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The purpose of this paper is to explore the perceptions of women working in the commercial real estate industry to assess how they approach mentoring relationships and take steps to maximize the value derived therefrom.

Through thematic analysis of 39 interviews conducted with women serving as local chapter presidents of CREW Network, the paper offers insights as to how women position themselves to receive mentorship throughout their careers and engage with mentors to address their evolving needs. In particular, three themes of commitment, reciprocity in the mentoring relationship and mentee motivation emerged.

The results suggest that this is a strategic process and one in which many women are proactively engaging to ascend to leadership positions in the corporate world. While the study is limited to those working in commercial real estate, clear implications exist for other industries.

By identifying and exploring these themes, the paper serves as a starting point for future research considering how women inside and outside of the commercial real estate industry can more strategically pursue mentorship and use it to attain leadership roles.

Examines the current literature on total quality management/continuous quality improvement (TQM/CQI) in the health‐care industry and determines the common threads that exist in the successfully implemented programmes. Based on the review of literature, proposes a comprehensive model on how to implement and maintain a TQM/CQI programme in the health‐care industry.

The concept of company culture is now playing an ever‐increasing role in the continuing endeavour to work towards ever better company management, particularly in the industrial field. This monograph reviews the history and development of both national and company cultures, and then goes on to demonstrate the significance of a culture to proper company management. Well‐managed companies will have both a “quality culture” and a “safety culture” as well as a cultural history. However, it has to be recognised that the company culture is subject to change, and effecting this can be very difficult. Of the many national cultures, that of Japan is considered to be the most effective, as is demonstrated by the present dominance of Japan on the industrial scene. Many industrialised nations now seek to emulate the Japanese style of management, but it is not possible to copy or acquire Japan′s cultural heritage. The text is illustrated by a large number of practical examples from real life, illustrating the way in which the company culture works and can be used by management to improve company performance.

Motivation theory in the 20^th century has evolved to meet the changing social, political, and economic environment. The purpose of this paper is to examine the developmental path of modern motivation theory from the perspective of the Tao and the cyclical nature of Yin and Yang. We review motivation theory from the Industrial Revolution to the present. The developmental path during the past 100 years consists of seven distinct stages, each stage representing a significant shift in theory as well as a shift in the social, political, and economic environment in the United States. The dominant theme that emerges from the analysis is the discourse between science and humanity, and the revolving cycle of these fundamental theories throughout the century.

Statistical process control (SPC) is a powerful technique for managing, monitoring, analyzing and improving the performance of a process through the use of statistical methods. The purpose of this paper is to present results of a survey on SPC in the software industry. The focus is on understanding the critical success factors (CSFs) for successful implementation of SPC in the software industry.

In total, 12 critical success factors (CSFs) with 36 variables were identified from the literature and discussions with software quality professionals. An e‐mail questionnaire was used to gather the data.

The results reveal that management commitment and involvement are the most critical success factors, followed by selection of control charts. The use of SPC facilitators was found to be the least important factor in successful deployment of SPC in the software industry.

This research project was conducted with a limited number of participants, and was limited to software firms in India; cultural differences in other nations may yield different results.

These results provide an increased understanding of how to better implement SPC in the software industry, and provide managers with improved guidelines for identifying the most important factors that will lead to success.

Indian software companies are leading exporters to Europe and the USA. Considering the growth of the Indian software industry and increased inclination towards acquiring quality certifications and implementing quality management techniques, a better understanding of the implementation of SPC can provide companies with a stronger competitive advantage.

Defines total quality management (TQM) and ascertains its current state within the National Health Service. Reports on a recent study of TQM in the NHS that focused on management and organisational arrangements for quality improvement, patterns of leadership, strategic planning for action, and thepattern and aims of quality of activity. Outlines some possible strategies for successful implementation while simultaneously avoiding some of the common pitfalls.

The concept of Total Quality Control (TQC) in the Malaysian environment is discussed in general terms, and the TQC infrastructure in Japan is compared to that in Malaysia. It is concluded that given the right environment and conditions the Japanese approach to company‐wide quality control (CWQC) can be adopted to take root in Malaysian industries. This has already been demonstrated by those factories operating in the Free Trade Zones. The need for Dunlop Malaysia to implement a TQC programme is described along with some of the potential barriers to TQC. An outline of the programme is given as well as progress to date.

To examine how different types of ownership, including investor-owned, employee-owned, and mixed models, affect the dynamics of participatory practices in the workplace, and the broader social effects of these differences.

Brings together literature from democratic theory and empirical research in workplace participation and employee ownership. The first step is to articulate the range of democratic practices from nondemocratic to strongly democratic. The essay then discusses the different forms that participation can take and the threshold for what can be considered democratic participation. It then considers different models of ownership and the impact of ownership type on participatory practices.

It is found that investor-owned firms cannot be considered strongly democratic and that worker cooperatives are more likely to be strongly democratic and cannot fall below the threshold of weak democracy. However, strong democracy is not necessarily a feature of worker cooperatives.

Little work has been done to consider the way the type of ownership affects the kind or degree of democratic practices that may be present in an enterprise.

While there has been much conjecture as to the implications of TQM for shopfloor workers, there have been relatively few studies that have investigated shopfloor responses to TQM via in‐depth interviews. Focuses on shopfloor workers who might have been expected to conform to the “solidaristic” stereotype in terms of their orientation to work, because they had traditionally used the group as a source of power against the employer. The expectation was that they would resist any involvement in TQM. The initial response was positive and the paper seeks to explore this finding. It suggests that shopfloor orientations to work within the male‐dominated, well‐paid, unionised manufacturing sector may have moved from an emphasis on collective conflict towards “collective instrumentalism”, which encompasses a shift away from overt conflict, towards uneasy patterns of co‐operation.

This issue is a selected bibliography covering the subject of leadership.