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This paper reflects on the experiences gained through developing a partnership with the International Management Centres Association to deliver action learning programmes in a totally virtual environment over the Internet for alumni dispersed around the world and presents a framework to be used in development of future distance and action learning programmes at The Swiss Hotel Association Hotel Management School Les Roches. The framework is a culmination of two years’ work in implementing a graduate distance and action learning MBA degree programme for Les Roches alumni. The study, based on action research methodology, integrates the design and evaluative work with prior research, publications and subject‐related expertise in the context of leading a team in exploring ways of improving the design and functions of virtual tutoring.

The aim of this article is to examine the relationship of service employees perceptions of servant leadership provided by their supervisors/managers and employee’s reports of service quality provided to clients by their hotels.

Data were collected from 221 frontline employees, a 37 per cent response rate, working in four- and five-star hotels in Cappadocia, Turkey. Previously developed and validated measures of servant leadership (Liden et al., 2008) and service quality (Parasuraman et al., 1988) were used and both were found to be highly reliable in this study.

Respondents were generally young, had relatively short organizational tenure and had high school educations. Respondents having longer organizational tenures and those working in five-star hotels reported lower levels of servant leadership. Longer tenured employees, and males, rated some dimensions of service quality lower as well. Service employees reporting higher levels of servant leadership from their supervisors/managers generally indicated higher levels of service quality.

Some limitations should be noted. First, all data were collected using respondent self-reports, raising the limited possibility of response set tendencies. Second, the sample, while reasonably large, may not be representative of all hotel employees in Turkey. Third, all properties were located in one region of Turkey and may not be representative of hotel employees in other regions of the country.

First, organizations could select individuals exhibiting higher levels of servant leadership potential based on indications that these individuals are interested in developing long-term relationships with staff and co-workers and in helping them become more skilled in doing their jobs. Selection can also be augmented by servant leadership training (Fulmer and Conger, 2004). Supervisors/managers could be coached to help them develop their staff and help them meet their unique goals (Raelin, 2003). Finally, workplace cultural value supportive of both servant leadership and service quality can be identified, modeled by senior level managers, supported and rewarded.

Most studies focus on defining and measuring servant leadership or service quality. This study investigates the relationship between servant leadership and service quality.

This chapter flips innovation on its head. Instead of validating our ideas in the market, why not facilitate a market already motivated to change to do so. Theoretical and empirical evidence is presented to support this theory, along with tools and techniques enabling Innovation Leaders to deliver radical change. Three case studies are shared showing how successful innovation leaders have researched and developed opportunities for radical innovation.

The literature on the past triggering learning in strategy practice is scant. To fill this gap, this study aims to examine the meaning of the past to learning in strategy practice and expands on the strategy-as-practice (SAP) literature. Understanding the relationship between the past and learning in strategy practice is important because learning is what keeps strategy practice in motion and remains in place, even if organizations and strategy practitioners change.

The authors used a longitudinal case study design combined with historical methods to examine how the past is embedded in present strategy practice. To capture learning in strategy practice over time, the authors applied a four-stage methodology in our analysis of document and interview data.

The authors identified four dimensions of the past embedded in the present strategy practice. These dimensions emerged from the analysis of the interviews and document data. The study’s results showed that the past appears in structures and routines, materiality, positioning and reflecting over repeated rounds of strategic planning. According to the study’s results, reflecting on strategy practice draws on past structures and routines, positioning and materiality. The past facilitates reflecting and reflecting on the past enables learning in strategy practice.

The authors constructed a conceptual model and showed that in strategy practice, reflection triggers learning. The authors contributed to theory development by demonstrating how the past is embedded in present strategy practice and is available for use by strategy practitioners. The authors showed that strategy practice is a continuous learning process.

This paper explores how medical quality management has developed in the USA since the 1900s reviewing and summarizing the history of the movement through an extensive literature review. With a particular emphasis on action learning as a theoretical construct, the paper then assesses the extent to which action learning can be applied to the quality process. Using two case studies from the literature, the paper suggests that the action learning process, can in fact overcome some of the problems related to the implementation of quality initiatives in medical settings, and in particular those related to the fear expressed often by physicians that quality procedures emphasize cost cutting at the expense of patient care.

Business Schools and other executive training providers have come under withering attacks since before the global financial crisis for their standardised, non-integrated executive curricula, rigid methods of instruction and weak participant engagement. The crisis has extended this critique. Further criticisms relate to the inability of providers who are schooled in Western paradigms of instruction to manage increasingly multi-cultural, executive workshops. This chapter proposes a play-based approach to executive training. The chapter argues that a play-based approach re-dresses some of the above imbalances and re-positions the interests of entrepreneurial and executive learners. The chapter evaluates the development of the approach to learning by using play-based and experiential-learning simulator called Synergy. Initial arguments are presented with indications and results on why play-based designs can offer a productive response to some of the current criticisms that are levelled at executive and entrepreneurial training provision.

Physician leadership programs serve to develop individual capabilities and to affect organizational outcomes. Evaluations of such programs often focus solely on short-term increases in individual capabilities. The purpose of this paper is to assess long-term individual and organizational outcomes of the Stanford Leadership Development Program.

There are three data sources for this mixed-methods study: a follow-up survey in 2013-2014 of program participants (n=131) and matched (control) non-participants (n=82) from the 2006 to 2011 program years; promotion and retention data; and qualitative in-person interview data. The authors analyzed survey data across leadership knowledge, skills, and attitudes as well as leadership titles held, following program participation using Pearson’s χ² test of independence. Using logistic regression, the authors analyzed promotion and retention among participants and non-participants. Finally, the authors applied both a grounded theory approach and qualitative content analysis to analyze interview data.

Program participants rated higher than non-participants across 25 of 30 items measuring leadership knowledge, skills, and attitudes, and were more likely to hold regional/national leadership titles and to have gained in leadership since program participation. Asian program participants were significantly more likely than Asian non-participants to have been promoted, and women participants were less likely to have left the institution than non-participants. Finally, qualitative interviews revealed the long-term impact of leadership learning and networking, as well as the enduring, sustained impact on the organization of projects undertaken during the program.

This study is unique in its long-term and comprehensive mixed-methods nature of evaluation to assess individual and organizational impact of a physician leadership program.

In a world teeming with concurrent processes and associated chaos, organizational working procedures have adapted to new trends; employees must keep up with everything while maintaining their mental health. Spirituality lends a person's life significance. Spirituality in the workplace can both physically and psychologically engage employees. Spirituality in the workplace is reflected in the organizational culture, which is founded on fundamental values such as trust, honesty, appreciation, innovation, care, respect, and loyalty. Workplace spirituality encompasses the pursuit of one's ultimate purpose in life, the development of a solid connection to colleagues and other people associated with work, and the consistency or alignment between one's fundamental beliefs and the organization's values. To have a competitive advantage and attract the best personnel, an organization's working environment must be based on strong ethical and spiritual values such as compassion, integrity, respect, harmony, trust, teamwork, and forgiveness, among others.