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The purpose of this paper is to present the findings of an empirical research on the leanness of the home services sector in the Czech Republic. The automotive sector provides reference to argue the numerical outcomes.

The research uses a specifically designed assessment tool (Lean Index – LI) to determine the sector’s leanness level. Referring to the results from both sectors, the paper draws conclusions about the current leanness level of home services providers.

The proposed LI indicates a value of 69.50 per cent for home services providers, whereas the LI for the automotive industry suppliers is 82.88 per cent. This suggests that there are large opportunities for the implementation of lean management in the home services sector. However, the main challenge is to introduce a continuous improvement approach to these companies.

The sample size limits the generalisation of the research results. However, this paper represents the first empirical attempt to implement a large-scale survey. The results are limited to the Czech Republic. However, parties from other countries have indicated interest to replicate the research.

This research provides first empirical findings on the possibilities of implementing lean in the home services sector. Future research projects in other sectors will have the opportunity to make use of the LI assessment tool.

The paper presents the first approach of lean management into the home services sector. It provides valuable information to specialised institutions in the sector about the possibilities of lean management in the sector. It also provides an overview of the sector for practitioners and academics willing to pioneer lean in the sector.

The purpose of this paper is the introduction of a best practice tool in order to analyze operating costs in the health care sector. This study presents the findings by using a new innovative benchmarking tool to analyze operating costs, identify cost drivers and highlight the potential savings.

The paper focuses on a survey of operating and maintenance costs from 18 residential homes in Tyrol, Austria. In order to determine the volume and to prioritize the cost drivers, CAREB (Computer‐aided Real Estate Benchmarking) software was used, which was developed by the Institute of Real Estate Benchmarking at the University of Applied Sciences KufsteinTirol, Austria. Statistic analysis was conducted to investigate savings potential, determine the best case of the sample and submit recommendations to the decision‐makers.

Compared to conventional benchmarking methods, this model allows a holistic view on the key factors of cost drivers and reveals the savings potential for each dimension. The key figure which reveals the largest potential gives an indication of whether a residential home has general problems with efficiency (high costs per bed), with occupancy (costs per resident) or with the space efficiency (costs per average space consumption). Furthermore, the study reveals the immense savings potential in the costs of various services.

The paper identifies the volume and structure of the cost drivers of operating costs of buildings in the health care sector by using a new innovative benchmarking tool. This survey is based on the operating costs. Other running costs such as costs for health care personnel as well as quality indicators are not considered in this survey.

The results should help to establish cost benchmarking increasingly and develop it as a strategic planning tool in order to support management in the health care sector in the decision‐making process.

The paper presents a new measuring method which allows a holistic view of the influencing cost factors to investigate weak points in cost efficiency for the health care sector.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate ethical implications of surveillance by means of the care software “I‐Care” in the Swedish home‐help service sector.

A small‐scale interview study on home helpers' experiences of and reactions to the implementation of the care software “I‐Care” in their workspace has been conducted. The interview serves as the starting point for an ethical analysis of the impact of the care software “I‐Care” on key values within ethics: privacy, autonomy and equality.

The implementation and use case of surveillance capable technology in a home‐help service sector is assessed from the perspective of ethics. It is concluded that employees' level of awareness, access to sufficient and relevant information, as well as their chances of influencing surveillance conduct, are significant for their acceptance of the surveillance regime.

Surveillance in the home‐help service setting has been investigated from the perspective of ethnology and organizational studies but not, as here, from the perspective of ethics. Conditions for the ethical acceptance of workspace surveillance are suggested.

Southern Ireland faces similar challenges to the rest of Europe in that it has a rapidly increasing older population, seemingly infinite demand for health and social care and growing financial pressures. Against such a background, there are concerns about the quality of care provided for frail older people, especially in long‐term care settings. This paper considers some recent policy development in Ireland, with a particular focus on long‐term care. It describes the response to a series of inquiries about the quality of care in such environments and the subsequent formation of the Health Information and Quality Authority (HIQA). HIQA has just introduced a series of new inspections standards, and these are presented in the article. However, whilst these standards are to be welcomed, it is argued that standards alone will not result in improved quality unless there is also a recognition of the role and value of long‐term care as a positive care environment for older people.

