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Although social media proficiency and use are key business and marketing practices in today’s digital environment, research has failed to offer sufficient insights into what drives small firms to use social media and how they vitalise co-creative social media environments with consumers. In response, the purpose of this paper is to examine how small firms utilise social media to interact and build bonds with consumers. These bonds become an important tool in the development of successful, profitable businesses and marketing practices in the digital age.

To examine how small firms use social media to engage with consumers and vice versa, the authors utilised a case-study approach and collected qualitative data by conducting semi-structured interviews.

The results showed that the small firms in this research seek to establish relationships and facilitate interactions with their core consumers in order to co-create value. In particular, the data demonstrate that producers engage in two distinctive practices: bonding (i.e. cultivating emotional ties with music fans) and spreading (i.e. encouraging expressive circulation by fans). Altogether, the findings indicate that the representative firms in this research use social media to develop synergistic relationships with consumers and to tap into the collective energy of consumers in their business environments.

The authors show that small companies use social media to establish relationships and interact with fans in order to co-create value and vitalise collective consumption, engagement, and participation. The case blurs the traditional distinction between production and consumption and suggests that the value of goods is a social creation, not merely a manufactured product.

Describes a research project carried out within the Manchester Royal Infirmary (MRI) to evaluate and improve the recycling and disposal of pharmaceutical products. Discusses supply chain management practices in the National Health Service and, in particular, focuses on the concept of reverse logistics (the recycling of pharmaceutical stock for later re‐use). The research involved the analysis of returned stock from 28 hospital units and, from this data, the development and implementation of a revised recycling process within MRI Pharmacy. Concludes by arguing that there are significant financial and operational advantages to the NHS, and other organisations, in developing effective reverse logistics processes.

This article examines the changes in the relationship between government departments and the UK construction industry brought about by the privatisation of the Property Services Agency (PSA). In particular, it shows that while there has been some encouragement for closer, and more long‐term, collaboration, in reality government departments seem to be stuck in a short‐term, win‐lose orientation. The article concludes by arguing that this is a product of four factors: the lack of experience among both purchasers and providers of long‐term partnership arrangements; the risk‐aversive nature of the Civil Service; the pressure on departments from ministers to minimise risk; and government guidelines on competitive tendering which make it difficult to enter into long‐term agreements.

Follows on from and develops the arguments presented in an earlier Management Decision article ‐ “No such thing as ... a ‘one best way’ to manage organizational change” (Burnes, 1996a). Begins by examining Burnes’ (1996b) Choice Management ‐ Change Management model which, in particular, draws attention to the influence on the choices an organization makes of the context in which it operates. Then moves on to discuss Miles and Snow′s (1978) classification of organizations into four strategic types. From this, argues that the choices an organization makes, regarding what to change and how to change it, will be significantly influenced by its strategic type. Concludes by maintaining that, on the one hand, organizations can create a virtuous circle whereby they can influence or control the circumstances in which they operate through the changes they make and how they make them. However, on the other hand, organizations can find themselves in a vicious spiral of decline and stagnation through an inability to control their own destiny and inconsistent and unsuccessful approaches to change.

The paper uses data from a questionnaire survey of UK firms to examine the ways in which benefits and costs are divided in buyer‐supplier relationships. These results are analysed in the light of Burnes and New′s framework for considering supply chain improvement. The results indicate that some caution is required in the applicability of the notion of “win‐win” in buyer‐supplier collaborations. Conclusions are drawn for theory and practice.

Organisational culture has been a recurring theme in the literature on organisations over the last decade. Indeed, it sometimes seems almost impossible to find a book or journal without some reference, albeit often superficial, to the curative and restorative powers of organisational culture. The literature is studded with oft‐repeated phrases which still trip neatly off the tongue: “a strong culture makes a strong organisation….” (Handy, 1986:188), even when the context has been forgotten.

As a subject of academic interest, organisational learning has been around for a long time. However, in the 1990s, there was an upsurge of interest in the topic from both academia and industry. Indeed, there are many writers who are now claiming that organisational learning is the new paradigm for managing organisations. This interest in and promotion of organisational learning, especially in the business world, stemmed from two major concerns: the rapidly‐changing nature of the world we live in; and the increasingly competitive environment in which firms operate. This article explores and evaluates the rationale for organisational learning and the key propositions that underpin it. In particular, by setting organisational learning in the wider context of theories of organisational structure, culture and change, it questions its generalisability. The article concludes by arguing that though organisational learning may make an important contribution to managing organisations, it is doubtful whether it is applicable to all organisations and all situations.

In a fast‐moving and unpredictable world, there can be little doubt that organizational change is one of the most important issues facing organizations. This is especially so, when it is claimed that over 60 per cent of all change projects are considered to fail. Not surprisingly, therefore, there is also much debate about which approach to change is the best. Over the past 20 years, the emergent approach appears to have superseded the planned approach as the most appropriate. However, as this paper will argue, the idea that planned and emergent changes are competing approaches, rather than complementary, is contestable. This paper looks at the case of XYZ construction which, between 1996 and 2000, used both emergent and planned approaches to transform itself. The paper concludes that organizations need to avoid seeking an “one best way” approach to change and instead seek to identify the approach which is best suited to both type of changes they wish to undertake, according to the organization's context.

This article aims to explore the arguments that citizens of future cities will increasingly live in virtual communities as well as bricks and mortar ones, and that some previously physical supply chains will become virtual networks or communities. In examining these arguments, the article investigates the development of the independent music community in Seoul, South Korea.

The research is based on a qualitative case study of music fans and independent record labels in Seoul.

The article shows that independent music fans in Seoul have built a self-organising, fan-dominated, value co-creating community, which has replaced the old, music label-dominated, hierarchical supply chain. The community arose from the passion of fans and their engagement with social media, rather the intentions of city planners and supply-chain architects.

The article shows that Seoul may be an exemplar of how future cities can and will develop, particularly in terms of the ability of people to use social media to develop and run their own virtual spaces and communities, which are tailored to the way they want to live their lives.

Suggests that current advice on how to achieve, maintain or improve organisational effectiveness is flawed in certain respects: there is a lack of clarity as to what organisational “effectiveness” is; there is a tendency to assume that all organisations operate in the same unpredictable and dynamic environment; it is assumed that the proffered panaceas suit all organisations irrespective of size, purpose, mode of ownership or industry; and though some management gurus acknowledge that there may be some drawbacks to their prescriptions, they tend to see this as an unavoidable consequence of pursuing effectiveness. Conversely, this article argues that as there is no universal definition of organisational effectiveness, there can be no universal recipe for achieving it; organisations operating under the same conditions may adopt different approaches and still be successful. Organisations have a wide degree of choice in the priorities they set and the approaches they use to achieve these. Just as the fate of individual organisations cannot be divorced from the host society in which they operate, the reverse is also true.