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In the past, too many government sponsored initiatives have presented valuable learning resources which have been wasted because the target small business audience have failed to utilise them. This paper explores the issue of offering learning materials to small‐ to medium‐sized enterprises in a manner which recognises their working environment, mode of operation and preferred learning methods, and after addressing these, outlines differing methods at present being tested in the UK and Ireland. The two methodologies are different in that one programme is aimed at distance learning in primarily small businesses, whilst the other is aimed at face‐to‐face learning primarily in micro‐enterprises. It is the contrast between the two which we hope will indicate those common elements in the two methodologies that can specify an ideal path for educating/training micro and small enterprises – the vast bulk of EU organisations.

The purpose of the paper is to research the stress caused to small to medium‐sized enterprise (SME) staff by online collaboration. It aims to investigate online team roles as possible stressors.

The paper is based on research carried out on online collaborative teams by the authors in the Open University Business School, and on existing literature on stress and collaboration. The paper uses MTR‐i™, a commercially used team role analysis tool, and Myers‐Briggs personality types to postulate reasons for stress caused by online collaboration in SMEs.

If team roles are not taken into account then the entrepreneurial members of an SME team may well find online collaboration stressful and so may not be able to fully participate in collaboration, or support others to do so.

The limitations of the research are that so far the research has been carried out on relatively small numbers. A much wider scale study is needed.

The research so far indicates that online collaborative learning in SMEs (whether formal, or informal) needs to take into account the team roles usually carried out by individuals at work if full use is to be made of in order to optimise online collaboration.

This paper links Myers‐Briggs personality types to the ability of SMEs and entrepreneurs to collaborate online. It will inform educators and SME entrepreneurs.

On‐line collaboration is becoming increasingly common in education and in organisations. It was believed that this could in itself cause stress for collaborators. An analysis of on‐line learning diaries, phone interviews and questionnaires indicated that on‐line collaboration could cause stress, and this stress was linked to the dependency of the collaborators on each other, and the level of their mutual trust. Stress could be designed out of on‐line collaborative exercises through management of the on‐line working processes. The trend in both education and management towards increased on‐line working and collaboration indicates that further research needs to be carried out into finding how to reduce stress from this cause.

This paper aims to identify the dimensions of the political empowerment of Indian women and assess the factors responsible for the lacunas that hold women back in their potential.

The research was based on primary data collected through a personal interview method from a sample of 68 women managers working in five different sectors of the Indian economy, namely; IT, education, telecom, banking, and hospitality sector. Further, data on the five factors from a sample of 423 women employees from the above-mentioned sectors have been collected and analyzed using a multiple regression model with control variables (marital status and generation gap).

The major factors churned out that are needed for the political empowerment of women are namely, information or awareness, family support or family environment, legal environment, political environment, and personal ambitions or internal motivation.

The present study has presented new insight into the field of women and politics by providing a case study into the dimensions of political empowerment among Indian women. The pilot model developed in this study can be initiated and replicated across the land on being successful.