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The paper examines a recent example of work and employment restructuring in the Royal Navy. This involved the creation of a new employment branch (the Warfare Branch) out of two former branches: the Operations Branch and the Weapon Engineering Branch. The case study is used as a vehicle for exploring whether, and if so in what senses, technical change can be argued to have contributed to this organizational restructuring, within the wider contexts and dynamics of change.

The purpose of this paper is to review some uncertainties experienced by a group of CEs, and how they are assuaged through their participation in an executive development (ED) programme. These uncertainties relate both to their involvement in the programme as such, particularly during their early days of membership, and to their everyday work experience.

An in‐depth, longitudinal case study of an ED programme undertaken by the authors, using participant observation, semi‐structured interviews and documentary analysis.

Five main CE uncertainties are identified: knowledge, job/career, behavioural, personal, and contextual. The case study section of the paper outlines each of these uncertainties, and illustrates how they are being assuaged through the CE programme.

The usual caveats apply about generalising from a case study. On the other hand, the paper presents a rare detailed “insider” account of and reflection upon chief executives' experience of an ED programme, situating it in the wider contexts of their work and anxieties.

In the light of the uncertainties identified, a number of implications for the design and operation of executive development programmes are outlined and discussed.

New data is presented and analysed, linked to relevant themes in the ED/Leadership Development literatures.

The purpose of this paper is to explore whether talent management (TM) practices are fundamentally different from traditional approaches to human resource management (HRM) and whether TM in China is an element of the struggle by those in the human resource (HR) profession to improve its credibility and status.

Case studies are the main method of collecting data. These are supplemented by documentary analysis. Four in‐depth case studies were undertaken in Beijing. The target organizations were chosen from the information technology, health care and education sectors. The interviews were semi‐structured and were conducted with a range of stakeholders in each organization, including at least one HR specialist (normally, the senior HR professional, senior and functional managers as well as non‐managerial staff. In addition, interviews were also conducted in three management consulting firms regarded as being at the cutting edge in order to explore the orientation of such firms to the TM phenomenon.

TM emerges as being different from traditional HRM, incorporating new knowledge rather than being a simple repackaging of old techniques and ideas with new labels. Therefore, TM should not be seen simply as “old wine in new bottles” with respect to the case of China. In addition, this study challenges the idea that TM is yet another struggle by HR professionals to enhance their legitimacy, status and credibility within their organizations.

This study concerns itself with only well‐established and recognized multinational corporations in Beijing. There might be different conclusions for the other types of enterprises.

This paper offers new research on TM in China.

Recent research into communities of practice (CoPs) has focused on large organizations, suggesting they can be constructed for the purposes of knowledge acquisition and innovation. The present study found that, for science-based SMEs, CoPs are more likely to emerge unplanned to support incremental innovation in the form of problem-solving activities. This paper aims to discuss these points.

Deploying a social constructionist research methodology, thematic template analysis was used to analyze 25 in-depth interviews conducted with a range of employees in six science-based SMEs.

Both intra and inter-organizational CoPs were leveraged for a variety of purposes, including knowledge acquisition and the enhancement of the organizations' ability to generate innovative solutions.

Whilst there is no claim for the representativeness of the sample in relation to the wider population of science-based firms, the paper offers new material and theorizing in a domain which has been dominated to date by a focus upon large organizations and a managerialist orientation.

A contextualized framework for the construction of CoPs in science-based SMEs has been developed from the findings of this study.

The role of CoPs in science-based SMEs and the factors that influence their success or failure have been neglected to date, and thus have received little attention in the literature. Yet CoPs, as we found, can contribute to knowledge acquisition and innovation.

Existing brand literature on assemblage practices has focused on providing a map or geography of brand assemblages, suggesting that an artist brand’s ability to evolve and achieve brand longevity remains constant. Using geology of assemblage, this study aims to explore the types and mechanisms of change in brand evolutions to address the problem of identifying when and how a brand can transform in an evolving marketplace.

The authors apply an interpretive process data approach using secondary archival data and in-depth interviews with 31 self-identified fans to explore the artist brand David Bowie over his 50-year career.

As an artist brand, Bowie’s ability to evolve his brand was constrained by his assemblage. Despite efforts to defy ageing and retain a youth audience appeal, both the media and his fans interpreted and judged Bowie’s current efforts from a historical perspective and continuously reevaluated his brand limiting his ability to change to remain relevant.

Brand managers, particularly artist brands and human brands, may find that their ability to change is constrained by meanings in past strata over time. Withdrawal from the marketplace and the use of silence as a communicative practice enabling brand transformations.

The geology of assemblage perspective offers a more nuanced understanding of brand changes over time beyond the possibilities of incremental or disruptive change. We identify the mechanisms of change that result in minor sedimentation, moderate cracks and major ruptures in a brand’s evolution.

The purpose of this paper is to ask if customer experiences in public houses (pubs) go wrong because of poor initial and subsequent training for front-line staff, while questioning if enough is being made of employee engagement and socialization as a means to improve consistency within the pub service encounter.

The study applies a critical review of the literature with a focus on the initial and subsequent training of front-line employees in the context of managed and entrepreneur-led pub-retailing operations.

The delivery and impact of a well-designed initial training programme may not only enhance long-term employee engagement and loyalty, but also provide competitive advantage for pub-retail operations through a more consistent service delivery. The paper questions the suitability of the approach currently being adopted within the sector and suggests that change is needed in order to ensure the longer-term survival of pub-retail businesses.

Can reliable and consistent customer experiences be delivered without a more progressive approach to the initial training and engagement of front-line employees?

While the importance of initial and subsequent training is widely accepted, the potential for its poor delivery has an almost predictable impact on many customer experiences. The paper recommends a review of the methods used by managed house and entrepreneurial (tenanted and leasehold) pub-retailing businesses to enhance employee socialization, engagement and loyalty to fuel the sector’s drive to generate greater competitive advantage.

Conducting relevant research is a cornerstone of good academic practice. However, considering academics and practitioners’ divergent paradigms and social systems, it is challenging to undertake impactful research. Indeed, the research–practice gap remains an essential issue in human resource management research. There have been several calls for translating research for dissemination, making it more societally relevant, and beginning conversations and activities that move beyond the confines of the academic context. In fact, research on talent management (TM) has been accused of lagging in offering organizations vision and direction. Understanding the perceived causes and potential solutions for relevant problems is a real need to successfully narrow the TM research–practice gap. Thus, the purpose of this chapter is to offer an in-depth discussion on the research–practice gap in TM. To do so, we first identify the critical dimensions of research relevance that will help us to ground our discussion regarding the applicability of current academic TM research. By doing this, we seek to understand better what is happening with TM research, which should then help provide insights into how its practical impact can be improved.

We present a new approach that shifts the leverage point of information systems development from problem orientation to opportunity development. Our approach, entitled FormIT, employs a careful focus on enhanced user involvement, concentrating on users as human beings, and attention to users’ needs as opposed to system requirements. As theoretical and methodological foundations, we build on the 4-D cycle model of Appreciative Inquiry and current research on needfinding. Our field experience demonstrates that FormIT shifts the systems development process from being reactive to being proactive, and in turn, enables a smoother implementation of inevitable change, particularly radical change. Moreover, FormIT stimulates the generation of rich local knowledge and helps reveal deep insights into the development process and the overall organization.