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Opportunities for Redesigning Supply Chains of SMEs according to Circular Economy Principles
No full textThe uncontrolled extraction of natural resources is known to be one of the primary causes for the loss of 90% of global biodiversity and the visible impacts of climate change. The current linear economic model (i.e., take, make, and dispose) has been criticised for its negative impact on the environmental and social set-up. This has prompted an urgent need for transitioning to a Circular Economy (CE). This transition requires actions and policies at a strategic level and collaborative efforts amongst all players along the value chain. Australian small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) find it challenging to adopt CE principles due to their limited capacities and organisational constraints. Although prior empirical-driven research on incorporating CE principles within the supply chain (SC) has been studied extensively, the actual implementation for SMEs remains unexplored in details. Therefore, there is a need to explore the possibility of incorporating CE strategies by SMEs to gain a competitive advantage in highly dynamic markets. This research aims to identify opportunities for SMEs to align and adapt their business practices with CE strategies. More specifically, the main research question for this study is, “How can the adoption of CE principles enable SMEs to unlock potential opportunities?” To answer this, a structured literature review was first conducted to build understanding around the adoption of CE principles and opportunities for competitive advantages. Six CE principles were identified from the literature. Challenges and opportunities of CE adoption were also researched. To compare the findings from existing literature and real-world applications, an empirical evaluation of employing case studies was then conducted. This study also selected two Australian SMEs to examine the challenges they encountered and opportunities they have experienced from adopting CE principles. To establish a connection between the adoption of CE principles and opportunities for SMEs, a conceptual framework was proposed. The framework was then used to extrapolate the findings from the literature review and the case study process. The study’s findings indicate a lack of motivation among SMEs to adopt all the principles of CE. With their limited resources, they are more inclined to integrate those practices that yield maximum benefits. In this context, the principles of waste II elimination and cascade orientation were determined to be the preferred options due to their numerous benefits, which include business growth, reduced greenhouse gas emissions, and improved social well-being. Economic optimisation was the one CE principle that neither of the two sample SMEs could adopt, as neither could reduce costs via CE adoption. The study outcomes also highlighted two specific actions for SMEs to consider integrating into their business models: quantifiable data management and third-party certification. These actions can provide substantial benefits by boosting consumer confidence and achieving a strong long-term return on investment. This study also makes significant contributions to the field of research. First, it establishes a connection between adopting CE principles and potential opportunities for SMEs, such as enhanced brand image and increased social well-being. By understanding such links, managers and supply chain partners of SMEs can prioritise and focus their resources on those principles that maximise advantages for their specific business operations. Second, the study’s focus on positive outcomes may encourage other SMEs to adopt CE practices. Finally, it opens pathways for cross-country and sector-specific research on CE adoption in the context of SMEs.</p
A Study on vocational high school teachers' beliefs and their practices in incorporating the 4Cs skills in their Indonesian context
No full textCritical thinking, communication, collaboration, and creativity, collectively known as the 4Cs skills, are integral to 21st-century learning and have been embedded in Indonesia's vocational secondary education since the 2013 Curriculum, later strengthened under the Merdeka Curriculum and the Pancasila Student Profile framework. This policy evolution reflects Indonesia's ongoing commitment to 4C skills development, aligning with UNESCO and OECD priorities that emphasise transferable skills for an evolving labour market. However, national assessments of students in vocational and general high schools reveal persistent weaknesses in critical thinking, collaboration, and communication. In vocational settings specifically, low pedagogical capacity and poor performance on national competency assessments highlight limitations in teachers' instructional readiness. Little is known about how vocational teachers interpret and translate expectations regarding 4Cs integration into classroom practice within the confines of pedagogical and contextual challenges. This study investigates this complexity by exploring vocational high school (Sekolah, Menengah Kejuruan, SMK) teachers' beliefs about and implementation of the 4Cs within the changing curriculum and policy environment of Indonesian vocational education. Employing an explanatory sequential mixed-methods design, the study surveyed 276 SMK teachers purposively drawn from six provinces across Indonesia's western, central, and eastern regions to capture diverse vocational education contexts. The study examined belief patterns related to good teaching roles, essential tasks in facilitating the 4Cs, confidence in enacting these skills, and perceived challenges of integration. The qualitative phase involved interviews and document analysis with 25 purposively selected teachers. Guided by Kelchtermans' Personal Interpretative Framework (PIF), the study also drew on the Belief Function Model, the Teacher Belief Framework, and the