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In higher education libraries, the concept of the user experience has increased in profile and importance. The concept of the “student as customer” has generated much debate but there is general agreement that universities need to be more successful in meeting student expectations. A key strategic area for university libraries has been to adapt and improve their physical spaces to ensure that they are still relevant for today’s students. York and Loughborough University Libraries have both undergone building refurbishments and both are committed to monitoring and reviewing services and spaces. The paper aims to discuss these issues.

There were various constraints which very much influenced the methodology. These included: avoiding survey overload no resource allocation an acknowledgement that the methodology employed needed to combine rigour and validity with a pragmatic approach to data collection. A joint project team was established of representatives from each university. A questionnaire created on Google Forms was administered by staff with individuals in the library and entering the data onto a iPad.

Findings provide evidence of use across a range of users along with valuable information on who is using our library spaces and for what purpose.

This research is a rich contribution to the evidence based around student’s learning in universities. It benefits from the expertise and knowledge of two university libraries. As university’s continue to develop learning spaces, this work will enable further investigation around what makes a successful learning space and what makes the library a destination of choice.

The purpose was to examine the development of transformational and transactional leadership skills among Generation X collegiate student organizational officers and members. This study looked at the organizational structure of each group and member’s gender to determine if these variables were related to leadership style. In this correlational study 190 college students between the ages of 18-22 from two different leadership organizations were given the Multifactor Leadership Questionnaire (Bass & Avolio, 1995). Significant relationships were found between the transformational leadership scores and gender. It was found that female student leaders tended to be more transformational than male student leaders. Males had a tendency to portray transactional leadership skills. The type of organization did not influence what type of leader emerged. Although Generation X attributes suggest all members are more transformational, it was concluded that gender continues to have a significant impact on the development of student leader transformational leadership skills.

The purpose of this paper is to present a case study of the implementation and use of the Value Scorecard in a university library. The Value Scorecard seeks to articulate the full value of a library through a four dimensional matrix populated with data, evidence and narrative.

The study covers two years of collection of data and evidence to populate the Value Scorecard at the University of York, UK. This is action research and development.

The paper describes the success of the implementation of the framework across a broad university service including library, archives and IT services. The reporting template is outlined and the availability of relevant measures for populating each dimension are discussed, together with developments in the concepts of each dimension since the original paper on the scorecard. The paper reflects on the advances in the understanding and practice of performance measurement and assessment in libraries that the Value Scorecard offers. The strengths and omissions of other pre-existing frameworks, including the Balanced Scorecard, are discussed and absorbed into the value framework. The application of the Value Scorecard offers a practical and successful framework for library performance measurement and advocacy in a dynamic and changing landscape.

The limitations of the research are those generally applying to a single case experience.

Nothing arises from the study to suggest that other libraries could not apply this framework, as it encompasses other previous frameworks and allows for local variations and circumstances. Some elements of the framework lack full measurement methods, and this is discussed.

The originality and value of the paper is that it provides a unique framework for measurement of all dimensions of activity and value in an academic research library, and one that can be tailored to local requirements.

The purpose of this paper is to present a case study of the use of people surveys to enact change in human capital organization and practices in a University library.

The study covers seven years of people surveys and the consequent interventions applied based on this and other data and evidence at the University of York, UK. The case describes measurement of staff’s lived experience, leading to innovation and intervention in management strategies, structures and policies. The research employs a mixed methodology; the paper draws on quantitative evidence from surveys, qualitative evidence from focus groups and desk research on human capital measurement and emotion in the workplace.

The paper describes the findings of investigations across seven years, discusses the available methods for people assessment, and the different theoretical foundations of the engagement, climate and excellence surveys used across the period. Strategic and structural interventions are described and their effectiveness discussed.

The limitations of research in the field of human capital are discussed, including the participant observation of the library director, together with the potential confounding factors affecting data collected during the period of research.

The paper reflects on advances in the understanding and practice of people evaluation in libraries. The development of a people strategy based on evidence, and repetition of surveys to gauge the effectiveness of interventions, with consequent refinement of solutions, appear to have had a real effect on the lived experience, culture and service provided by the case library.

The originality and value of the paper is that it provides a unique long-term case study of people surveys, strategy and structure in an academic research library.

Two major reform movements have shaped child and adolescent mental health services over the past quarter-century: the Systems of Care movement, and more recently, the movement toward evidence-based practice. Results from several studies indicate that youth served in traditional residential or inpatient care may experience difficulty re-entering their natural environments, or were released into physically and emotionally unsafe homes (Bruns & Burchard, 2000; President's Commission on Mental Health, 1978; Stortz, 2000; Stroul & Friedman, 1986; U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, 1999). The cost of hospitalizing youth also became a policy concern (Henggeler et al., 1999b; Kielser, 1993; U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, 1999). For example, it is estimated that from the late 1980s through 1990 inpatient treatment consumed nearly half of all expenditures for child and adolescent mental health care although the services were found not to be very effective (Burns, 1991; Burns & Friedman, 1990). More recent analyses indicate that at least 1/3 of all mental health expenditures for youth are associated with inpatient hospitalization (Ringel & Sturm, 2001).

