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This paper summarises the results of a survey of how Canadian firms are implementing continuous improvement (CI) programs, where CI is defined as a set of activities intended to achieve ongoing improvement in customer satisfaction, productivity, and quality. The paper first summarizes and compares certain market and organisational characteristics of survey respondents from the auto and auto parts, electronics, metals and metal‐processing, and food‐processing industries. Next, the study examines the extent to which specific CI practices are being implemented within each industry. Conclusions are presented, based on statistical analysis, on similarities and contrasts among the four industries in the extent to which they implement particular CI practices. Finally, the authors seek to provide insights into why each industry establishes its CI practices at specific levels, by relating the adoption of CI practices to the market and organisational characteristics of firms in that industry.

Examines the literature to identify the essential components of kaizen or continuous improvement programmes. Relying on published sources on the North American experience with continuous improvement, also tries to identify organizational structures and practices likely to lead to successful implementation of such programmes. Distinguishes between kaizen and more radical, “strategic leap” improvement approaches, and describes the North American record of success with continuous improvement programmes. An emergent theme is that success with continuous improvement requires a wide array of systems, processes, and orientations to be congruent within the organization. Argues that the study of when, how, and why kaizen succeeds is by no means complete, and proposes a set of open research questions whose investigation is likely to be useful to both scholars and practitioners. Finally, discusses some of the ways in which the existing literature can be immediately useful for practice in organizations.

This study seeks to demonstrate that employees' reactions to their supervisors' influence behaviors are governed by meanings inferred from the behaviors. Another aim is to develop a method in which “weights” for predicting employees' reactions are assigned using mean ratings of perceptions of the features and social/organizational implications of the influence behaviors.

Employees of an energy utility completed survey questionnaires concerning the extent of their supervisors' use of specified influence tactics. Employees' organizational commitment, supervisor commitment, turnover intention, and stress also were surveyed. A separate, community sample rated the influence tactics for dimensions of meaning or implications of the tactics. Data from the two samples were combined in a novel arithmetic scoring procedure as one of several analyses looking for evidence of the specified dimensions' effects.

The study finds that employees' work attitudes and other outcomes were predicted to a statistically significant degree by dimensional, perceptual characterizations of the influence tactics used by their supervisors. In culminating multiple regression analyses, respectfulness was associated with supervisor commitment, turnover intention, and emotional distress; directness was associated with organizational commitment. Additional analyses indicated that other dimensions of meaning also were associated with outcomes.

The meanings of supervisors' influence behaviors are somewhat culture‐specific, so the generalizability of findings to other cultures is uncertain. However, the central role of social inferences in reactions to supervisors' influence behaviors may be replicable to other cultures if culture‐specific content or ratings are substituted there. This research also has the usual limitations of cross‐sectional, correlational research.

In their interactions with employees, managers and supervisors should be aware that their influence behaviors, collectively, generate reactions that are significant for employees' motivation and well‐being. Supervisory behaviors and work contexts should be managed so that employees will infer that their supervisors are showing respect and are being honest and direct.

Processes previously assumed to intervene between supervisory influence behavior and employee reactions were operationalized and demonstrated. Novel methods were developed for this research, and these methods may also be applicable to other research domains that involve sets of behaviors that parallel existing schemes for influence behavior.

This paper aims to respond to Yammarino's article in this issue on level of analysis and the US Constitution.

This paper expands on two concepts central to levels of analysis: entity and causal process. Then additional alternative ways of conceptualizing, analyzing, and representing multi‐level organizations – beyond the organization chart – are described. A rationale for America's use of the Electoral College is sought.

The paper reveals connections among traditional notions of hierarchy (including the traditional organization chart) and contemporary social network concepts.

Leaders and other members of social and organizational systems should be mindful of their mental representations of hierarchy, of organizational or social groupings (e.g., US States), and of social distance. These representations can influence behaviors and perceptions, including perceived fairness of procedures.

The paper presents interesting information on connections among traditional notions of hierarchy and contemporary social network concepts.

This paper aims at interpreting the epistemology of marketing. The paper investigates several research questions, proposing some initial reflections concerning their impact on marketing.

The paper addresses the research questions by conducting an analysis of the marketing literature. An analysis of philosophical postmodern literature is also carried out. The paper's attempt constantly to create links between the level of philosophical elaboration and that of marketing research leads to a proposal of new approach to marketing research: experiential research.

In the paper's review of the marketing literature the traditional pragmatic approach of marketing as a discipline is highlighted. Its strong managerial perspective has partly diverted researchers’ attention from the theory, and focused it mainly on the method. This has created an increasingly marked distinction between the marketing literature aimed at management, and that aimed at the academic community. The postmodern perspective on marketing calls for a rethinking of the “scientific nature” of marketing as an investigative field.

The main point is that marketing cannot be a scientific discipline only by adopting a scientific method. Marketing research is by definition different in nature: it cannot generate better but only different knowledge. This perspective shift has an impact on all research components. First, the field of research widens enormously, because researchers can deal with everything arousing their interest and to which their accumulated knowledge can be applied. Since the discipline does not become scientific, the researcher can use any method. All methods can originate scientific theories, and therefore incremental knowledge. Hence science is neither objective nor absolute.

This paper analyses the philosophical roots of postmodernism, in order to understand its impact on postmodern marketing better. It also focuses on the impact of postmodernism on marketing research, and proposes a new approach. This paper then explores the features of the experiential research in marketing, and its effect on the processes of generating knowledge.

The purpose of this paper is to reflect upon the contributions made to the social and environmental accounting literature by papers that comprised a 2002 Special Issue of Accounting, Auditing and Accountability Journal (AAAJ) entitled social and environmental reporting and its role in maintaining or creating organisational legitimacy. This paper will also provide insights into the origins of legitimacy theory as used in the social and environmental accounting literature as well as providing reflections about the strengths, and shortcomings, of the theory. Suggestions are made with respect to the ongoing application, and development, of legitimacy theory.

As a commentary, this paper utilises a review of the social and environmental accounting and institutional literature across a number of decades to reveal insights about the development and use of legitimacy theory as a basis to explain social and environmental reporting practices. Citation data are also used to indicate the potential impact that the papers in the 2002 Special Issue had upon subsequent research.

This commentary shows that the 2002 Special Issue is the most highly cited issue in the history of AAAJ. It also shows that individually, some of the papers in the Special Issue represent some of the most highly cited papers in the social and environmental accounting literature. The commentary provides arguments to suggest that the development of legitimacy theory is in need of further refinement, and suggests a way in which this refinement might take place.

This paper is largely based on the opinions of one researcher, and the evidence presented in the paper is selected on the basis that it is deemed sufficient to support the opinions being projected. The paper also relies on citation data as an indicator of “impact”. The implication of the research is that it identifies a “way forward” for the development of theory applicable to the understanding of organisational social and environmental reporting practices.

The study provides evidence to show that the 2002 Special Issue was significant within the context of AAAJ, and also within the context of the evolution of the social and environmental accounting literature. The description of the history of the development of legitimacy theory, and of the theory’s subsequent application, provides a solid impetus for future refinements to the theory.