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The purpose of this commentary is to reflect on some of the themes presented in the associated article “Vocational training for livelihood and rehabilitation of persons with intellectual disabilities” and provide considerations for future close-to-practice research in the area of vocational training models and rehabilitation provisions.

This commentary considers the literature in relation to rehabilitation provisions centred around vocation, highlights the need for a person-centred focus and reiterates the potential of vocation as a route to social inclusion and wider social networks.

The focus on adapting supports and vocational training programmes to fit within the context of low-income areas and country-specific legislation should be afforded particular consideration, alongside ways to achieve high-quality research rigour, which still puts the person supported at the centre of any outcome measures.

This commentary is aimed in part at practitioners working in the field of learning disabilities and employment/vocation, who are keen to conduct close-to-practice research.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the consequences of a managerial approach to renewal for a union’s behaviour by analysing the UK’s fourth largest trade union – The Union of Shop, Distributive and Allied Workers (USDAW).

The findings draw on in-depth semi-structured interviews with union officials.

The research findings show the significance of a managerialist approach to UDSAW’s renewal strategy and its correlation with existing renewal strategies of organising and partnership. However, this approach was not immune to context, with tensions between agency and articulation challenging the basic concept of managerialism and influencing union behaviour.

The data were collected from a single case with a small sample size.

The authors’ findings suggest that tensions between bureaucracy and democracy will mediate the extent to which managerialist approaches can be used within unions adding support to the strategic choice theory and underlying arguments that unions can influence their fortune. However, institutional and external pressures could see managerialism becoming more prevalent, with oligarchic and bureaucratic forces prevailing, which could be particularly applicable to unions operating in challenging contexts, such as USDAW. The managerialisation of unions has consequences for union officers; with officers facing increasing pressure in their roles to behave as managers with attendant implications for role conflict, identity and motivation.

If managerialism is becoming more prevalent with unions, with oligarchic and bureaucratic forces prevailing, this has potentially wider societal implications, whereby collectivism and worker-led democracy could become scarcer within unions and the workplace, thus irretrievably altering the nature of the employment relationship.

This paper brings together disparate themes in the literature to propose a conceptual framework of three key elements of managerialism: centralised strategies; performance management and the managerialisation of union roles. The authors’ findings demonstrate how there is scope for unions to adopt a hybrid approach to renewal, and to draw upon their internal resources, processes and techniques to implement change, including behavioural change. Consequently, theories and empirical studies of union renewal need to better reflect the complexities of approaches that unions are now adopting and further explore these models within the agency and articulation principles that underpin the nature of unions.

This chapter challenges middle-class bias in work-life literature by examining work-life balance dynamics through a social class perspective. It reveals class-based disparities in physical, temporal, and psychological outcomes, including the role of economic capital in work-life balance and the challenges encountered by the socially mobile in achieving psychological balance. It emphasizes the need to acknowledge social class implications for work-life balance and urges organizations to address class-based inconsistencies and inequalities in their practices.

Distinguishes between training and education and suggests why it is important for practitioners and advisers to take part in the learning process – for example: the movement into new areas of management; job motivation; changes in management structure; development of facilities management as a profession. Compares the benefits of short‐term training with the long‐term view of education, claiming that facilities management as a profession needs an educational background for its credibility. Concludes by detailing the facilities management qualifications available at the present time and what the future holds.

Discusses the identity, role and functions of facilities management and how it is different from building services engineering and surveying. Argues for improvements in performance in the quest for professional recognition of FM.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the interplay between the role of front line managers (FLMs) and their contribution to the reported gap between intended and actual human resource management (HRM).

The findings draw on case study research using 51 semi-structured interviews with managers across two UK retail organisations between 2012 and 2013.

This paper argues that FLMs are key agents in people management and play a critical role in the gap between intended and actual employee relations (ER) and HRM. The research found that these managers held a high level of responsibility for people management, but experienced a lack of institutional support, monitoring or incentives to implement according to central policy. This provided an opportunity for them to modify or resist intended policy and the tensions inherent in their role were a critical factor in this manipulation of their people management responsibilities.

