Paul Mercieca

A new ERA of open access

There has been a push for open access journals for more than a decade in a higher education and research environment in which the ‘publish or perish’ syndrome is as dominant as ever. This article examines the success, or otherwise, of open access schemes in light of the Excellence in Research for Australia (ERA) initiative. It compares the Australian Research Council draft list of journals, which will be used to rank academic output under the ERA initiative, with the Directory of Open Access Journals. If academic recognition is linked to journal prestige, how do open access journals rate in this context?

The Influence of Social Media on Entrepreneur Motivation and Marketing Strategies in a Developing Country

Entrepreneurs are increasingly using social media in running their businesses. This phenomenon is remarkable especially in developing countries where entrepreneurs now exploit business opportunities by using cheaper platforms. Prior studies claim that social media plays a crucial role in establishing a business and ensuring its survival through effective marketing. However, from the context of developing countries, limited research has sought to understand the role of social media in motivating entrepreneurs to start and market their businesses. This current study seeks to investigate this issue through a field study comprising interviews with Nigerian entrepreneurs. The research explores how social media shapes Nigerian entrepreneurs’ motivation to start a business and how they market their businesses via social media. It was found that most of the entrepreneurs interviewed were opportunity-driven rather than necessitydriven due to opportunities afforded by SM. Furthermore, entrepreneurs devised several social media marketing approaches across different platforms to reach their audiences.

Identifying Social Media’s Capability for Recognizing Entrepreneurial Opportunity: An Exploratory Study

Social media is believed to play an essential role in entrepreneurial opportunity recognition. However, little is known about the exact nature of the relationship between the capability of social media and entrepreneurial opportunity recognition. Addressing this gap in literature, we interviewed eleven Nigerian entrepreneurs to investigate how opportunity can be recognised via their engagement with social media platforms. It was found that, via Social Media, entrepreneurs recognise opportunities regarding introducing new products, entering new markets, better customer relations and participating in entrepreneurial events. We also identified that opportunity recognition is driven by five capabilities of social media: networking, searching, observation, experimenting, and social media data analytics. Implications of our findings and limitations are discussed.

Succession Planning in Vietnamese Libraries: Challenges and Solutions

Research into succession planning was first conducted in the business, educational, government, not-for-profit and healthcare sectors and introduced in libraries in the late twentieth century, There is limited literature addressing library succession planning generally, and no literature related to the concept as it exists in Vietnam. Library succession planning has been in existence for over 20 years internationally but has only recently been introduced in libraries in Vietnam. Vietnamese libraries have an embryonic recruitment culture where the concept of succession planning is often unknown or little understood by staff at all levels of the library, from general staff to senior managers and board members. Additionally, the implementation of succession planning in Vietnamese libraries faces many challenges including availability and suitability of staff for management positions, the political environment, and succession processes themselves. This chapter examines these issues as they impact on the information sector, focusing on academic and public libraries in the Mekong Delta area of Vietnam. Based on interviews and a survey of library leaders and staff, and underpinned by transformational leadership theory, this chapter considers existing succession planning processes and makes recommendations on how these processes may be adjusted and developed to meet and overcome challenges in Vietnamese libraries, and beyond.

“Integration and collaboration” within recently established Australian scholarly publishing initiatives

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to highlight how application integration and project collaboration is being used to support the development of newly established university electronic presses and institutional repositories.Design/methodology/approach – This paper presents a summary of a number of projects that have been established within the Australian university environment. These projects are used to illustrate models of collaboration that can be used to assist the establishment of small or new scholarly publishing projects.Findings – Suggests that in instances where universities are exploring new models for dissemination of their scholarship, collaboration between institutional projects may assist in the ongoing development of content and in the provision of access to this content.Originality/value – This is a reflection based on current projects being developed within Australia. It provides an overview of projects that illustrate cooperative development as a means to assist in access to scholar...

Knowledge management and information management : Convergence and future directions

This paper explores the educational competencies that are required by new graduates entering knowledge-based industries. The competencies are examined in light of the changing and converging roles of information management and knowledge management.