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Multi‐source processes have been increasingly adopted by organisations in recent years and most projections suggest this trend will continue. As a developmental technique, one underlying rationale to such systems is their potential impact on target managers’ self‐awareness; increasing self awareness is thought to enhance performance. The main theme of this paper relates to the potential of 360‐degree assessment for yielding measures of self‐awareness and the different ways of deriving indices of this variable. The relationship between self‐awareness indices and measures of performance are discussed in light of research findings. It is concluded that different self‐awareness measures used in the research literature are not equivalent, and may have differential relationships to performance. It is argued that self‐awareness should be assessed in selection and other settings using a variety of methods, not necessarily utilizing the kinds of measures typically associated with multi‐source feedback systems.

The construction industry in Australia is characterised by a long work‐hours culture, with conditions that make it difficult for staff to balance their work and non‐work lives. The objective of this paper is to measure the success of a work‐place intervention designed to improve work‐life balance (WLB) in an alliance project in the construction industry, and the role the project manager plays in this success.

The paper focuses on an alliance case study. Interviews were conducted at two points in time, several months apart, after the interventions were implemented.

Results showed that staff on the whole were more satisfied with their work experience after the interventions, and indicated the important role that managers' attitudes and behaviours played.

Managerial support for work‐life initiatives is a critical element in achieving WLB and satisfaction with working arrangements. The fact that the manager “talked the talk and walked the walk” was a major contributing success factor, which has not previously been demonstrated.

This article introduces the special issue “Beyond psychometrics: assessment for the new millennium” and further speculates on how a number of organisational trends may influence selection practice in the future. These trends include the continuing emphasis on delayering, of selecting “core” strategic staff, of organisational fit, the impact of technology, the devolution and outsourcing of selection, the rise of teleworking, the questioning of Western assumptions alongside globalisation, and diversity. Developments in selection responses to these factors are identified, such as the popularity of assessment centres, psychometric tests, personality instruments and genetic testing. Some suggestions are made for possible future developments including whole team (or board) selection, the greater use of depth interviews, clinical tests of neurological functioning, and of virtual simulations, and the notion of the possession by individuals of a portable and verifiable assessment portfolio.

In the increasing discussion about electronic assistive technology, the most emotive reactions are provoked when it is suggested that technology is used to monitor older people with dementia. The words associated with monitoring are rather negative ‐ surveillance, ‘big brother’, intrusive, controlling.For the past two years care practitioners in local authorities and NHS mental health trusts have been using the Just Checking activity monitoring system to assess people with dementia, living alone in their own homes. Small, wireless movement sensors placed in the key rooms of the house, are triggered as the person goes about their daily life, and the data are represented as a line on a 24‐hour chart. There are no cameras. The chart is accessed via a password controlled website.The charts give care professionals and family carers a much clearer ‘picture’ of how a person with dementia is acting in their own home. The information is used to devise a care package that is appropriate, and will support them to continue to live independently.Case study names have been changed.

William Baumol is best-known as an academic. He was a prodigious researcher and publisher of texts on microeconomic theory, and a highly regarded educator with roles as head of the Department of Economics at Princeton University, director of the C.V. Starr Center for Applied Economics and director of the Berkley Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation at New York University. Less well-known were his engagements as a corporate consultant, notably for the telecommunications monopoly AT&T. Baumol’s work as an advisor, expert witness and theorist for AT&T spanned three decades from 1966. His relationship with AT&T arguably forms the context within which we can better understand his work on contestability theory, which he developed with a team of economists working for AT&T’s Bell Telephone Laboratories in the 1970s. Contestability theory was later deployed as a policy tool to justify industry deregulation and even advocate for monopolies and oligopolies on the ground that they were optimally efficient industry structures if potential competitors faced low barriers of entry. Baumol’s intellectual contribution to contestability theory was arguably influenced by the Chicago school and by AT&T’s drive toward the technological integration of telecommunications. Contestability was a rebellion against economic orthodoxies concerning competition and government regulation, and the status quo within AT&T which opposed market competition on the ground that it threatened the technological integration of the Bell system. The outcome was a revolution in industrial organization that would pave the way for the emergence of platform business models incorporating multi-sided and two-sided markets as exemplified by Amazon and Uber.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the political, toy manufacturing, and educational activities of Caroline Louise Pratt (1867‐1954), founder of the Play School (later renamed City and Country School), New York City.

The paper reviews previously unreported biographical material and draws on a number of Caroline Pratt's own writings, combining results of archival text research and digital searches.

Newly available data sources on Caroline Pratt's 1896‐1921 life show her to be more of a social reconstructionist than previously concluded. This research demonstrates that it was Pratt's feminist, socialist and trade unionist ideals, transformed into educational aims, that formed the core of her educational work.

This investigation is limited to Pratt's activities during the years 1896 to 1921.

The internet has provided ready access to a wealth of newspaper and journal documents. The ease of access has no precedent, and the volume of newly available data sources has brought opportunities for reinterpretation and rewriting of the history of education. Yet even more new data will inevitably become accessible. This paper provides insights into how previously unresearched documents, now easily found through digital research, can enhance understanding of the contributions of Caroline Pratt.

The ideal of an open, all-inclusive, and participatory internet has been undermined by the rise of gender-based and misogynistic abuse on social media platforms. Limited progress has been made at supranational and national levels in addressing this issue, and where steps have been taken to combat online violence against women (OVAW), they are typically limited to legislative developments addressing image-based sexual abuse. As such, harms associated with image-based abuse have gained recognition in law while harms caused by text-based abuse (TBA) have not been conceptualized in an equivalent manner.

This chapter critically outlines the lack of judicial consideration given to online harms in British courts, identifying a range of harms arising from TBAs which currently are not recognized by the criminal justice system. We refer to non-traditional harms recognized in cases heard before the British courts, assessing these in light of traditionally recognized harms in established legal authorities. This chapter emphasizes the connection between the harms suffered and the recognition of impact on the victims, demonstrated through specific case studies. Through this assessment, this chapter advocates for greater recognition of online harms within the legal system – especially those which take the forms of misogynistic and/or gendered TBA.

Communications regarding this column should be addressed to Mrs. Cheney, Peabody Library School, Nashville, Term. 37203. Mrs. Cheney does not sell the books listed here. They are available through normal trade sources. Mrs. Cheney, being a member of the editorial board of Pierian Press, will not review Pierian Press reference books in this column. Descriptions of Pierian Press reference books will be included elsewhere in this publication.