from others’, for his opinions were original, not regurgitated. Through continuous discussions between the protagonist-optimist and the antagonist-pessimist of his dual-self, he engaged in synergy-seeking intellectual turmoil. And with the passage of time and the wisdom of his own reflections, he became a master of the complex web of dichotomies that defined his very existence.

Thus, he evolved, not as one man, but as many. And he lived many lives, in one

David Robinson (2007) The DaWei Laws

David Robinson (2005) Destiny: The reflections of a surfing professor, Free Ride Surfing.

Professor Robinson's doctoral thesis:

A phenomenological study of how South African entrepreneurs experience and deal with ethical dilemmas, Rhodes University.

Papers for uploading...

links below or find most here too https://drive.google.com/open?id=0BxDkS-TpuBiKakMxQUY4RUV5TWM

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based on the work of Dr Dave Robinson, Prof Mgt GC CQU (recently Prof Entrepreneurship Bond Uni, Australia) et al. as told by Mahesha 'M' Goleby (c) 2008