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The purpose of this study is to empirically test the extent to which gossip plays a role in individual reputation development in the context of contemporary organizations. This study answers the continuous calls to integrate theory across fields by exploring the theoretical links between these two constructs.

This study provides a conceptual analysis and general review of the literature on gossip and reputation. The relationship between these two constructs is investigated through a two-study package (lab and field) yielding convergent results.

The findings of this study are that gossip contributes to organizational identity in that it reinforces the social norms of groups and that gossip serves as an important enabler of reputational development. This study provides empirical evidence that gossip serves a more significant role in the development of personal reputation than more formal methods of communication.

As organizations and individuals attempt to develop and capitalize on the effects of individuals’ reputations, this study provides practical insights into the knowledge that needs to be built regarding the method by which this development can occur. This study points to the practical value of gossip in the creation of personal reputation.

The theoretical framework in this study highlights the centrality of gossip as a primary enabler of reputation development in contemporary organizations. Reputation theory is advanced by studying a segment of the construct that has, until now, been excluded from consideration in this field.

The purpose of this paper is to analyse the construction of discourses in current popular management models described in the field of management coaching in order to examine the disciplining forms and the type of authority appeal drawn upon in these models.

The authors apply a discourse analysis to two selected works on management coaching in order to investigate the rhetorical articulation of the coaching concept in terms of established discourses of management.

It seems that the analysed works draw on both a rationalistic and a spiritual paradigm of disciplining. Self‐realisation is mainly a superficial change. The discourse pattern thus fits into a wider social postmodern context in which social order seems to be constituted through a blending of rational and spiritual discourse order.

The analysis provides insight into the extent to which management coaching practices are likely to facilitate intrinsic employee involvement and hence organisational innovation and learning.

Since there are only sparse studies of discourse analysis within management coaching, the study provides new insight into how a rather new emerging management technique constructs and disciplines the employee's project of self‐realisation.

Is leadership theory ready for a major reappraisal? Theories of leadership are explored through underlying sets of assumptions (basic frameworks or paradigms). The result is a convenient way of negotiating a vast body of literature. This meta‐analysis offers scope for further research, and linkages between theory and practice. For example, charismatic theory is identified as being ripe for paradigm shift.

The purpose of this article is to assess managers' evaluation of risk associated with applicable uncontrollable forces when developing pricing strategies.

The present study is based on attribution theory. An experiment using more than 100 business managers was conducted to assess the perceived risk of uncontrollable environmental factors.

The findings suggest that when uncontrollable environmental factors dominate pricing managers tend to select pricing strategies with external orientations to deflect risk away from themselves personally.

This research is limited to pricing strategies and not a broader selection of marketing strategies. The present research provides greater insight as to why managers make certain strategic pricing decisions.

This paper suggests management should frame decision‐making contexts so that minimizing personal exposure is consistent with corporate goals and objectives.

This paper is an extension of previous research examining the managers' perception of risk. In particular, this paper focuses on how managers examine/evaluate risk and how that impacts their decision‐making process when selecting pricing strategies.

This paper begins with a comprehensive review of the management literature on culture, and demonstrates close parallels with research and writings on organisational climate and values. The paper then reports the findings from an empirical investigation into the relationship between the organisational culture, climate, and managerial values of a large Australian public sector agency. The relative strengths of four dimensions of culture in this organisation were measured using Hofstede’s instrument. Added to this were items from a questionnaire developed by Ryder and Southey, derived from the Jones and James instrument measuring psychological climate and providing scores across six specific dimensions of organisational climate. Measures of managerial values, drawn from a questionnaire by Flowers and Hughes, were also incorporated. Results show that levels of culture within this particular organisation are at variance with those reported by Hofstede from his Australian data. Findings indicate a strong link between specific organisational climate items and a number of managerial values dimensions. Additional relationships between particular dimensions of culture, climate and managerial values are also reported. From this, a hypothesised, predictive model of linkages between the constructs is presented.

In assessing international marketing endeavours, it is essential to understand customer services as a function of the logistics structures of global organisations. Users form idiosyncratic perceptions of service, and these ultimately influence the survival of the organisation‐customer relationship. The process by which users form impressions of an organisation′s services and its apparent service deficits must be understood. Perceptions of service can vary on a global basis. An attempt is made to develop a framework that accounts for such variation as well as provide general guidance regarding user perceptions and misperceptions of customer service.

The purpose of this research paper is to examine the role corporate and individual risk (from the point of view of the pricing manager) plays in developing pricing strategies.

Managerial professionals in two graduate business programs were used to assess riskiness associated with pricing strategies. Grounded in attribution theory, t‐tests were used to compare the different types of risk associated with the various pricing strategies.

The findings suggest that pricing managers will view risk from different perspectives (i.e. corporate and individual) and that this “point of view” should have an impact on the pricing strategies selected.

Research limitations include the use of graduate students in lieu of actual pricing managers. However, this research is a first step in examining the different perspectives of risk that may be taken by managers.

Pricing managers and organizations alike should be made aware of how a point‐of‐view perspective regarding risk can have a significant impact on selecting pricing strategies. The results of the study could provide guidance for corporations so that they can make sure pricing managers have the “correct” point of view regarding the riskiness of pricing strategies.

The research is the first to identify and examine the different risk perspectives. This provides value for academic research because it is the first in the area of risk regarding the different perspectives.

THE training model to be discussed is based on an integrated set of manual and mechanised indexing systems, all handling the same body of information from a limited subject field. By extending the scope of the model's operations to include prior and subsequent activities like the selection and abstracting of the documents to be indexed, and the preparation and dissemination of material through the use of the indexes, the model may be used for a wide range of documentation training, principally at three levels: demonstration by the lecturer to the students; use by the students in the retrieval and dissemination of information; and development by the students through the selection and abstracting of documents, the indexing and storage of information and ultimately the use of feedback from the dissemination stage to improve the systems.

EVERY now and again, one of the solemn monthly or quarterly magazines, by way of enlivening its pages, inserts a terrific onslaught on municipal libraries, in which the judgment of heaven is called down upon the fiction reader, and the library authorities are condemned as a set of ignorant and inefficient office‐holders, who pander to a depraved public taste. The last assailant of this sort whom we had the pleasure of setting right was Mr. J. Churton Collins, who used the Nineteenth Century and After, as the medium for conveying his accusations. Now comes Mr. W. H. Harwood, who fills six‐and‐a‐half pages of the Westminster Review for February, 1906, with a quantum of twaddle about libraries, which differs from most recent articles of the same sort only in its dulness. In his use of this journalistic cliché, Mr. Harwood displays the customary ignorance of the Public Libraries Acts, by styling his paper “Free Libraries and Fiction,” and by his failure to prove even one of his statements by reference to a single concrete fact. Briefly, Mr. Harwood's position is this:—