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Environmental and social sustainability are becoming key competitive priorities for companies, but the way in which they are integrated in operations strategies remains an open issue. The purpose of this paper is to determine whether established operations strategy configuration models (i.e. price-oriented, market-oriented and capability-oriented models) are modified to include environmental and social priorities and whether different operations strategy configuration models are equally successful in the short and long term.

Analyses were performed using data from the International Manufacturing Strategy Survey (2009), including companies in the assembly industry in 21 different countries. According to previous studies, cluster analysis of competitive priorities and ANOVA analysis of the business strategy and short- and long-term performance were performed.

The results show that traditional operations strategy configuration models are slightly modified. Market-oriented and capability-oriented operations strategies are complemented by environmental and social sustainability priorities. These operations strategies are adopted by companies with a differentiation and innovation business strategy. Moreover, capability-oriented companies, which are the most committed to environmental and social sustainability, perform better in both the short and long term.

This research shows to companies that traditional operations strategies focusing on specific competitive priorities (e.g. low price) are being replaced by more holistic strategies that include sustainability priorities. However, environmental and social priorities contribute to competitive advantage when complementing capability-oriented operations strategies.

This paper extends operations strategy configuration models highlighting how environmental and social sustainability priorities can be deployed together with traditional competitive operations priorities.

While many libraries do some form of planning, few take the time to identify, review and establish priorities. The lack of a commitment to setting priorities leads libraries to operate in a manner that does not always reflect the needs of the organization and the people it serves. It can also lead to wasted time, energy and financial resources as the organization focuses its efforts on developments of lesser importance. The priority setting process is not easy, but it will allow the library to understand its organizational needs and allocate resources accordingly. This will also create a situation in which the library can justify and explain the decisions it makes and the work that it is working on currently as being that which is most critical to the organization.

Managers have mainly used microcomputer programs to handle and communicate known data and information more efficently. However, information is only valuable if it actually helps people make more effective decisions within the time they have available to them, and no managers ever have enough time.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate how the underpinning ideas of public procurement allowed for broader outcomes – a more strategic form of public procurement – to emerge. The paper contributes to the literature on public procurement by empirically addressing the evolution of procurement as a government policy lever in New Zealand so as to demonstrate how policy pragmatism can ensure a shift without a complete overhaul of a complex system.

The paper has used a single country case study to examine a recent development in procurement policy. The objectives of the paper are achieved by adopting a unique conceptual framework connecting ideas, sensemaking and bricolage.

The paper provides empirical and conceptual insights about how bricolage, or policy pragmatism, aids in dealing with the constraints of ideational legacies. It demonstrates a particular form of targeting in procurement, common in public administration but not well understood in the procurement field.

Single country case studies lack scientific generalizability. However, they add to the canon of knowledge that is lacking in the field of public procurement in this case. They also provide a stronger starting point for further research especially with respect to comparative studies.

The paper provides an excellent example of the development of procurement policy that is useful for procurement officials from other countries undergoing change or looking to update or create procurement policies. It shows a high-level process of implementation for government priority outcomes from a country well-known for its quality of public management and governance.

New Zealand has significant equity issues especially as related to its indigenous population. Procurement is being used increasingly as a lever to improve equity. This article includes information about New Zealand's uptake of social procurement.

This paper fulfils a need for greater understanding of how policy is “put together” and the dynamics at major points of change or the implications of policy changes. To the best of the author’s knowledge, this case study of procurement policy in New Zealand is original, and the author is aware of no other similar work emanating from New Zealand in the academic journals.

The purpose of this paper is to explain the changes in the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.0 compared with WCAG 1.0 within the context of its historical development.

In order to compare WCAG 2.0 with WCAG 1.0 a diachronic analysis of the evolution of these standards is done. Known authors and publications in the field, the Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI) web pages, WebAIM and the blogosphere were also monitored for comments and third‐party analyses. The analysis of the main changes from WCAG 1.0 to WCAG 2.0 was based on personal experience with WAI guidelines, experimentation with some of the new guidelines, and a selection of best practice online services in the application of the WCAG, including WAI documentation.

