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In the last two decades the economic literature has devoted significant attention to the mechanisms behind firms′ recruitment strategies as a possible way of reducing (un)employment problems. At the workfloor many efforts have also been made by firms to develop strategies that both alleviate conflicts with employees and at the same time lead to acceptable levels of productivity. This effort has resulted in the broad acceptance of the personnel management function in the firm. Examines how successful this approach has been by focusing on the gap between practice and theory in recruitment, by investigating the extent to which and the way in which experiences and findings from actual recruitment (personnel management) have been incorporated in economic theory. Gives an overview of findings on recruitment and selection strategies of firms, with a particular emphasis on economic motives.

Analyses the UNI‐Europa Graphical Sector (UEGS) agreement on European co‐ordination of collective bargaining initially made in 1999. Explains the purpose of the agreement, its objectives, its main components, the principles underpinning it and the mechanisms by which it is reviewed. Provides empirical data on the extent to which graphical trade unions (all affiliated to the UEGS throughout Europe, in their 2000 collective bargaining round with graphical employers, were able to make accommodations consistent with the spirit of the co‐ordination of collective bargaining agreement. The research is based on official publications of UEGS, the Minutes of its Collective Bargaining Committee, the reports of its annual general meetings and attendance at its Annual Collective Bargaining Conference for Negotiators.

This paper outlines the purpose and the economic theory underpinning the Uni‐Europa Graphical co‐ordination of collective bargaining within a European context policy. It then analyses the development of the policy in terms of its scope, its institutions and its information networks. It discusses the statistical series and quantification problems involved in attempting to assess the extent to which the policy's guidelines are being achieved. The majority of UEG affiliates, however, are experiencing difficulties in gaining bargained wage increases at the national level equal to the sum of inflation increases plus average national productivity increases. Finally, it assesses the future prospects for the policy.

This article is concerned with exploring changes in the organisation of work in the graphical industry. The aim is to examine the link between employer attempts to restructure work and resilience of the prevailing machinery of collective regulation within the sector. It is structured around three main areas of work organisation change, notably the search for organisational flexibility, attempts to recast the nature of work and finally the intensification of work. It concludes by arguing that threats to union organisation emanating from the restructuring of work currently appear to be at the “edges”. The argument is that a “community of interest and identity” predicated upon strong levels of union organisation has created the necessary apparatus to redress or resist attempts to dilute unionism. However the article closes by highlighting the continuing gender segregation within the sector and argues that this community of interest must extend to cover all workers within the industry.

This paper aims to explains how the Dutch unions evolved in the post war period and the reasons why they committed such significant resources to developing strong links and assisting the new democracies of Central and Eastern Europe complete the “Transition Process”.

The author draws on his first‐hand experience as the president of the Dutch graphical union, and for many years president and vice president of the sector's international trade union federations – to give an insight as to the rationale behind international trade union cooperation and solidarity.

The paper suggests that the help and assistance provided by the West European workers organisations, although costly has brought added value to the enlarged European Trade Union movement in so much as it has ensured that the Central and Eastern European trade unions have been able to complete the transition period.

The paper provides a first hand account of the difficulties that trade unions in the former soviet block countries had to deal with during the transition period, and how trade unions in the West had to overcome ideological and historical prejudices in order to provide help and assistance to their sister unions in Central and Eastern Europe.

This paper aims to map the critical changes in the history of trade unionism in the countires which until the late 80s early 90s formed the USSR, and spans a period from 1905 to 2005.

The author has chosen to assess the role of trade unions in the former Soviet states by placing them into their historical context. The diversity of their development in the various states is discussed and the painful transition journey they made in the aftermath of the collapse of the Soviet Union is described as a means of explaining the structure and role they play in the newly created democracies within the region.

The paper emphasizes the powerful and influential role that trade unions enjoyed under the old regime when they were very much – de facto – an arm of the state machine. Their role as overseers of social and welfare benefits and enforcers of health and safety regulations and guardians of the Labour Code is compared with that in the post‐communist period when the new governments throughout the region quickly transferred those functions back to the state and in most cases consciously set out to marginalize the unions. The paper summarizes the state of play of the trade unions in the region as they seek to adapt to the new conditions and establish a new raison detra.

The existing literature contains few accounts of trade union activity and how it changed as a result of the collapse of communism in the former Soviet territories. This study of the Cultural Workers Union provides a sound base from which to launch further research into the development of free trade unions in other sectors of the region in the post‐communist period.

This paper's primary value is that it starts to fill a gap in our understanding of employee relations in the new democracies of what was the USSR and in particular the form that trade unions have taken, the role they play and the challenges that they face.

The purpose of this paper is to present a case report involving environmental performance analysis of a big Brazilian graphic company.

An “environmental performance indicator” (I_epa) was developed, which is calculated taking into consideration the weighting of potential environmental impact of each residue/sub-product generated, the relative spatial dispersion which each residue/sub-product can reach and adequacy evaluation of final allocation accomplished by the company for each residue/sub-product.

Despite the evidence that the corporations emit gases generated by the burning of volatile organic compounds to the atmosphere, the result obtained is favorable to enterprise, largely, due to the adequate allocation given to industrial effluent, which is the waste with the largest share on I_epa (50.2 percent). Industrial effluent is collected by a company licensed by Environmental Sanitation Company of the state of São Paulo, which is an environmentally adequate practice. The result of I_epa=90.8 percent is explained by the large amount of CO₂ emitted by the operations into the atmosphere throughout the year.

The method used can be applied to measure the environmental impact generated by any business of a graphic service sector.

The authors observed, in the specialized literature, a small number of works dealing with the environmental management of graphic sector companies, as well as methodologies for assessing the environmental performance of companies through environmental performance indicators. The originality of the work is in the developed method, which takes into account: the potential impact of each residue/sub-product generated; the amount of each residue/sub-product generated in a given time period; the dispersion that each residue/sub-product can attain; and the evaluation of eventual allocation of each residue/sub-product.

The purpose of this paper is to propose a new business process representation adapted to the needs of Industry 4.0 to facilitate the implementation of technological solutions in the construction sector.

This work is based on the Design Research Methodology approach and includes four phases: (1) a literature review on the main business process modeling standards and their ability to take into account the specificities of Industry 4.0; (2) the identification of the attributes to be considered to model Industry 4.0 processes; (3) the development of a mapping model for Industry 4.0; and (4) the validation of the model using a case study from the construction sector.

To the authors’ knowledge, current business process modeling standards do not effectively represent business processes in the context of Industry 4.0.

The proposed model can represent not only the 4.0 solutions that can be implemented in the construction sector, particularly from a technology and data perspective but also measures, with the help of performance indicators, the impacts of successive process changes in terms of skills, cost and time for a true 4.0 transformation.

Instructing a robot to perform a task is rarely a simple process, even if the task is straightforward by human standards. One reason for this is that the sub‐task flow into which the human mind naturally breaks the task differs greatly from information a robot needs to perform the task.