To better understand the uptake of cosmetic procedures in the wake of Instagram, this study aims to unravel how the aesthetic labour of influencers acts as the packaging of the cosmetic servicescape. In doing so, the authors contribute to theorising of aesthetic and emotional labour within the services marketing literature, fleshing out the bodywork of influential others not as employees but endorsers, who act like the “walking billboards” (Zeithaml and Bitner, 2003) for the cosmetic service industry.

This study adopts a dual qualitative approach to data collection, coupling netnographic material from Instagram posts with 16 in-depth interviews with female Instagram users who have undergone or hope to undergo cosmetic surgery. Using mediated discourse analysis, the authors weave their visual and discursive data together for a richer account of the commoditisation of cosmetic surgery.

Adopting a postfeminist neoliberal lens, where women are viewed as aesthetic entrepreneurs who are constantly working on the body and the self, the findings of the study reveal how influencers’ aesthetic and emotional labour help package, propagate and demystify the cosmetic servicescape. Through their visual storytelling, we see how influencers help endorse (local) cosmetic services; commoditise cosmetic procedures through the conspicuous display of their ongoing body projects whilst masking the labour and pain involved; and how face-filters that use augmented reality (AR) technology foster new forms of (digitised) body dysmorphia.

The authors shed light on the darker side of social media and body-enhancing technologies, where tales of body transformation trivialise cosmetic intervention and AR technology induces a digitised body dysmorphia.

High-fidelity simulation has well-established educational value. However, its use in psychiatry remains underexplored. This study explores medical students’ experiences of high-fidelity simulation teaching during their psychiatry placements. A session was delivered on “psychiatric emergencies”, set in a simulated emergency department, with equal emphasis on the management of physical and psychiatric aspects of patient care. This paper aims to report on student attitudes to high-fidelity simulation teaching in psychiatry, as well as student attitudes to “integrated” teaching (i.e. covering both physical and psychiatric knowledge).

Semi-structured focus groups were conducted with medical students at a UK university. This exploratory approach generated rich qualitative data. Thematic analysis was used.

High-fidelity simulation teaching in psychiatry is well regarded by medical students, and helps students recognise that psychiatric problems can present in any clinical setting. This study has demonstrated that students value this type of “integrated” teaching, and there is potential for this approach to be more widely adopted in undergraduate health-care professional education. High-fidelity simulation could also be considered for incorporation in undergraduate examinations.

To the best of their knowledge, the authors are the first to conduct an in-depth exploration of attitudes to simulation teaching specifically in psychiatry. The authors are also the first to directly explore student attitudes to “integrated” teaching of psychiatry and physical health topics. The results will support the effective planning and delivery of simulation teaching in psychiatry, the planning of undergraduate summative assessments and will likely be of interest to health-care professionals, educational leads, simulation practitioners and students.

Private retail and brand-driven sustainable procurement standards are influencing global agri-food markets, shifting trade and export priorities and reshaping food supply chains. Using the case of Australian beef, the authors construct and evaluate three procurement activity “portfolios” and evaluate how these activity sets pull towards or against diverse organisational goals and/or science-based sustainability objectives.

A review of the academic and practitioner literature identified three key pillars for sustainable Australian beef procurement: animal welfare, environmental management and climate change (i.e. emissions). A subset of sustainable beef production activities (n = 100) was identified through this review plus semi-structured interviews with Australian beef retailers and industry bodies. This activity set was filtered (n = 40) and scored by a panel of science experts via a series of workshops and an additional survey. Using these data, the authors use a k-means cluster analysis (k = 3) to consider the strong or weak contributions of each activity portfolio towards typical sustainable beef goals.

A portfolio-based view of sustainable procurement puts the trade-offs between activities and the need for clear sustainability prioritisation into sharp focus. The authors find that individual strategies may be singularly more or less impactful, complex or popular, but when combined as a suite of activities enacted towards a particular goal or set of goals, essential for success. The authors find that obtaining balance across sustainable beef pillars versus within specific pillars can narrow the optimal set of activities that can succeed against multiple sustainability goals.

For procurement managers, the balance between clear focus and multidimensional progress is a difficult challenge. It requires the bold identification and articulation of an organisation’s interlocking corporate, industry or environmental objectives and flexibility on the strategies, tools and resources required. The authors posit that shifting away from a focus on rigid metrics may be useful in breaking the impasse on meaningful action.

Using a set of known activities and strategies that a procurement manager might draw from in operationalising sustainability goals, the authors cluster activities into three discrete activity portfolios. Each portfolio requires differing levels of effort, implementation complexity and potential for within-pillar and cross-pillar impact (i.e. co-benefits). Assessing the evidence and potential for cross-pillar impacts of individual strategies is a complex undertaking, indicative of the systems and tangled interactions that characterise sustainability science more broadly.

By assessing how the procurement function can be leveraged and operationalised towards sustainability goals through a lens of optimal portfolio management, the authors provide a way forward for the procurement managers working within large retailers and agri-food businesses to progress towards multiple sustainability pillars simultaneously.