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Good system documentation is the backbone to the success of any automated system, for only through complete and thorough documentation can the user fully understand and utilize a system's capability. This symposium focuses on printed documentation and the many related applications that affect the daily lives of computer users. Printed documentation takes different forms, including user and reference manuals, tutorials, reference cards, and “cheat sheets.” The various forms are produced by both system vendors and system users, the latter frequently adapting and modifying vendor‐prepared documentation to reflect local practice and meet specialized training needs.

Cape and Barkham's practice improvement model (PIM) describes how healthcare systems can be designed to facilitate the usage of self‐generated clinical outcomes in the delivery of subsequent interventions. This article aims to describe the application of the PIM in the implementation of group‐based cognitive‐behavioural therapy, for clients referred from Primary Care with anxiety disorders.

The groups were evaluated using and pre‐ and post‐intervention design using a variety of validated measures of psychological functioning as part of a wider audit and evaluation system. The conclusions drawn from the audit and evaluation system, in the form of PIMs, were fed‐back into the design of successive groups in the attempt to increase subsequent effectiveness. Group 1 had no PIM applied, group 2 had a single PIM applied and group 3 had two PIMs applied.

The introduction of the single PIM for group 2 increased the effectiveness of clinical outcomes, while for group 3, the introduction of two PIMs increased effectiveness again in comparison to group 1, but not in comparison to group 2.

The results indicate that the active use of feedback of outcomes from interventions conducted can be utilised to design and then evaluate the application of resultant PIMs. This represents attempts to introduce and operationalise the concept of continuous quality improvement in the delivery of a clinical service.

The evaluation of PIMs is in its practical and methodological infancy and this initiative represents the first attempt to utilise PIMs in the design of Primary Care psychological services.

The purpose of the study is to employ the need theory to investigate whether a need for achievement has an effect on persistence behavior among entrepreneurs, and whether a need for achievement and business goals interact to influence such persistence.

A longitudinal study of nascent entrepreneurs was conducted by a field survey in a metropolitan area of a mid‐western state in the USA. Logistic regression was used to test the hypotheses.

Need for achievement is found to be positively related to entrepreneurial persistence. Business goals are found to moderate the relationship between need for achievement and persistence.

The time span between the two waves of data collection in the longitudinal study might have been too short.

This study highlights the importance of matching need for achievement and business goals. For complex tasks, a strong need for achievement should be accompanied with moderate business goals if persistence is to occur. Venture capitalists and government agencies can improve entrepreneurial success by keeping a close eye on the match.

Few studies have explored the issue of entrepreneurial persistence. The present study contributes to a better understanding of motivation and other variables that influence entrepreneurial persistence.

The purpose of this article is to examine the role of social capital and higher order meta-skills in developing the employability of marketing students at a UK university.

This conceptual article, bolstered by illustrative primary data, provides a broader conceptualisation of employability. This is to address the specific research question on how social capital (contacts and connections) is deployed (via capability-based higher order meta-skills) in a UK university developing the employability of a specific group of students. The article is situated in the highly fraught context of teaching excellence measurement schemes [such as the teaching excellence framework (TEF) in the UK].

The research findings highlighted the role of social capital and higher order meta-skills in developing the employability of marketing students at a UK university.

While the illustrative primary data are not generalisable, as they are limited to one group of marketing students in one UK university; the conceptual development, including a new social capital based definition of employability that incorporated the capabilities, provided by higher-order meta-skills, is widely applicable.

The article has highlighted how the impact of social capital, etiquette and meta-skills, while being “between the lines” of the employability discourse and the metrics of the TEF, explains the differing perceptions of the value of employability initiatives. The article highlights the grey area of between the reasons given as to why some candidates are valued over others. Perhaps no rhyme or reason sometimes, just the “hidden” perception/interpretations of the interview panel of the “qualities” of one candidate over another.

The difficulty in ascertaining the influence of social capital (and how it can be deployed through higher-order meta-skills as capabilities) results in challenges for universities as they endeavour to respond to the data requirements of “learning gain” within teaching excellent measurement schemes such as the UK teaching excellence framework.

