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The aim of this study is an exploration of the behavioural addictions to work (workaholism) and to use of technology (technolophilia), particularly as they overlap in managers' work routines and expectations placed on their employees.

The paper presents a qualitative analysis of managers' comments from structured interviews and focus groups in several countries.

This research culminated in a model of various adaptations to both work pressure and need to use technology in today's business work, including the potential to over‐adapt or lapse into a pattern of addiction.

The consolidation of multi‐disciplinary literature and the framework of the model will serve as a reference points for continuing research on behavioural addictions related to work and technology.

Human resource professionals concerned with employee well‐being can utilize the components of this model to proactively recognize problems and generate remedies. Specific suggestions are offered to offset undesirable adaptations.

This is the first study to focus on the mutually reinforcing addictions to work and use of technology – an important step forward in recognizing the scope of the issue and generating further research with practical application in business world.

To explore whether workaholism seems to be a pre‐requisite for success in the high‐technology industry.

Survey results from a team of fourteen managers are used as a case study, to examine tendencies believed to relate to workaholism. A variety of cross comparisons are presented as scatter plots to frame the discussion, along with composite profiles of individual managers.

While some of the managers seemed to represent the archetypal workaholic, some were quite the opposite. Others classified as either moderate or at‐risk.

Study took place within one company and using measures taken within a relatively short time span of several months. Statistical comparisons were not possible with a group of 14. The management group was exclusively male, eliminating any potential for gender comparisons.

These managers had proven success within the same company and a high demand industry. Yet some did not display workaholic characteristics, refuting the idea that a demanding and fast‐paced environment requires one must be a workaholic to succeed.

Multiple measurement scales are used to develop composite profiles based on various aspects suggesting workaholism. This is an important examination of differences among managers within a context often cited as supporting, or perhaps requiring, workaholic tendencies. These examples indicate that employees need not sacrifice all else for work in order to get ahead.

To provide current information on managers' expectations of their employees, toward structuring future research on amount of time and energy devoted to work.

Qualitative data, acquired through focus groups and interviews, provide a sample of the perceptions of 57 managers in the mid‐Atlantic region of the USA regarding employees' work ethic.

The results are presented as descriptive information of interest in formulating future research. The traditional work ethic (hard work, responsibility, diligence) still dominates managers' expectations, and they believe many employees have lost the willingness to work now for later returns (that was a key component of the early Protestant work ethic in the USA). Many of the concerns these managers expressed parallel predictions by writers in social and economic history – for example, influence of early social development, emphasis on everything “instant”, and the pressure through technology to work anywhere/anytime. Some implications for practice are discussed.

This study is unique in that it asks the managers directly about their individual expectations. Literature reflects both individual and organizational pressures for hard work, but the organizational side is assessed through examining unfortunate outcomes of policies and practices. The personal comments of the managers provide an important dimension to considering demands of the workplace.

John Seely Brown notes that context must be added to data and information to produce meaning. To move forward, Brown suggests, we must not merely look ahead but we must also learn to “look around” because learning occurs when members of a community of practice (CoP) socially construct and share their understanding of some text, issue or event. We draw explicitly here on the structural components of a Habermasian lifeworld in order to identify some dynamic processes through which a specific intellectual capital creating context, CoP, may be theoretically positioned. Rejecting the individualistic “Cogito, ergo sum” of the Cartesians, we move in line with Brown’s “we participate, therefore we are” to arrive within a Habermasian community of practice: we communicate, ergo, we create.

Organizational change initiatives are successful only through the efforts of the people, so it is important to look beyond surface reactions and understand the deeper implications of employees' visible work habits. By integrating work from several disciplines, this paper poses a series of questions aimed at creating better awareness of differences in how and why people work. Historic tracking of beliefs about work in the USA is provided as an example of how a positive foundation of strong work ethic can become the dysfunctional extreme of workaholism.

The authors use Agarwal's (1992, 1997) research methodology for analyzing the intersection of gender, poverty and the environment in rural India and apply it to the case of fishing communities in Newfoundland. Here too, environmental degradation, “statization” and privatization of hitherto public resources, as well as technological development, and erosion of community management systems, effect similar adverse consequences on women. In both cases the effects are magnified by a retrenchment of liberal ideology that shrivels state social programs. We find the devaluation of women's fishing knowledge, their decreasing health and general nutrition, and the gendered nature of financial and temporal-spatial stress are associated with these larger trends.

George Mortimer Pullman (1831-1897), nineteenth century US luxury rail car entrepreneur, divides opinion. Some commemorate Pullman as a brilliant industrialist, innovator and self-made man. Others view him as a loathsome robber baron, union buster, racist and affront to democracy. This paper aims to demonstrate Pullman’s significant contribution to marketing.

Historical accounts of Pullman are re-examined to highlight his company’s unique adaptation of numerous marketing techniques (consumer research, brand strategy, public relations, product launch, fashion cycle, advertising, product placement and customer service marketing).

Pullman’s distinct flair for understanding his market enabled him to develop marketing strategies intertwined with broader cultural changes in ideals and practices. Pullman’s construction of destination tourism met an expanding white middle class desire for recreation and escape from the economic and racial inequality of the city. Pullman’s creed that beauty acted as a civilizing agent spoke to the social norms of leisure class femininity. Constant release of ever-grander rail cars shaped a fashion cycle around which wealthy men’s status competition turned. Pullman pioneered the leasing of luxury to control his best asset: the service of black Porters’.

First, this paper provides a new perspective on George Pullman, a significant figure in US history. Second, it addresses a common bias in nineteenth century historical accounts that privilege the contribution of men, industrial labor and production and shadow the role of consumption, women and leisure. Third, it challenges the idea of a clean divide between industrial and post-industrial economies by tracing contemporary consumer culture practices to their nineteenth century roots (marketing, destination tourism, brand stories, democratization of fashion, tipping and service with a smile).

An in-depth analysis of how senior managers in a large multinational corporation interpret their social and environmental responsibilities revealed that, notwithstanding formal corporate interpretations, discrepancies persisted in their interpretation of what was expected of them and how to implement it. Two fault lines emerged: (1) an instrumental versus a normative interpretation of corporate societal responsibilities, and (2) a focus on ‘doing less/no harm’ versus ‘doing more good’. This chapter introduces a theoretical framework that combines these fault lines to form four quadrants that each represent a different set of challenges managers face as they commit to improving their organisation’s impact on society. Rather than adjudicate between them, a holistic interpretation of corporate social responsibility (CSR) takes all four types into account. But the four types of challenges differ considerably in nature and thus in the strategic approach that is necessary to deal with them. In this chapter, each quadrant is discussed in detail. What characterises the issues in this quadrant, what mindset, and what strategy are necessary to address them? The chapter concludes with the observation that the framework, and the taxonomy of types of CSR challenges that it brings to the fore, creates greater awareness of how industries are confronted with different sets of challenges and thus need different strategic approaches. A better understanding of these differences may lead to more support, in particular for those managers who work in industries that face a disproportionate share of one particular type of challenges, the ‘nasty trade-offs’.