Belief–Practice Typology to explore belief, contextual influences, and instructional enactment. Survey findings identified four belief domains in SMK teachers' integration of the 4Cs: teaching roles, instructional tasks, teacher confidence, and perceived barriers. While survey data showed hesitancy toward both directive and fully student-led roles, were further elaborated through qualitative themes of 4Cs-oriented learning, particularly guided facilitation and hands-on roles, shaped by teachers' self-image, subject demands, and learner needs. Beliefs about student-centred planning, assessment, and digital tools reflected complementarity, with qualitative insights highlighting contextual adaptation. Confidence in facilitating the 4Cs was high, informed by belief in the 4Cs as academic foundations and catalysts for broader success, shaped by aligned task perceptions and validated by subject relevance and industry expectations. Barriers showed convergence and deeper vulnerability linked to policy ambiguity and leadership inconsistency. In practice, teachers integrated the 4Cs explicitly through student-centred selective strategies such as Jigsaw, teaching factory models, and role-play, whereas implicit integration was evident in project-based learning. Greater emphasis appeared to be placed on communication, collaboration, and critical thinking, while creativity was less evident in teachers' reported practices. While formative and authentic assessment approaches were valued, their enactment was inconsistent, constrained by limited guidance. ICT was mainly used to support instruction and information access, rather than for pedagogical transformation, with few instances of student-created digital products. Two belief–practice patterns were prominent. When alignment was not possible, teachers adapted their instruction in response to constraints such as scheduling issues, resource shortages, and student readiness while remaining guided by their task perception and self-image. Where alignment was possible, it was enabled by strong industry linkages and extensive teaching experience, which provided contextual relevance and practical support for enacting 4Cs-related beliefs consistently. Survey validity was ensured through expert review, while triangulation of interview and document data strengthened rigour. Meta-inferences and joint displays integrated the qualitative and quantitative strands, adding contextual depth. To support sustainable 4Cs integration in SMK settings in Indonesia, this study proposes three recommendations: enhancing professional development, aligning the curriculum with workplace needs, and improving feedback systems and industry partnerships. The study also advances existing models of teacher belief by demonstrating how contextual factors mediate belief–practice alignment and extends global understanding of 4Cs integration in vocational and other educational contexts. Future research should examine belief formation in early-career teachers and belief–practice dynamics over time. The findings of this research challenge the views of vocational teachers as lacking sufficient professional engagement, revealing their adaptive reasoning and commitment despite contextual constraints.</p
Performance Evaluation of Quantum Computing Technologies using Multicriteria Group Decision Making Method
No full textThis paper presents the development of a multicriteria group decision making method for evaluating the performance of quantum computing technologies. The subjectiveness and imprecision of the decision making process is dealt with effectively with the use of interval-valued intuitionistic fuzzy numbers. A multicriteria group decision making algorithm is developed for generating an overall intuitionistic fuzzy performance value for every quantum computing technology alternative across all criteria. An example is presented that shows the multicriteria group decision making method is efficient and effective for dealing with the performance quantum computing technology evaluation problem.</p
Exploring Citizens' Engagement with Urban Digital Twin Applications in Australia: A Theory of Scenes Perspective
No full textDigital twins, which are virtual representations of city infrastructure that use real-time data to optimize infrastructure, energy, and transportation, are revolutionizing how smart cities are governed. Citizens as active contributors of data, end users, and co-creators for digital twins are key to their success. Traditional frameworks such as TAM and UTAUT evaluate user acceptance, but they tend to ignore the dual function of digital twins as virtual communities integrating citizens’ lived experiences and technological tools. This paper aims to fill the gap by applying the theory of scenes to investigate the urban factors that influence residents' interaction with digital twins in smart cities in Australia, and the ways in which this interaction influences the perception of urban quality of life. With a more integrated approach, this research proposes a novel framework, and the findings can potentially improve citizen-driven urban governance and inform smart city studies.</p
Psalm 22 as Impassioned Repudiation of Gendered Scapegoating: An Affective Model of Interpretation
No full textThis presentation examines Psalm 22’s intense emotional aspects as a poignant repudiation of gendered scapegoating, offering insights into its reception within androcentric contexts. Drawing concepts from René Girard’s mimetic theory and feminist theories of androcentricity (Luce Irigaray, Julia Kristeva, and Hélène Cixous), this unique interdisciplinary interpretive method situates the psalm within its socio-historical and cultural setting, illuminating its capacity to demystify and disable processes of gendered violence and victimhood. Through this lens, Psalm 22’s emotive language—its cries of abandonment and suffering—emerge as the arresting voice of a male scapegoat, revealing the embodied experience of male violence and victimhood within androcentric contexts. The psalm’s affective power accordingly urges communities to confront and transform complicity in these enduring scapegoat structures. This study underscores the lived emotional dimensions of the text, demonstrating affective resonance with liberatory hermeneutics and perceptions of a broader biblical orientation away from antiquity’s violent sacrificial paradigms.</p