Technological advances, globalization, network complexity, and social complexity complicate almost every aspect of our organizations and environments. Leadership educators are challenged with developing leaders who can sense environmental cues, adapt to rapidly changing contexts, and thrive in uncertainty while adhering to their values systems. In a complex leadership context, inadequate leader responses can result in devastating organizational impacts akin to the butterfly effect from chaos theory. This paper advances a simple model for leadership education based on a program we designed to develop leaders who understand the nature of complex systems, reliably use their ethical value systems, are emotionally intelligent and resilient, and can adapt to emergent situations.

A demographic time bomb is ticking in many school jurisdictions. Up to 70 per cent of present leaders in the private and public sectors will retire within the next five to ten years as the “baby boomers” move on. While succession planning has become a major initiative in the private sector, leadership succession in education tends to hew to old paths. Where are new educational leaders to come from? How should their succession be orchestrated? The traditional source of succession at the secondary level, the department headship, is no longer an attractive route for many teachers. Many potential leaders do not perceive the role of principal or assistant principal in a positive light. These roles are increasingly being associated with managing the standards/standardization agenda with which many professionals profoundly disagree. While it is premature to declare a leadership crisis in education, it is not too early to call on policy makers to attend to the growing need for succession planning at all levels in education. Based on an examination of change over times in four schools in Ontario, this article addresses issues of leadership succession in education and, more precisely, examines the influence of principals’ succession on the principals themselves and their schools.

The Fred Meyer Charitable Trust, Division of Library and Information Resources for the Northwest, has funded five research projects that will demonstrate the potential of various techniques and new technologies to facilitate communications and resource sharing in the Northwest. The experience and information derived from these projects will be of value to all libraries and information centers, not just those conducting the research. The techniques and technologies being evaluated include: simultaneous remote searching, which uses inexpensive terminals and modems; a mini‐computer‐based union list and resource sharing network (INFONET); networks using facsimile machines; networks that transmit documents that have been optically scanned into bit‐map image files; and use of optical character recognition equipment to capture ASCII machine‐readable information that can be broadcast by television stations to user‐sites. Contributors of reports are: Verl Anderson, Linda Brander, Millard F. Johnson, Jr., Bruce Morton, and Steve Smith. Summary observations are provided by Joseph R. Matthews.

The purpose of this paper is to broaden extant understanding of actor engagement behavior beyond its currently dominant dyadic (micro-level) focus, by examining it from multiple levels of aggregation within a service ecosystem framework.

This conceptual paper draws on service-dominant logic and structuration theory as theoretical lenses to inform engagement research.

By means of a stepwise exercise of “zooming out,” the paper introduces a multi-perspective (micro-, meso-, macro- and meta-level) view of actor engagement that develops understanding of multiple engagement contexts, and suggests that balancing multiple roles may result in actor disengagement behavior. The role of reference groups and role conflict associated with balancing multiple roles is critical to understanding why engaged actor proclivities may wax and wane between contexts.

The paper offers a set of five propositions that can be utilized by engagement scholars undertaking further research in this area.

Firms need to understand the values and norms embedded in diverse engagement contexts which can affect actor groups’ needs and motivations. Firms should develop appropriate organizational mechanisms to facilitate (rather than impede or obstruct) the desired behaviors of engaged actors.

The broader context within which engaged actors operate, and its effects on engagement, has been largely overlooked to date. By broadening the analytical perspective on engagement beyond the dyadic this paper reveals previously unaddressed aspects of this phenomenon, such as the role of disengagement behavior, and the effects of multiple engagement contexts on actors’ future behaviors.

This study was conducted in the United States of America to identify what practices virtual mentor-coaches perceived to be effective in virtual mentoring and coaching (VMC) within virtual professional learning communities (VPLCs). The authors also sought to determine the ways in which virtual mentor-coaches provided VMC for school leaders within VPLCs.

The authors used a phenomenological approach in our research, describing the lived experiences of practicing virtual mentor-coaches as they engaged in VMC. Data analysis included video analysis and systematic coding of interview data.

An in-depth analysis of interview and video data showed that virtual mentor-coaches support school leaders in developing and transforming school leaders' leadership for building teachers' instructional capacity. The authors identified a VMC process model within VPLCs, including four steps as follows: (1) presentation, (2) collaboration, (3) reflection and (4) action plan.

VMC for school leaders participating in VPLCs is regarded as a transformative model which provides encouragement, reflection and support for instructional leadership actions.

Key steps and components of an effective VMC highlighted in the current research offer practical guidance for future virtual mentor-coaches in conducting and implementing VMC within VPLCs.