Modern corporations, like the mythical hero Oedipus Rex, are afflicted by a refusal to acknowledge the truth that is almost psychopathic. This is according to Leon Gettler, who argues in Organisations Behaving Badly that the spirit of this Greek king to turn a blind eye to the bleeding obvious, is indicative of how many national and international corporations run their empires. This fascinating, and at times humorous exploration of big business, parallels Greek mythology. Like a chief executive confronted with news that threatens the established order, not to mention his job, Oedipus flies into a rage and begins to accuse his brother-in-law, Creon, of plotting to overthrow him. You get the picture? With fascinating and insightful explorations into such organisations as HIH, OneTel, Parmalat, James Hardie and even the role of the Church and the education system, Leon Gettler leaves no stone unturned and sets out to prove that organisations have been behaving badly since ancient civilisation. Leon Gettler is the Economics staff writer at The Age.

Organizational science profits from taking new perspectives using a simple model to understand why behaviors of particular types occur within them. This volume provides readers with a rich source of casestudies and empirical studies of the role played by the interaction between individual actors, organizational contexts, and the actual behaviors being performed the actors. These chapters each seek to describe how these three interact in to create organizational practices with negative effects on either internal members of the organization or external stakeholders (e.g,. clients). The chapters provide insight into how organizations may control these negative behaviors with basic Human Resource Management practices. It is this volume’s hope that these chapters may provide insight into the important role these three factors plays in understanding negative organizational behavior within organizations across the world.

Corporate social responsibility (CSR) has become an increasingly heated topic since the 1980s. This title proposes that the concept of Corporate Social Irresponsibility (CSI) offers a better theoretical platform to avoid the vagueness, ambiguity, arbitrariness and mysticism of CSR.

There is evidence of a movement from 'a culture of narcissism' toward elements of a perverse culture. This book brings forth and examines the evidence as it reveals itself through one of the major institutions of our time: the work organisation. Corporations and organisations for work are major centers of social activity. In many senses they provide a critical source of identity for their members, just as do families and religions.The examination of corporations and organisations gives access to most of the dynamics operating within our society and reveals some of the deeper assumptions upon which our lives are based. To call them simply a reflection of human social organisation and proclivity, perhaps is to underrate the importance of themselves shaping today's psyche. To look at the formation of perverse practice, structure and culture within organisations is also to look at that development in society more broadly. The book first examines the nature of perversity and its presence in corporate and organisational life.

Behaviour that involves an abuse of a teacher's position of trust or a breach of the standards of propriety is regarded as misconduct and may lead to a teacher being barred from the teaching profession. This book offers the school leader advice on making decisions arising from misconduct or alleged misconduct of their staff. It addresses issues such as: how to deal with an allegation of a teacher's sexual misconduct how to judge when a relationship between a pupil and teacher becomes abusive how to decide what to do about drug abuse how to support an 'outed' gay or lesbian teacher how to decide when private matters become public ones how to deal with the media. Often there are no clear-cut answers, or easy solutions, but this book will raise the dilemmas and explain the employment and criminal law in jargon-free language. School leaders have to make important decisions about such incidents, considering their responsibility to their staff, to the local community, and to their pupils. Leadership training rarely includes exposure to these issues, but most people working in schools may have to face them at some point in their career. Teachers Behaving Badly draws on real cases and explores the dilemmas faced, offering practical and legal advice to help school leaders prepare for such critical incidents.

Project management is at a crossroads: There is a pressing need to rethink the approaches used in initiating, managing and governing projects, programmes and change initiatives. The aim of this book is to progress the dialogue around project practice by shifting the focus from instrumental methods and prescriptive techniques towards a context-sensitive consideration of people, strategy and change. Projects are initiated to deliver agreed outputs that can be translated into meaningful outcomes capable of satisfying the wishes and expectations for improvement and development. Yet, people, strategy and change, which are largely ignored by the conventional bodies of knowledge, are clearly central to the sustainable and enduring success of projects, efforts and initiatives. The volume brings together some of the best writing by leading authorities on key topics including trust, ethics, people, psychology, requirements, project performance, audits, uncertainty, anti-fragility, strategic initiatives, governance, change management and commercial management. The collection offers an invaluable new resource for informed managers looking to engage with the latest thinking and research.

Essential reading for academics and students, this work brings together analyses based upon some of the best empirical studies of public and non-profit governance in the United Kingdom.