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The Nature of Business Policy Business policy — or general management — is concerned with the following six major functions:

The purpose of this paper is to explore the influence of bankruptcies on the market share effects of rival firms in the airline industry.

Employing event study methodology, the authors examine the impact of bankruptcies on major and minor airlines by analyzing four different types of events: filing for bankruptcy by major carriers; coming out of bankruptcy by major carriers; shutdown by major carriers; and filing of bankruptcy by minor carriers.

Empirical results indicate that filing for bankruptcy by major carriers and shutdown by major carriers resulted in positive abnormal returns around the announcement dates for rival firms, while coming out of bankruptcy by major carriers resulted in negative impact. As expected, the last type of events involving filing for bankruptcy by minor carriers resulted in insignificant abnormal returns.

The results point to the importance of systematically incorporating bankruptcies by competitive firms in estimating and forecasting market demand. The results provide a diagnostic tool to evaluate what kind of contingencies necessitate planning for unexpected spikes in market share.

In October 1984, the Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of the McDonnell Douglas Corporation in St. Louis, Missouri, directed that each of the company's major components establish a competitive intelligence organization to improve its understanding of the competition. One premise behind this directive was that an assessment of the competition in the marketplace was essential, and that the company's current informal methods of competitive‐intelligence gathering were inadequate. Another premise was that only ethical and legal data‐gathering techniques were to be used, especially since there was so much information available from a wide variety of public sources. The directive specified that the overall process must be action oriented with a focus on analysis, assessment, and communication.

This paper provides an extensive survey of the recent literature on scholarly publishing and its conversion to the electronic medium. It then presents the results of a questionnaire survey of the UK‐based scholarly publishing industry. The results of this survey suggest that the publishers are moving quickly towards the use of the Internet as a major medium for the distribution of their products, though they do not expect an early print publication. They also do not expect that any alternative system, based on scholars providing their results free of charge at the point of use, will seriously threaten the future of the commercial scholarly publisher. They do, however, perceive several significant difficulties in the near future. These include a shortage of appropriately trained staff, uncertainties about pricing mechanisms, lack of adequate budgetary provision by universities for library purchases, and unrealistic expectations on the part of scholars that electronic information should be inexpensive.

The financial crisis and the subsequent distrust of the existing banks have created an opportunity for new competitors to enter the market for financial services. Organisations from outside banking could use their trusted brands, their stronger grasp of information technology and their stronger customer service ethos to potentially shake‐up the provision of financial services and hence to take business away from the “traditional” players. This paper aims to examine the potential for these “non‐banks” to enter and expand into the UK financial services sector and to analyse their prospects, before finally reflecting on how big a challenge they face in entering this market.

The paper is based on a report entitled “Tesco Bank and Virgin money: prospects for banking without the banks” released in 2010, which offers an analysis of the UK market and of the main potential entrants. It presents a much abridged version of the report and has also been revised to provide a more international relevance.

The paper discusses the strengths and weaknesses of the two main potential entrants, Tesco Bank and Virgin Money, and draws conclusions based on some of the challenges that they will face in seeking to enter this market.

The paper is very relevant, given the publicly espoused aspirations of both Tesco Bank and Virgin Money to enter the market for financial services in the UK. It may also have lessons for other new entrants in other countries.

In the early sixties, aquaculture was perceived as a major investment opportunity; receiving attention in financial publications and attracting the interest of large corporate groups. By the late sixties it became apparent that the technological problems in moving aquaculture from a research concept to a commercially feasible proposition were such that the industry faced a long gestation period. This situation, coupled with the 1972–73 recession when many large corporations deemphasised any high risk or long‐term pay‐out projects, caused aquaculture to lose the “glamour growth industry” image. It was no longer an easy task to attract investors and many of the significant technological advances were achieved by small entrepreneurial groups who could percieve the long‐term benefits of creating viable culture units. These groups were assisted in certain instances by public sector research operations, but with a few notable exceptions (e.g. Ralston Purina, Coca Cola, General Mills, Kraft, Unilever) it was the poorly funded small companies who formed the nucleus of the industry by the late seventies.

The purpose of this paper is to describe the application of scenario planning methods to: identifying disruptive innovations at an early stage, mapping out potential development paths for such innovations, and building appropriate organizational capabilities.

A combination of scenario planning with technology road‐mapping, expert analysis and creative group processes. The techniques described can be integrated with traditional tools of strategic technology planning. The paper presents a short illustrative case study and examples from practice.

Scenario techniques can be successfully applied to analysing disruptive innovation.

Scenario techniques help guide managers to more effective decision making by preparing for a wide range of uncertainty and by counteracting typical biases of over‐optimism and decision “framing”. The techniques presented can be used in executive development and in strategic planning for innovative and high‐tech industries.

This paper presents a novel way to combine scenario methods with technology road‐mapping and creative group analysis. It also provides an overview of the literature and research related to scenario planning for disruptive innovation.

“OE” is overseas experience – periods of “working holiday” undertaken by young people autonomously exploring other countries and cultures. This paper investigates OE and considers its effect on career development. OE is a world‐wide phenomenon, but has special significance in Australia and New Zealand, where it is undertaken as a “rite of passage” by many young people. The paper reports results from an interview study of 50 OEs undertaken by young New Zealanders. It focuses on predisposing personal and situational factors prompting OE, the unplanned and improvisational nature of OE, the main forms of OE, and its apparent consequences for personal development and subsequent careers. The evidence suggests that OE brings benefits but that the process is complex and unpredictable because of confounding forces such as non‐career travel agendas and personal relationships. The special value of OE to careers in current conditions requiring greater self‐direction, flexibility and internationalisation is emphasised.

Describes the changes which are taking place in the procurement environment and the steps which suppliers need to take in order to adapt. Inventory is increasingly being pushed back up the supply chain and suppliers face higher service expectations, against which they are frequently measured by their customers. The authors predict that rationalisation of the supply base will continue, increasing the importance of large accounts for suppliers. Managing these accounts will require a change in the way sales teams realign their selling approaches to better match customer procurement strategies.