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Investigates the values of Behaviourally Anchored Rating Scales (BARS), in assessing and training student nurses at work. Seven experienced practitioners had been asked to state what they thought they would be saying about any student whom they placed at each behavioural level on a BARS system. The resulting data showed that stereotypes of work behaviour were used in making assessment. This process affected the value of the BARS as an assessment system, and hampered on‐the‐job training; students scored at the poorer end of each scale were seen as negative, deviant people. Two of the subjects had been able to use the stereotyped data to expand their own constructs of a person performing at each level of work behaviour represented by the BARS. The ensuing constructs had been stated in a way which had allowed them to be used by less experienced assessors both to assess and to train students at work.

Definitions, development and measurement must be applied to the concept of the learning organization to move it towards implementation. Many definitions have captured the essence of the learning organization but, until the characteristics or “attributes” are defined, it will remain difficult to move the concept forward, because it is the definition of these attributes that allows an examination of the behaviours which will either encourage or inhibit organizational learning. These behaviours can be measured using behaviourally anchored rating scales which indicate strengths and weaknesses which can be improved through action.

Over the past two decades, institutions of higher education worldwide have come under pressure to demonstrate effective performance. Their response has been to borrow the quality concept from industry and place it at the centre of institutional performance assessment in higher education. This article describes a Hong Kong study which developed valid and reliable organisational effectiveness self rating scales for higher educational institutions. In the course of developing these scales, the relevance of quality to institutional performance assessment was examined. In failing to produce a valid and reliable effectiveness scale for a quality dimension, the study highlighted the shortcomings of the quality concept particularly as a basis for the comparative assessment of institutional performance. The study also indicated a methodology for identifying concepts which may provide a firmer base than quality for such comparisons.

Calls for public accountability in higher education are widespread and higher educational organizations are under pressure to demonstrate “value for money” performance. Organizational self‐assessment is one response to the pressure for public accountability but self‐assessment exercises thus far have largely relied on criteria that are both subjective and untested. This paper describes a Hong Kong study that attempted to produce more objective assessment criteria through the development of organizational self‐assessment scales for Hong Kong higher educational organizations. A modified version of the behaviourally anchored rating scales (BARS) procedure resulted in four organizational effectiveness scales capable of producing valid and reliable ratings for higher educational organizations in Hong Kong. The nature of the scales highlighted human resource management issues that are current in Hong Kong higher education and are likely to be relevant to other higher education systems that, in common with Hong Kong, rely largely on public funding.

The purpose of this paper is to report the development and validation of the entrepreneurial behaviour inventory (EBI), an instrument for measuring the entrepreneurial behaviours of corporate managers.

Through actual consulting experience, interviews and discussions with business owners and company managers, 40 incidents were written to describe ten of the most commonly identified entrepreneurial attributes. The response options were developed using behaviourally anchored rating scales and were validated by rank‐order correlation analysis and t‐tests. The authors then conducted a study to examine the dimensionality of the EBI via principal component analysis and to reduce the number of situations from 40 to 12. A confirmatory factory analysis was further conducted using the data from a second sample of corporate managers.

Through an integrated series of studies, the authors identified a reliable and valid four‐factor structure of the EBI. The dimensions are innovativeness, risk taking, change orientation, and opportunism.

The EBI is an effective and objective instrument for assessing entrepreneurial behaviours applicable to both business owners as well as corporate entrepreneurs. Using a simulated incident method with behaviourally anchored rating scales, the EBI provides a sophisticated means of assessing actual behaviours rather than traits or attitudes. The EBI is useful for classifying types of entrepreneurs and forming the basis for training and developing entrepreneurial corporate managers.

Creative role‐reversal training is demonstrated to be a powerful instrument for improving the creative and creative‐related effectiveness of product managers and agency account managers. Beneficial results appear to have been maintained into the longer term, with greater confidence and professional compatibility achieved with the agency creative development. The Learning Style Inventory developed by Kolb and Fry was used to evaluate participants' learning styles, and Behaviourally Anchored Rating Scales were used to measure effective‐ineffective course performance.

This paper aims to investigate whether verbal rating scales are viable formats for attitude measurement through an application to Japanese consumers' product quality perceptions.

The article notes theoretical differences between Likert‐based and Thurstone approaches to attitude measurement. The paper illustrates a Thurstone scale development process.

The new scale possesses nomological validity; it correctly predicts how consumer ethnocentrism relates to product quality evaluations for brands in different competitive situations.

The convenient, ready‐to‐apply verbal rating scale can measure Japanese consumers' perceptions of product quality. The article also offers survey researchers some practical guidance for developing their own verbal rating scales.

Verbal rating scales are rarely found in existing literature. This study sheds light on a frequently overlooked measurement scale format for measuring attitudes.

Many firms measure customer satisfaction on an attribute‐by‐attribute level. Past research has shown that halo errors can pose a serious threat to the interpretability of such data. Examines three factors that potentially reduce halo, using a combination of an experimental and quasi‐experimental research design. Three conclusions were drawn. First, measurement after consumption showed less halo than delayed measurement. Second, relative rating scales contained less halo than standard satisfaction scales. Third, an interaction effect was found between the number of attributes to be evaluated and the rating scale used. The evaluation of many attributes reduced halo in comparison to an evaluation of few attributes when a standard satisfaction rating scale was used. However, when the more complex relative rating scale was used, halo was not reduced when subjects had to evaluate a large number of attributes, perhaps due to the increased complexity of the task.