The Nature of Corporate Sustainability Practice in the Tourism Industry of Australia
No full textCorporate Sustainability (CS) is an approach to designing a sustainability strategy for an organisation whose ultimate goal is to contribute to the achievement of sustainable development goals (SDGs) through ensuring economic integrity, social equity and environmental integrity (Kantabutra, 2022; Pazienza, de Jong, & Schoenmaker, 2022; Bergman, Bergman & Berger, 2017; Missimer, 2015, Bansal, 2005, United Nation Global Compact, n.d.). This thesis investigates two aspects of CS practices in the tourism industry of within State of Victoria in Australia: the way organisations are including corporate sustainability into their strategic management process and the practical applications of economic, social and environmental pillars of CS. CS practice in the tourism industry demands especial attention as it is dependent on natural-exploration and connected closely to the nature-conservation issues. The industry’s human resource practices are criticised for unfavourable working-conditions and discrimination characterising a delicate balance of economic and social dimensions (United Nation World Tourism Organisation, UNWTO, 2017; International Labour Organisation, 2017; Chen, Zeng, Lin and Ma, 2017; Hengerer, 2018). The tourism industry has been declared by the United Nations (UN) as one of the priority sectors, as being crucial to achieve SDGs. The tourism industry of Australia has been selected as the study area for the current research for its significance as an economic contributor at the national level (2.5% of national GDP; Tourism Research Australia, TRA, 2023). While the relevantly new field of CS has been enjoying increasing academic attention since 1990s, it lacks practical orientation and strategic framework covering all the three pillars (economic, social and environmental) combined (Bansal, 2005; Montiel, 2008; Montiel & Delgado-Ceballos, 2014). This thesis will propose such a strategic planning framework through empirical investigation, which will use that holistic view of CS. Business managers and executives were found to refer to sustainability with different meanings and it was not clear how they built up rationales regarding the choices of the CS activities (Visser, 2007; Lozano, 2015, Rego, Pina & Polo´Nia, 2017; Bergman, Bergman and Berger, 2017; Kantabutra,2022; Pazienza et al., 2022). The current research focused on an integrative approach to CS and investigated how far tourism managers (in Victoria, Australia) conceptualise it. It is expected to make a worthy contribution to the CS literature as well as be an enabler for academics, policymakers and business practitioners to match CS relevant practice and priorities at national level. CS theory and practice are expected to be aligned with SDGs adopted by the United Nations (UN) member countries, irrespective of developed and developing, to address the global challenges related to ‘poverty, inequality, climate, environmental degradation, prosperity, and peace and justice’. There are seventeen goals targeted to be achieved by 2030 (UN, n.d.). Australia is an active signatory of the declaration of SDG and is actively working to achieve the targets as declared; however, SDG progress ranking of Australia was 20 in 2016 which went down to 37 in 2018 and 40 in 2023 (Sachs, Lafortune, Fuller & Drumm, 2023). The country has some priority SDGs and to achieve these, every organisation is expected to contribute through adoption of a corporate sustainability strategy. Thus, it is imperative that stakeholders and policymakers of the tourism industry should understand how CS is working in the industry and how it can work in the future. This research applied case study method to explore the phenomena of corporate sustainability practices of the tourism organisations in Victoria, a state of Australia. It involved four tourism organisations of Victoria. The 25 top- and mid-level managers plus two industry experts participated in semi-structured interviews and 108 field-level employees participated in informal short surveys. The collected information was the primary source of data. Relevant organisations’ published materials as well as Government policies were secondary sources of data. Collected data were discussed and analysed to answer the research questions and support the proposed research framework. The research indicated that the selected tourism organisations in Victoria, Australia were able to integrate the CS goals into their overall strategic goals and designed appropriate actions plans for implementation. Though a major portion of participating managers were inclined to the ecological pillar of CS; their organisational policies and reports covered almost all the sub-elements of ecological, economic and social pillars of CS as suggested by the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI). This could be credited to the detailed and revised regulatory requirements and advice coming from the State (Victoria) and Federal Government of Australia. Recommendations came from the participants that proactive policy and legal advice would likely to encourage improved CS performance of the tourism organisations in the future.</p
Constructive resistance: Essential to optimise workplace quality
No full textCivility between colleagues is a key requirement of any productive
workplace; incivility or uncivil behaviour undermines
collegiality, contributes to discord and workplace disharmony,
decreases morale and productivity, and increases staff absenteeism
and attrition (Anderson et al. 2022; Jackson et al. 2024).
