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This paper discusses the significant role of the maintenance function in an integrated management system and discusses how the efforts of maintenance management can contribute a value added perspective to the third party assessment process. Due to global competitiveness, businesses are now trading internationally and are expected to have management systems certified through a third party to international standards enhancing customer‐supplier relationships and stakeholder perceptions. This paper discusses several international standards such as ISO 9001:2000 Quality Management Systems standard, ISO 14001:1996 Environmental Management Systems standard and the internationally developed British Standards Institute OHSAS 18001 Health and Safety Management specification and how they might affect maintenance organisations in the future.

This paper discusses the essential factors in teamwork development, which has been identified through action research conducted in co‐operation with UK based industries. The authors advocate how to draw on these factors for assessment of teamwork performance of organizations. Hence, the TEaM (teamwork excellence modified) model, a self‐assessment tool based on the EFQM framework is presented and discussed. This model incorporates both tangible and intangible elements of teamwork performance and provides the framework for assessment of different teams inside and/or outside of the organization.

This paper explores the implementation of a process‐based management system within a service organisation that has recently achieved certification of its quality management system to the ISO 9001:2000 requirements. Many academics and business people alike consider process‐based management as a fundamental requirement of certification to ISO 9001:2000 quality management systems. Hence, this paper discusses the definition of a process‐based management system and also considers, through a literature review, theories relating to the topic. Consequently, a theoretical model is proposed that outlines the factors affecting successful implementation of a process‐based management system. The paper demonstrates that the theoretical model has been assessed within a UK housing association enterprise case study organisation. The case study organisation presented in this paper, shows the potential barriers of implementation of a process‐based management system.

Following the growing interest in corporate governance and corporate social responsibility (CSR), the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) Committee on Consumer Policy (ISO/COPOLCO) opened the discussion about the feasibility of CSR management system standard. In this paper, we investigate the underlying issues that shape the development of CSR standard. Based on our case study research, we provide a framework for organisations to establish, manage, improve and document a CSR management system. This framework is based on process and systems thinking and analogous to ISO 9001:2000 adding significantly to existing definitive management frameworks. Finally, we outline areas for further research and indicate substantial managerial implications.

To investigate the influence of organisational culture on the implementation of ISO 14001:1996 environmental management system (EMS) standard in two manufacturing case study organisations (CSOs).

This research is a case study action research conducted in two manufacturing organisations in the UK.

The hassles authors identified a framework of four dimensions of organisational culture that play an important role during the ISO 14001:1996 implementation process of. These are recognised as people, process, structure and environment.

The study is limited to two case organisations, which are based in the UK.

The four dimensions of organisational culture identified through this research can help practitioners to coordinate their ISO 14000:1996 implementation projects.

This paper fulfils the need to improve the understanding of the impact of the organisational culture on ISO 14001:1996 implementation projects within the manufacturing environment.

This paper discusses self‐assessment and benchmarking of intangible assets in teamwork development. First examines key approaches to team‐performance measurement and present a systems perspective on teamwork, hence benchmarking of teamwork performance. In consequence, a generic model based on EFQM framework – the TEaM model, is proposed as a self‐assessment and benchmarking tool. TEaM consists of ten criteria (enablers and results) that are outlined in the paper. Also demonstrates how TEaM can be applied in organisations and how this tool reflects the emerging trends in benchmarking practice.

Higher education institutions possess a plethora of knowledge at the institutional, departmental and individual levels. Therefore, knowledge management plays a vital role in assisting partnerships to synergise knowledge and strengthen market competitiveness when working collaboratively. The purpose of this study is to identify and critically discuss the role of knowledge management concepts that support development of UK higher education partnerships. This knowledge management research was undertaken with the purpose of exploring components of behavioural constructs in assisting the development of successful partnerships between higher education institutions.

