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The paper seeks to explore the phenomenon of the flagship store from the perspective of brand management and brand context within the luxury furniture sector.

Adopts a case‐study approach, focusing upon Milan‐based furniture manufacturer and retailer B&B Italia and comprises interview derived data and archive material.

Recognises the difficulty associated with manufacturing/product‐orientated organisations to establish a brand context. It identifies that the forward integration of luxury manufacturing companies into retailing, through the establishment of flagship stores provides such companies with an opportunity to provide a context for their brand and exercise a level of control over its manifestation that is difficult to achieve through other distribution channels.

Highlights the value of forward integration as a means of establishing brand context and experience.

Demonstrates the wider value of the flagship store as a brand management device and the potential contribution to brand communication for non‐retail based organisations.

The purpose of this paper is to assess the health promotion needs of vulnerable young prisoners and the existing health promotion activities in custodial settings in seven European Union (EU) Member States.

The research comprised two components: the first involved identifying existing health promotion practices. The second involved mapping out young offenders’ health promotion needs by carrying out a needs assessment. Both quantitative and qualitative methods were adopted. The quantitative element comprised surveys among young prisoners and prison staff and focused on the availability and perceived importance of health promotion activities in prison. The qualitative element comprised focus groups with young offenders and individual interviews with prison staff, field experts and NGO members.

The findings from the research have identified a number of similar, but also some diverse areas of unmet need for health promotion activities in prison settings across these diverse seven EU countries. There is no consistency of approach within and between countries regarding health promotion policy, guidance, resources and programmes for young prisoners. In order to improve the health of young prisoners and to establish and increase sustainability of existing health promotion programmes, there is a need for the establishment of National and EU standards.

Providing health promotion activities for young prisoners while in custodial settings is key to addressing their unmet health and well-being needs and to facilitate their reintegration back into the community. Despite the barriers identified by this research, health promotion is to some extent being delivered in the partner countries and provides a foundation upon which further implementation of health promotion activities can be built especially when the benefits of health promotion activities, like dealing with the common problems of alcohol and drug addiction, mental health and communicable diseases are linked to successful reintegration.

To report on the 20th North American Serials Interest Group held in Minneapolis, Minnesota, in May 2005.

Provides a concise review of the conference, whose theme was Roaring into our 20s.

A variety of topics of interest to serialists were covered in the programs through plenary, concurrent and workshop sessions.

This paper is a useful summary of a conference of interest to library and information management professionals.

The purpose of this paper is to propose a conceptual model for understanding the impact of organisational culture on knowledge management processes and their link with organisational performance. It is suggested that organisational culture should be assessed as a multi-level construct comprising artefacts, espoused beliefs and values and underlying assumptions. A holistic view of organisational culture and knowledge management processes, and their link with organisational performance, is presented.

A comprehensive review of previous literature was undertaken in the development of the conceptual model. Taken together, the literature and the proposed model reveal possible relationships between organisational culture, knowledge management processes and organisational performance.

Potential implications of organisational culture levels for the creation, sharing and application of knowledge are elaborated. In addition, the paper offers possible new insight into the impact of organisational culture on various knowledge management processes and their link with organisational performance.

A number of possible relationships between organisational culture factors, knowledge management processes and their link with organisational performance were used to examine such relationships.

The research model highlights the multi-level components of organisational culture. These are: the artefacts, the espoused beliefs and values and the underlying assumptions. Through a conceptualisation of the relationships between organisational culture, knowledge management processes and organisational performance, the study provides practical guidance for practitioners during the implementation of knowledge management processes.

The focus of previous research on knowledge management has been on understanding organisational culture from the limited perspective of promoting knowledge creation and sharing. This paper proposes a more comprehensive approach to understanding organisational culture in that it draws on artefacts, espoused beliefs and values and underlying assumptions, and reveals their impact on the creation, sharing and application of knowledge which can affect the overall organisational performance.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the influence of culture on organizational readiness to change (ORC) within the context of merger and acquisition (M&A) in the banking sector in India.

A multisource approach is used to collect data from a public-sector bank in India for testing our hypothesis. A hierarchical approach based on higher-order modelling has been deployed for confirming the path model. The foundation of the study is based on power distance (PD) and uncertainty avoidance (UA) cultural dimensions of Hofstede (1984).

Employees in organizations with large PD and high UA index exhibit low readiness to change. Findings support a negative relationship of culture (large PD and high UA) with organizational readiness to change at the individual level.

The study has three major implications. First, measures and importance of change readiness at the individual level during corporate events such as M&A is elucidated in the study. Second, a paradigm for assessing higher-order models grounded in theoretical and methodological rigour for testing our hypothesis is presented in the paper. Last, the role of culture in M&A processes is highlighted vis-à-vis factors related to PD and UA on ORC.

The findings of the research answer to the call for a study on factors that help in creating a synergy for successful M&A across all sectors especially in the banking sector. People representing high UA and large PD often look forward to direction and guidelines for guiding employee actions. Leaders therefore need to set clear agenda and effectively communicate the appropriateness of change to their employees for developing positive behaviour towards desirable organizational outcomes. This study touches upon this important perspective for its practical utilization.

The study adds to the limited literature on change which addresses the need for studying socio-cultural factors in the M&A process, especially in an emerging economies context.