Rivigo, a new entrant in the trucking business in India, believed that a new paradigm in the trucking/logistics industry could be brought about that would not only improve the quality of service dramatically, but also upgrade a truck driver's lifestyle. While the industry faced driver shortage largely due to long stays away from home, Rivigo hoped to attract drivers by offering them roles which would bring them back home in 24 hours. Drivers would be part of a relay, handing over the truck at pit stops. Further, they leveraged an IT-enabled IoT platform on a fleet of owned trucks. All this revolutionized most of the traditions then followed in the industry. The entrepreneur and his core team comprised professionals from premium institutes of the country, with experience in professional organizations in related domains. By offering services like assured delivery at half the time and full shipment visibility, Rivigo had to charge a premium to market segments that would value this. The case raises the question of sustainability in the future.

The nature of paid domestic work is changing, with the growth in companies delivering domestic cleaning services. Few studies have looked at why people opt to use these services and the underlying drivers. As with the outsourcing of non-core tasks in businesses, outsourcing domestic work is motivated by similar, yet different reasons, which have to do with the personal and private nature of domestic employment. This study aims to establish the reasons why “clients”, who were former employers of domestic servants, opted to outsource domestic work to a domestic cleaning service provider.

Given the limited research on domestic cleaning services in South Africa, a mixed-methods research approach is used.

The findings showed that there are three key motivations: the nature of the domestic cleaning service supplier, the services rendered by domestic workers and the tripartite employment relationships. These three benefits imply that clients have access to functional and numerical flexibility, unlike employing a domestic worker directly. This study contributes to the literature on outsourcing and domestic work by showing that clients not only look to change the economic structure of the relationship with domestic workers, but it allows them to psychologically and emotionally distance themselves from domestic workers.

This study shows that some people are no longer willing to have a relationship with the people who clean their homes, and that they believe it is simply not worth the effort to maintain a relationship. This is an aspect that needs further research, as this is the one sphere where women are united in their plight, albeit from different worldviews. Thus, a limitation is that this study only focuses on clients' views of outsourcing. Have domestic workers employed by the outsourced domestic cleaning service supplier become just like assembly-line workers, where they are anonymous to their clients, performing routine tasks with little recognition from those whose homes they are servicing? Future studies could focus on domestic workers' views on outsourcing and the effects it has on their working conditions and employment relations.

Firstly, studies mainly focus on the Global North where domestic work and outsourcing have different dynamics, regulation policies and social changes when compared to South Africa. Secondly, few studies have sought to establish why people shift from employing a domestic or care worker directly to an outsourced domestic agency when direct domestic help is available and affordable. Considering these shortcomings, this study aims to provide a better understanding of domestic cleaning service suppliers from the perspective of clients, often omitted from the literature. Accordingly, this study aimed to establish what the benefits are for clients (former employers of domestic workers) who use domestic cleaning service suppliers.

The purpose of this paper is to analyze employees’ trajectories within the Accreditation of Prior Experience Learning process (APEL) in France. It seeks to understand how candidates implement this right, the resources and supports required to manage this implementation, and how employer‐employee relationships impact on the end result.

The paper draws on a new national survey of more than 3,000 employed APEL candidates, most of whom are women working in the care sector.

The paper argues that individual pathways within this process are influenced more by the socio‐economic issues at stake in a given sector, its certification policies, environmental incentives and employer‐employee joint investments than by individual characteristics. All these elements go to configure a “capability pathway”, comprising individual resources, rights, and environmental, social and individual conversion factors.

A better understanding of employers’ role and the support they provide during the course of the overall process can help increase the efficiency of lifelong learning. Spaces of mediation at candidates’ disposal and real freedom at work, such as exercising one's right to voice and aspiring to development, are determinant.

Not much is known about how corporate policies affect individual employee pathways within the framework of the Accreditation of Prior Experience Learning (APEL) process in France. The paper contributes to this literature by using a recent survey econometrically investigating the impact of joint employer‐employee investment.

Looks at healthcare and technology and how home care service is coming more to the fore. Discusses IT and how it will further improve both cost and clinical procedures without losing the human contact part of it.