The data were collected from only one industry and two organisations so the conclusions need to be considered within these limitations.

Efforts to address the gap between intended and actual ER/HRM within organisations will need to consider the role tensions of both front line and middle managers.

This research provides a more nuanced understanding of the interplay between FLMs and the gap between intended and actual HRM within organisations. It addresses the issue of FLMs receiving less attention in the HRM-line management literature and the call to research their role in the translation of policy into practice.

In the period before Britain entered the European Community and again at the Labour Government's referendum, one factor which caused most concern in both those in favour and those against entry, was the possible loss of sovereignty by the Houses of Parliament to a supra‐national body. That there would be some loss was accepted but fears that it would be anything more than minimal were discounted, and not enough to affect the lives of ordinary people. Far‐reaching changes required by some of the EEC food directives and regulations, which even if held in abeyance for the usual transitional period will have to be implemented eventually, must be causing many to have second thoughts on this. If more were needed, the embarassing situation at the recent energy conference, at which Britain, as a major oil producer, demanded a separate seat, but had to submit to the overall authority of the Community, the other members of which, figuratively, do not produce a gallon of oil between them. A shift of power from Whitehall to Brussels may not be so evident at higher levels of government, however, as in secondary legislation; the language of the departments of government.

To examine the effect of negotiation training and conflict management styles on the relations between third‐party actors involved in international peacekeeping situations, we analyze data from a sample of Dutch military peacekeepers on missions between 1995 and 1999 (N = 850). We predict and find, contrary to the traditional “contact hypothesis” (Allport, 1954), that peacekeepers' contact with Non‐Governmental Organization (NGO) workers was positively associated with conflict between them, and this increased if the peacekeeper possessed an avoiding conflict management style. When sufficiently trained in negotiations, peacekeepers who had intensive contact with NGO personnel and possessed a dominating conflict management style were less likely to become personally involved in conflicts with NGO workers. Implications for conflict management and training are discussed.

Rehabilitation and reconstruction of social and economic infrastructure in a post-conflict environment are complex, long-debated issues in development cooperation. In addition to war creating large-scale human suffering, generating refugees, displacing populations, engendering psychological distress, obliterating infrastructure and transforming the economy, in post-conflict situations, deepening chaos and disorder can be found at the highest social, economic and political levels; serious developmental challenges remain insufficiently addressed. Repairing war-damaged infrastructure in order to reactivate the local economy is a challenge for all post-conflict countries. The paper aims to discuss these issues.

The study was designed to examine planning and execution of post-conflict reconstruction (PCR). The use of a mixed-method research approach combining both quantitative and qualitative data collection was used to explore planning and implementation of PCR infrastructure projects in Kosovo. The data collection in the field was undertaken for a period of eight weeks, from July to September 2008. A total of 420 respondents were involved in the study process, as follows: key informants (four), pilot test (12), semi-structured interviews (36), project manager/engineers survey (231), chief of mission/country director survey (117), and focus group (20). To meet the needs of the society and recognise the required functional components of project management, the overall contexts of managing projects in a post-conflict environment have been discussed in the study.

Planning and implementing reconstruction projects in areas affected by conflict have proven to be far more challenging than expected and responses by practitioners, aid agencies, and government regarded as inadequate. The changing political, economic, and social factors in Kosovo after the war in 1999 have had a significant influence on the limited adoption of a project management methodology in development and reconstruction projects. The findings from the exploratory study were aimed at improving understanding of the planning, pre-designing, and implementation of infrastructure projects. The findings indicated a need to promote a better understanding of how projects are undertaken at all levels of the organisation, and to describe processes, procedures, and tools used for the actual application of projects. The findings of the study identified a poor quality of planning and implementation of reconstruction projects in an environment of complexity, change, and uncertainty. The study also raised some very significant findings for a broader approach to community involvement in project identification, planning, and implementation. Infrastructure projects implemented in Kosovo were used to develop a conceptual framework for designing projects and programmes more likely to yield positive outcomes for post-conflict society.

The study was done by the researcher in Kosovo.