This research embraces a qualitative methodology and makes use of an expert panel method to gather field data and assess the relevance, robustness and applicability of a conceptual model developed in the context of higher education partnerships. Guided by two research questions, the researchers elicited knowledge from eight experts, academics and practitioners, who had initiated and led partnership development between UK higher education institutions. The experts were invited and selected to attend the panel using the criteria of “Years of Experience in the Higher Education sector”, “Job Positions and Experiences” and the “Partnership Scope and Impact”.

Depicting in a tree analogy, the conceptual model indicates that effective knowledge management will require higher education executives, managers and practitioners to centre on nurturing “tree roots” presented as behavioural knowledge management constructs and include institutional culture, trust, absorptive capacities and communication channels. The research findings elaborate on previous research and provide a categorisation of partnership outcomes between higher education institutions, explaining that partnership outcomes can be of an “Academic”, “Marketing and Finance” or “Managerial” nature. Importantly, practical use of the model could be implemented using audit methods or benchmarking methods, whereby the categorised elements of the model are used as a criterion of assessment for audit teams.

The conclusion extracted experiential insights to provide guidance as to how higher education executives, managers and practitioners can make use of knowledge management behavioural constructs and activities to assist collaborative undertakings in the higher education sector. This paper provided a new, modified, knowledge management higher education partnership tree, thus giving researchers and academic practitioners a holistic viewpoint of important partnership knowledge management factors.

The librarian and researcher have to be able to uncover specific articles in their areas of interest. This Bibliography is designed to help. Volume IV, like Volume III, contains features to help the reader to retrieve relevant literature from MCB University Press' considerable output. Each entry within has been indexed according to author(s) and the Fifth Edition of the SCIMP/SCAMP Thesaurus. The latter thus provides a full subject index to facilitate rapid retrieval. Each article or book is assigned its own unique number and this is used in both the subject and author index. This Volume indexes 29 journals indicating the depth, coverage and expansion of MCB's portfolio.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the role of logistics capabilities in achieving supply chain agility through a multi‐disciplinary review of the relevant research. The systematic literature review aims to provide the basis for formulating a conceptual framework of the relationship.

A systematic, comprehensive review of the literature on manufacturing, organizational and supply chain agility from 1991 through 2010 was conducted. The literature on logistics capabilities was also examined to identify the various elements that contribute to supply chain agility.

Supply chain agility has primarily been explored in the literature through a focus on manufacturing flexibility, supply chain speed, or lean manufacturing. The role of logistics capabilities in achieving supply chain agility has not been addressed from a holistic conceptual perspective. This research addresses that gap using a multi‐disciplinary approach. As such, it is the first phase in theory building on the concept of supply chain agility. Further research is needed to empirically test the conceptualized relationships.

This research is a systematic, integrative review of the existing literature on the concept of agility and logistics capabilities. As such, the next phase of research needed for theory building will be the operationalization of constructs and testing of the hypothesized relationships proposed by the conceptual framework.

The level of agility in a supply chain can determine the efficiency and effectiveness of the collective efforts. It is important that firms become more knowledgeable about the role of logistics capabilities in achieving agility.

Through a systematic, comprehensive review of the literature in four distinct areas, the paper explores the relationship between logistics capabilities and supply chain agility.

The purpose of this paper is to discuss the need for universities to develop an entrepreneurial culture and assess higher education practitioners’ opinions of the culture of the university they are working in.

The research provides empirical data collected through a survey instrument originally used for a PhD research study; however, this paper focuses on the question set related to culture, which was based on the organisational culture model presented by Quinn in 1988.

The findings indicate that a number of respondents reported from a heterogeneous population of higher education institutes predominantly responded they were working within a hierarchy cultural type with many reporting a market cultural type. While respondents from a homogeneous group from a single university reported in the main they were working in a market-driven cultural type with the next main category being a clan culture.

The study population reported in the main that there is predominantly a market culture in UK universities. However, this research has focussed entirely on respondents working within the UK HE sector, thus, has ignored potential differences that could be present within the global HE emerging markets.

The paper strengthens understanding of the critical importance of innovation and entrepreneurship in universities. Students, scholars, HE policy makers and HE practitioners can gather a range of insights pointed at university culture and rest assured in the main they are market focussed.