Incivility, which includes negative and disrespectful behaviours
such as unhelpfulness, sabotaging, dismissiveness, or ignoring
personal boundaries, can occur vertically or horizontally, with
nursing leaders, managers and colleagues alike identified as
demonstrating such behaviours (Waschgler et al. 2013). Multiple
papers have been written on the topic of incivility in nursing,
including the reasons why it occurs and strategies to manage the
associated behaviours.</p
Co-creating a research-based e-storybook for children coping with parental moral injury: Insights from affected communities and partners
No full textThis study provided an account of the affected community and partner (stakeholders) input into the interdisciplinary co-creation process and preliminary testing of the suitability of a research-based e-storybook for children coping with parental moral injury. Children whose parents have trauma-related mental health difficulties, including moral injury, tend to misunderstand their parent’s responses and behaviours. To date, there have been no research-based narrative resources to support these children. Our interdisciplinary, international team of researchers, clinicians, and those with lived experience co-created a bibliotherapy storybook using moral injury narratives. Using a mixed methods approach, a cross-sectional online survey of key affected communities and partners was conducted to explore the resources’ suitability. Preliminary findings suggest overall suitability and that the e-storybook’s narratives acted as a springboard to conversations about what was happening in their families. Thus, the co-creation process is an effective approach to developing targeted supports for children coping with parental moral injury.</p
Recognising vicarious trauma in research: The experiences of researchers who work with victimisation data and the support they need
No full textBackground The vicarious trauma people who provide direct clinical care may experience is well documented. However, there is limited information about the vicarious trauma that researchers working with victim-survivors of domestic and family violence (DFV) or victimisation-related data may experience.
Aim To describe and reflect on the vicarious trauma experienced by people researching DFV who have repeatedly been exposed to significant, traumatic data.
Discussion Reflections were sourced from three researchers who were studying DFV victim-survivors’ stories of trauma. Their work often left them feeling distressed and helpless. Crucial self-care strategies included taking regular breaks and debriefing co-researchers.
Conclusion It is essential to monitor, prepare for and provide appropriate supervision and trauma-informed support to manage and address the vicarious trauma that researchers who work with sensitive and distressing data and vulnerable populations commonly experience.
Implications for practice Researchers need to consider during the conceptual phases of their studies possible risks to their psychological safety. Furthermore, research institutions have a responsibility to support researchers’ mental well-being and promote safe research practices. Ethics committees may need to ensure prior to granting ethical approval that researchers have developed and implement strategies to prevent psychological harm to themselves.</p
Connecting by water: An Australian exploration of midlife women’s participation in structured surfing lessons
No full textStructured surfing lessons are a popular choice for participation in water environments, or blue zones, for fitness, connection, and building individual strengths. This study explored Australian middle-aged women’s perceptions and experiences of participation in a structured surfing programme, including positive aspects, barriers and enablers to participation, and wellbeing impacts. Thirty-four females, aged 40–66 years, completed an anonymous online survey consisting of open-ended questions. Reflexive Thematic Analysis generated five themes: surfing is simultaneously liberating, challenging, peaceful and a restorative activity; co-creating a sisterhood of waterwomen-in-the-making; the qualities of a safe space; beneath the surface lie hidden strengths; and wisdom through the teachings of the waves. The themes suggested that structured surfing lessons, when perceived as safe and appropriate to skill level, positively affected the overall wellbeing of participants, building confidence, relationships, and achievement. Findings contribute to a better understanding of ways to increase middle-aged women’s participation in this activity.</p