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Every year at this time — and in fact throughout the year — many thousands of students all over the country enrol for correspondence courses with the 20 colleges that comprise the membership of the Association of British Correspondence Colleges. The Association represents the major colleges in the United Kingdom which between them provide tuition for 12 GCE Boards, 8 London University external degrees and diplomas, some 100 professional or examining bodies, and over 150 technical, commercial, academic and leisure subjects.

Surveying hard-to-reach groups is difficult but necessary to prevent selection effects and biased sampling. Their diversity makes it difficult to recommend efficient solutions because they bring challenges that are specific to each group. Among these are limited ability in official languages, literacy problems, physical or mental disabilities or the particularities of subgroups such as ethnic, religious and cultural minorities, adolescents and the elderly. Drawing notably on lessons from migration research, this paper reviews the contemporary issues associated with five sets of circumstances that may result in groups being unreached by transport surveys.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the perception of skills shortages, namely, skills scarcity and skills deficiencies among managers, and its relationship with organizational characteristics.

The study used a quantitative approach and data were collected from 243 managers working in China. Multivariate analysis of variance and box plots were employed for data analysis.

The results revealed that organizational characteristics were found to have a significant positive impact on managers’ skill levels, and hard-to-fill vacancies caused by skills shortages were found in all types of organizations. Existing and deficient skills were also identified as affecting all organizations.

The results suggest that organizations would benefit from the adoption of a system supporting internal retention, training and development and external recruitment to close the skills gaps.

This is an empirical study that provides an insight into the skills shortages from a multi-organizational context. It highlights the effects of organizational characteristics in relation to skills shortages and provides a foundation to support the skills needed in the context of national and global organizations.

By the time these pages appear Christmas will have become but a memory; even the indigestion provoked in many of us by our zealous participation in the Christmas spirit will, it is hoped, have become a thing of the past. But as we write this spirit is abroad, and presents are still depleting our surplus finances. Every year more and more of these seasonable gifts take the form of books, and a very large percentage of children, particularly, will surely receive some reading matter from one or other of their friends or relations. Not so many years ago in most instances this Christmas book would be the only volume those children would see that year! Fortunately, we librarians can say, with Sganarelle, that “we have changed all that.” Our children's libraries throughout the country are sufficiently adequate to ensure that no child in a library area is unable to read to his or her heart's content—the days when three or four books must needs satisfy a child's thirst for reading have now been put definitely behind us.

Navigating the labyrinthine connections between people, process, technology and infrastructure is a key skill for employees in agile organisations. Political skill is imperative amongst millennials who in a continuously changing environment need to stretch their minds to accumulate and disseminate new knowledge and develop core competencies while responding to new business triggers. The purpose of this paper is to investigate a mediation model in which the effect of emotional intelligence (EI) and core self-evaluation (CSE) on knowledge-sharing intention is mediated by levels of political skill amongst millennials.

Hypotheses, on mediation, were tested with data collected from prospective employees graduating from a premier management institute in Northern India. Structural equation modelling was used to test hypotheses with bootstrapping to test mediation effects.

The findings demonstrate that the relationship between EI, CSE and knowledge-sharing intention is mediated by political skill. Theoretical and practical implications and directions for future research are followed.

This study contributes to the literature on knowledge sharing by providing a basis for understanding the mediating mechanism through which EI and CSE influence knowledge sharing. This is the first attempt examining the role of political skill as a mediator in the study of knowledge sharing, a critical lever for agile organisations to flourish. By investigating the underlying mechanisms through which individual differences impact knowledge-sharing behaviour, this study significantly supplements current research on knowledge management.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the effect of individual factors on the transfer of human resource management (HRM) knowledge in Chinese subsidiaries of multinational corporations, and to explore the relationships between individual factors and introduce the concept of joint effect‐integrated capability.

Based on the notion that certain factors can affect knowledge transfer (KT), this paper examines the effect of four factors, i.e. cultural difference and adaptability, language and communication, working relationship, and motivation and willingness, on the transfer of HRM knowledge. The paper is based on an empirical study of 22 individual HR professionals from 21 Chinese subsidiaries. Data were collected through semi‐structured interviews conducted between January and April 2004 and an exploratory data analysis was carried out with the assistance of Nvivo software.

The study has found that Chinese HR managers have the ability of all four factors to facilitate the transfer of HRM knowledge. The findings further suggest that integrated capability‐joint effect could be generated from the four factors and affect the transfer process jointly. When the capability is positive, it facilitates the transfer. Conversely, when the capability is negative, it impedes the transfer.

The findings not only extend the understanding of the effect of single factor on KT, but also the interrelationship between individual factors, their joint effect‐integrated capability and the transfer process.

Existing research has concentrated on studying the effect of single factor on KT, knowledge management by and large. There is little research investigating the correlations between individual factors. This paper addresses this gap and introduces the concept of joint effect, integrated capability.

This research specifies the factors impacting on the success of supply chain management (SCM) systems in the organizations. This paper aims to assess the effect of knowledge sharing, the vehicular ad hoc network (VANET), radio frequency identification technology (RFID) and near field communications (NFC) and the social capabilities of information technology (IT) and information and communication technology (ICT)on the success of the SCM systems and the simplification of the SCM challenges and other factors affecting its success.

A questionnaire is designed for measuring the elements of the proposed model. The questionnaires are revised by experts with experiences in SCM. For statistical analysis, SPSS 24.0 and SMART- PLS (partial least squares) 3.2.6 software package are used. The structural equation modeling (SEM) analysis procedure is conducted in two stages. The reliability analysis and confirmatory factor for analyzing the dimensions and items are included in the first stage. The second stage involves evaluating the assumptions through the SEM.

The results have depicted that four variables (knowledge sharing, VANET, RFID and NFC, and the social capabilities of using IT) affect the success of SCM systems.

This research specifies the factors impacting on the success of SCM in the organizations. These technologies aid companies in improving their performance in the SCM and facilitating coherence and collaboration.

The present study aims to explore knowledge sharing to evoke affective commitment of Gen Y employees through competency development.

The research uses cross-sectional survey to collect primary data. A questionnaire is developed based on extensive review of literature. A sample was obtained from Gen Y employees (born between 1980 and 2000) working in software organizations in India. In total, 582 completely filled, usable questionnaires were obtained.

Results indicate that knowledge sharing has a positive effect on competency development of Gen Y employees, which in turn, positively predicts affective commitment. Furthermore, this would result in the enhancement of employee competencies and eventually, the generation of affective commitment.

This study was limited to the software development professionals working in Indian organizations Therefore, researchers should test the research model further in other industries preferably in a different country.

The more knowledge assets are shared in the organization, the higher the enhancement of employee competencies will become. To evoke emotional attachment of Gen Y employees, an organization must implement learning and development interventions

This study contributes to knowledge management literature, particularly knowledge sharing by exploring its possible linkage with employee attitudinal outcomes through empirical data. This also happens to be an empirical study to investigate Gen Y employees’ commitment in Indian context.

The purpose of this paper is to illustrate existing learning and development (L&D) practices of an Indian HR consulting firm.

Structured interviews were conducted with 24 delivery managers to collect primary data and then content was analysed to develop the case study.

Mentoring, cross-training, knowledge sharing, job rotation, eLearning and social media–enabled learning tools are instrumental in executing L&D strategy of the case company.

The author recognises the scope of this study is limited to the HR consulting sector in India, and it lacks empirical investigation.

Organisations must implement a holistic L&D strategy.

It is one of the first studies to explore L&D practices in the context of Indian HR consulting sector.