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Unhappy customers, uninformed employees, mounting chaos: sound familiar? If any or all of these debilitating elements are in play in your company, you have been experiencing the classic symptoms of “performance gap” – the difference between the business outcomes you expect and the hard reality of what you are getting.

The pursuit of good corporate governance, as exemplified by compliance with Sarbanes‐Oxley (SOX), requires corporate real estate (CRE) departments to gain a better understanding of asset values and lease costs than most companies currently possess. As a result, CRE departments are motivated to centralise control over operations globally, to improve systems for ensuring consistent and accurate accounting worldwide and to scrutinise vendors more thoroughly. These changes will be difficult for many CRE departments, but, done properly, the focus on corporate governance will bring greater understanding of real estate’s impact on corporate financial performance, as well as enhancing relationships with the CFO, senior management and business unit leaders.

Purpose – This paper focuses on a unique historical case study of industry evolution in order to develop a road map where historical and strategic research could develop a common ground for trans-disciplinary inquiry.

Design/methodology/approach – The industry I explore is the Universal Credit Card Industry since its inception with the Diners Club in 1949 until its maturity in late 1990s. My empirical objective here is to develop a historically detailed and theoretically rich case study in which evolutionary processes are discovered as a result of the historical narrative.

Findings – The historical account of the industry demonstrates how the evolution of alternative business models as organizing forms has led to the establishment of interorganizational platforms with unique ecosystems. These alternative business models, through various experimentations, have ultimately produced two critical interorganizational organizations, one based on an open-loop system represented by Visa and MasterCard, and the other based on a closed-loop system represented by Diners Club and the American Express. The historical account also shows that in a given industry competition is not only among specific firms in the industry but also among the business models and the platforms created by these models.

Originality/value – I conclude that historical analyses reveal the nature of competition not only among firms but also among alternative business models where traditional strategy research rarely covers.

Reviews the latest management developments across the globe and pinpoints practical implications from cutting‐edge research and case studies.

This briefing is prepared by an independent writer who adds their own impartial comments and places the articles in context.

This review is based on “Strategic thinking about disruptive technologies” by Nick Evans, Bill Ralston and Andrew Broderick. They describe a project carried out by SRIC‐BI for the US government to identify the most important civilian technologies disruptive to US interests up to 2025. Six technologies identified as likely to be the most disruptive were biofuels and bio‐based chemicals, biogerontechnology, clean coal, energy‐storage materials, service robotics, and The Internet of Things.

Provides strategic insights and practical thinking that have influenced some of the world's leading organizations.

The briefing saves busy executives and researchers hours of reading time by selecting only the very best, most pertinent information and presenting it in a condensed and easy‐to‐digest format.

Evans Library at Texas A&M University has developed and released a Virtual Library Tour available via the World Wide Web (WWW). The URL for the tour is 〈http://www.tamu.edu/library/reference/ virtual/tour00.htmlhttp://www.tamu.edu/library/reference/ virtual/tour00.html〉. The tour, designed as a remotely accessible alternative to the basic library orientation tour, provides information on library departments, services, materials, and policies. Development and implementation of this new orientation tool involved technological issues and library instructional techniques. Approximately 165 hours of professional time were required to create and release the tour. To achieve an optimum combination of effective instruction and technical expertise, the development team for the Texas A&M University Evans Library's Virtual Library Tour consisted of the coordinator of instructional services, Pixey Anne Mosley, and the automated information retrieval services (AIRS) librarian, Daniel Xiao. This article discusses the process used and lessons learned through the creation of the Virtual Library Tour.

Builds on the work of previous authors to present a cyclical model of the process of consultation. Also argues that when consultation is perceived in this way the process becomes consistent with models of experiential learning and learning styles developed by Kolb and Honey and Mumford. This unification serves as a guide for practice and gives further insight into potential difficulties.

The scope of this column is being expanded with this issue in response to the dramatic increase in the publication and range of CD‐ROMs. We will include among the reviews CDs of interest which usually have some relationship with music. Also, as the spirit moves us, we will include CD‐ROMs which are not music related, just as the music CDs wandered beyond the strict confines of jazz.

The purpose of this paper is to propose a model for delivering greater customer value through the clear shaping, enhancing, and living of core values. The approach is to construct a model that explains the approach; illustrate it with a number of useful ideas, likely snags, and real examples. True customer value comes from a series of ordered events and related concepts that management must apply with rigor all the time. The paper shows how different pieces of a complex puzzle fit together into a lucid model. Value is to middle and upper management who are experiencing frustration at getting their message across and talented, overlooked employees who feel they don’t have a voice.

NEXT JANUARY, it will be ten years since I acquired The library world from W H Smith & Son Ltd. Next July, NEW LIBRARY WORLD may be ten years old.