Dr Anne Peachey

This qualitative study investigated corporate governance and management practices, with a particular focus on communications between the board and senior management, in two disability service organisations in the nonprofit sector. Fifteen interviewees participated across the two case studies and their insights and contributions were thematically analysed. Among the key findings was a significant contrast in communication processes across the two organisations. In one, communications were tightly controlled by the CEO (hourglass-shaped approach) and, in the second, there was a more accessible communication process between the board and senior management. This paper explores these two communication models.

Academic staff in Australian universities are experiencing significant change, generating stress and anxiety. Caught up in these emotions, individuals seek the means to manage them. Kahn (2001) suggests that an appropriate means for management of negative affect is a holding environment. A ‘collective auto-ethnography’, this paper describes the holding environment constructed by a group of academics focussing on interpersonal relationships which are at the core of the Community of Scholars (Goodman 1964). It offers evidence that the holding environment created by this mutual collaboration between like-minded people has served to provide support for those involved. A holding environment may be an option to be considered by others facing dynamic change.