The planning-performance literature suggests that there is a weak positive correlation between strategic planning and financial performance. This study has been undertaken to determine whether this weak positive correlation is true for Australian firms.

Strategic planning for the purposes of this study is arranged in three levels of planning complexity. A sample of 77 listed firms was surveyed to determine their level of planning complexity, and this was correlated with the firm's financial performance over a three year period.

A range of statistical tests did not reveal any significant correlation between strategic planning at any of the three levels and the financial performance of the firm. This negative finding is generally in line with other recent studies conducted in Australia, the United States and the United Kingdom.

However, positive correlations were found with several subjective performance measures, suggesting that respondents generally believe that strategic planning is helping their company.

The diversity of internal and external customers continues to increase with social, economic and global changes. This presents an array of opportunities and challenges for organisations. In the present paper we argue that whether interactions between diverse individuals results in benefits or deficits for the organisation depends largely on the level of openness to dissimilarity present in the exchange. This proposition is developed and presented in a model linking types of diversity to organisational group process and outcome effects. Implications for interactions with diverse internal and external customers are suggested. Structural and management characteristics expected to enhance dissimilarity openness in the workforce are offered.

Studies have shown that management training and development (MTD) can be a strategic weapon in improving performance and in building and sustaining competitive advantage. However, recent studies suggest that MTD is under-valued and under-used as a strategic tool by New Zealand firms as, despite a managerial skill shortage, New Zealand firms have not invested heavily in MTD. The present paper discusses a study of employer-based MTD in New Zealand that investigated managerial attitudes towards, and propensity to engage in, MTD. The study found several indicators that predict four MTD related variables (the MTD index, the percent of payroll spent on MTD, the increase in training expenditure and expected future increases in the MTD budget). The results suggest organisations that engage in MTD improve organisational effectiveness and implement their business strategy better and that MTD was seen as an important tool in gaining a competitive advantage.

Readers of management books frequently find themselves among experts who claim to know about motivational and personality dispositions. However, they find it impossible to agree on the most basic of details. This paper argues that dispositions are myths derived from an inadequate grasp of their dubious logical and linguistic status. Concepts such as need, motive and trait are logically deficient because of the inherent problem of circularity and linguistically inadequate because of the vagueness of definition that applies to all dispositional theories. Two leading representatives of the motivational dispositional perspective in management [David McClelland and Abraham Maslow] serve as the basis for case studies in which the notions of need and motive are shown to be problematic. Personality traits are also analysed critically and reveal similar deficiencies. An analysis of the authoritarian personality serves as a third case study and reveals an important negative relationship between personality and intelligence. It is argued that personality reflects deficiencies rather than dispositions and an alternative view is offered which treats individuals as pattern perceivers and rational choosers of goals. Such a view, however, works against dispositionalism's scientism, which has found much favour with managers and their consultants for the past fifty years. Why this should be the case is briefly explored.