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Discusses one particular solution to the problem of recording employees′ time in commercial organizations, a low‐price British electronic recorder – Timelink 2000. Examines the reasons for its development and the machine′s standard and optional features. Concludes that while Timelink 2000 has numerous advantages over older designs, and a price advantage over other electronic recorders, its success remains to be proven.

The importance of the role played by market towns in the vitality of rural England has become increasingly recognised in recent years, and has attracted considerable attention from government development agencies in support of major public policy initiatives. The example of the East of England Development Agency's Market Town Initiative is used to review recent approaches to market town partnerships and their links with retailing activity within the context of town centre management. The paper concludes by suggesting possible mechanisms to support market town partnership initiatives in achieving sustainability once the public funding stream ends – as the potential basis for a future research agenda in this area.

I used to believe in strategy and rock 'n roll. Two‐by‐two matrices and electronic keyboards were my life, but I haven't played with either of them in years—because I lost faith.

Benefits arising from the intelligent application of Direct Product Profitability (DPP) to the Boots operation have been substantial. They are using the system in at least a dozen ways; they are constantly making new discoveries about products, finding out where the profit comes from, and identifying loss‐making ranges.

The Bureau of Economics in the Federal Trade Commission has a three-part role in the Agency and the strength of its functions changed over time depending on the preferences and ideology of the FTC’s leaders, developments in the field of economics, and the tenor of the times. The over-riding current role is to provide well considered, unbiased economic advice regarding antitrust and consumer protection law enforcement cases to the legal staff and the Commission. The second role, which long ago was primary, is to provide reports on investigations of various industries to the public and public officials. This role was more recently called research or “policy R&D”. A third role is to advocate for competition and markets both domestically and internationally. As a practical matter, the provision of economic advice to the FTC and to the legal staff has required that the economists wear “two hats,” helping the legal staff investigate cases and provide evidence to support law enforcement cases while also providing advice to the legal bureaus and to the Commission on which cases to pursue (thus providing “a second set of eyes” to evaluate cases). There is sometimes a tension in those functions because building a case is not the same as evaluating a case. Economists and the Bureau of Economics have provided such services to the FTC for over 100 years proving that a sub-organization can survive while playing roles that sometimes conflict. Such a life is not, however, always easy or fun.

This is a story of partnership in action — the successful transformation of an outdated industrial therapy unit into a range of services that meet the diverse needs of individuals in an economically mixed locality in the south of England. The article is also a product of collaboration between people and perspectives.

Management's handling of the Lucas Aerospace corporate plan — prepared by shop stewards in a bid to safeguard jobs — could imperil forthcoming pay talks. Report by Chris Phillips.

Drawing inspiration from C Wright Mills exhortation to sociologists to locate themselves and their experiences in the ‘trends of their epoch’, I consider how first-hand experience of imprisonment can help criminology account for the growing trend towards the use of imprisonment in many Western democracies. Using interviews with a small group of British criminologists who have experience of imprisonment, I explore the connections between personal stories and collective narratives. Drawing reflexively from my own imprisonment, my subsequent professional trajectory and experiences of prison research, I consider the difficulties and potential of crafting a collective criminological project from disparate and profoundly personal experiences of imprisonment. The chapter combines methodological reflections on the use of autoethnography, autobiography and vignettes as a means to an end: establishing collective narratives from personal stories. I argue that the task of connecting these narratives to the ‘trends of the epoch’ that manifest in expanding prison populations is difficult but developing some momentum in convict criminology.