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Suggests that, in the current business environment, job security is not possible, nor is it desirable, since it limits opportunities. Outlines a framework for training and development which, on the one hand, maximizes the contribution employees can make to the company and, on the other, enables them to maximize their own personal development. Argues this will ensure that, in a business world of constant flux, these employees are always employable, and thus have their own personal security which in turn benefits the company.

The sibling organization is a stage in the development of organizations following the uncertainty created by downsizing and restructuring. People feel the need to invest in self‐preservation, perhaps at the expense of collaborative effort, risk‐taking and shared learning. Organizational defensive routines limit growth and creativity. Morale is depressed, job satisfaction is reduced and performance goes down. To counter this post‐change depressive effect, a new contract of mutual investment and respect needs to be created between the employee and the organization. A coaching style of management combined with independent mentoring support can provide the vehicle for a climate of two‐stranded development where both the needs of the individual and the needs of the organization are aligned.

Employability can be a new form of job security. It involves a new mutual psychological contract where employers provide self‐development for vulnerable employees (i.e. all employees) and employees take advantage of those opportunities. It is important that the self‐enhancement is in tune with business goals. There needs to be an ongoing dialogue about the present and future needs of the individual and the business. Individuals need to prioritize and set goals, manage change, present themselves well, network strategically, invest in continuous learning and work well in teams. Management needs to adopt a coaching style, using listening and motivation skills to facilitate good decision making by employees. All this requires a high level of understanding, a healthy life balance, and change resilience. Congruence is a key concept. When employees are seeking the same goals as the organization, both are likely to succeed.

People need certain skills and behaviours to be effective at work, but if these are not defined, they can become lost in vague generalisations. Competency frameworks set out what is required, and act as a template to check performance. As times change, the competencies required may also change, and in 2007 the National Trust decided it was time for a thorough overhaul. This paper aims to focus on this development.

The process started with a survey, focus groups, and interviews with senior managers across the Trust. The authors then researched what was happening in other organisations, to find the problems and the successes, in order to design the best and most appropriate new competency framework.

It was found that there was a tension between immediate needs and building for the future, and a need for more collaboration between functions.

Competency frameworks can be criticised as backward looking, concentrating on skills and behaviours that were needed in the past but not in the future.

The paper shows that the new National Trust framework addressed the issues involved, and became a dynamic process rather than a static template.

The relationship between a new measure of money, called the Rational Transactional Aggregate (RTA), and economic activity was investigated using annual and quarterly data in selected macroeconomic models from 1973–1990. For prediction purposes, the money demand function including RTA which used lagged output changes and lagged interest rates showed the most promise.

Research with parents of children with disabilities indicates one of the major hindrances to collaboration with professionals is difficulty with trust. However, it is also known that student outcomes are improved when there is a positive working relationship between parents, educators, and students, one that is founded on trust. This chapter explores the foundational constructs of trust and its role in parent-professional collaboration, from both literature in the field and the chapters contained in this volume. It suggests that trust is an essential component in securing identity, opportunity, and belonging, and offers strategies for (re-)building home-school collaborative partnerships based on principles of trust.

In a volume of the Cornhill Magazine published in the year 1860 we have discovered an article entitled “Adulteration and its Remedy” which well deserves the attention of those persons who imagine that we have made “wonderful progress” during the past half century and that the trade morality of to‐day is infinitely superior to the trade morality of the past. The unknown author of this article must have had a very clear appreciation of the nature of the gigantic evil upon which he wrote and of the character and probable effectiveness of the remedies to be applied. The adulteration of the period is described by him as a “strange, disgusting and poisonous demon” and while it is true that at the time, as shown by the revelations of the “Lancet Sanitary Commission,” there existed many forms of gross, disgusting and poisonous adulteration which are but rarely detected nowadays, our author's somewhat hyperbolic definition may still be regarded as applicable. For many of the grosser forms of adulteration prevalent fifty years ago were largely due to the ignorance of the adulterator. His prototype of the present day is no more troubled with moral scruples than he was. The dissemination and absorption of knowledge has not been accompanied, as some rabid “educationalists’ would have us believe, by any improvements in morality and virtue. The “faker ” of to‐day is merely a more skilful “faker” than his predecessor. He knows the value and makes full use of “expert” assistance, both scientific and legal, for the purpose of facilitating his escape—easy enough in any case—from what grip there is in that cranky and lumbering legislative machinery which is innocently supposed by the majority of people in this country to act as a sufficiently effective deterrent and repressant.

The purpose of this paper is to present a framework for advanced relationship planning between a contract manufacturer and the other key players within the supply chain. In doing so it allows the contract manufacturer to achieve improved optimisation through better insight into current and future supply chain activity.

The research commences with a literature review that synthesises across total quality management (TQM), customer focus and contemporary business excellence to create a framework specific to contract manufacturing. The major elements were verified by surveys. Applicability and exploitability was validated using action research.

The paper confirms that horizontal alliances in either collaborative or cooperative form are in their infancy as regards contract manufacturing. The framework presented makes it possible for contract manufacturers to identify, evaluate and form relationships with competitors and complementor companies towards understanding the interdependence between all supply chain players.

Further refinements are possible and could include the determination of formal avenues for relationship development and guidance while operating within supply chains at different levels of development.

Understanding how supply players interact in the field of contract manufacturing will assist in determining the influence of cooperation and competition or a mixture of both. The framework presented will provide direction in unravelling the intricacies of the connections and therefore provide the contract manufacturer with a valuable tool for relationship planning.

The Advanced Relationship Planning Framework described offers a unique supply management approach from the supplier of contract manufacture viewpoint that synthesises across the TQM, Customer focus and business excellence.

Addresses some of the key debates within the HRD literature and considers the extent to which HRD can be described as a field of study. The paper addresses the issues raised in the contributions that make up this special issue and identifies a broad range of methodologies and use of research methods. It argues that all of the contributions fit into at least one theoretical perspective: capabilities, psychological contacts and the learning organization/organizational learning. The paper concludes with a consideration of the prescriptions which the perspectives advocate for HRD in organizations.

This case describes how Varian Medical Systems, the successor to one of the pioneers of Silicon Valley, created a business with $11.6 billion in market cap by listening to dreams of its physician customers and their scientist colleagues and finding ways to fulfill them over several decades.

A key business opportunity that spurred the company was to identify the most perceptive thought-leader customers, then bring them into a long-term, system-building partnership.

If companies envision the future and work with perceptive, far-sighted customers and others who will benefit from high-value innovation, together they stand a real chance of achieving a desired future.

Establish forums where perceptive, visionary customers meet with executives, marketers and key developers to identify what you should deliver in the immediate future and in years beyond.

The case described the practical steps the company took to implement customer participation in the innovation process over many decades.