WCAG 2.0 is more educational and is applied to more technologies than WCAG 1.0. The limitations of WCAG 1.0 are mostly due to its origin. In changing from one to the other, new priorities and new elements must be taken into account. The paper concludes that though these guidelines are a useful tool for governments, they are only the first step towards accessibility, which can only be achieved through user‐centred design.

This paper explains the significance and limitations of the WCAG and gives a short guide to adapting web sites to the new regulations.

Support for environmental research has a long tradition at the Federal Ministry of Education and Research. A new funding priority establishes a new substantive priority area – sustainable management. The purpose is to develop strategies and solutions for sustainable management and test them in real life through cooperation between research institutions, industry and consumers. The results of 18 collaborative projects should help to exploit the potential for sustainable management in the private sectors, set new priorities in research on business management and initiate standardisation processes towards sustainable management. A support process has to pass the results of the projects as well as their implications for sustainable management on to potential users. The research projects altogether cover four priority areas; namely, information technology instruments, controlling instruments, planning instruments and communication instruments.

This editorial aims to identify new research priorities in the service marketplace that are emerging because of consumer and organizational trends in the shadow of the global pandemic.

A conceptual approach is used that draws on observations from practitioners to synthesize changes in consumer values, motivations and behaviors as they pertain to service consumption, design and delivery. This editorial draws on current trends and recent service research to discuss the current state of the marketplace and to uncover areas in which research voids exist.

This editorial offers ten research priorities for service researchers. These research priorities are supply chain and staffing shortages; sustainable services, older consumers embrace digital technologies; digital financial services; consumer pursuit of personal and spiritual awareness; participating in virtual communities, networks and worlds; affinity for peer-to-peer commerce; transformative places; seeking self-love services, and social distance concerns.

Academicians are provided with a series of research priorities that are interesting, timely and relevant for the new service marketplace.

Service academicians are encouraged to pursue empirical and descriptive investigations in-line with the priorities developed in this editorial. These research priorities are relevant, timely and interesting.

This work presents scholars with a historical overview of trends in service research. The challenges posed by the pandemic represent the beginning of a new era in service research thought and practice as many previously held theories and understandings of consumers’ marketplace behaviors have permanently changed due to behavioral changes that transpired during governmental mandated lockdowns.

Electricity plays an important role in the economic condition of any country. Nowadays, Pakistan is badly affected by shortage of electricity, which directly affected the economic growth of state. The purpose of this study is to propose an improved grey model DGPM(1,1,N) to forecast Pakistan's production of electricity, installed capacity and consumption.

To significantly simulate and predict accuracy, the discrete grey polynomial model DGPM(1,1,N) is improved with new information priority accumulation. The particle swarm optimization (PSO) algorithm is used for parameter optimization. The value of parameter is adjusted into improved grey model. By adjusting the parameter value in the model, the accuracy of prediction is enhanced.

The installed capacity of electricity needs more attention to improvement through implementation of effective polices, resolving major issues and funding scheme to fulfill the electricity demand of country. And improved DGPM(1,1,N) has better accuracy than original DGPM(1,1,N), DGM(1,1), nongrey models, linear regression and Holt–Winters methods.

This paper provides a practical and efficient improved grey method to predict the electricity production, consumption and installed capacity in Pakistan. This research and suggestion will help Pakistani government to formulate better policies to decrease the consumption of electricity and increase the installed capacity of electricity.

This paper not only improves the grey model with accumulation generation operator but also forecasts Pakistan's electricity production, installed capacity and consumption. It is a new idea to predict the installed capacity of electricity and the findings provide suggestions for the government to make policies.

Three principles are presented to help companies achieve sustainable, differentiated service in the 1990s. The “service brand” concept is introduced and the contrast made between a service brand and the conventional product brand. Practical methods to mobilise company‐wide support for the service brand are described, and the essential nature of brand contracts is outlined with a view to the new environment where forming a strong service network is of crucial importance.

Considering the small sample size and non-linear characteristics of historical energy consumption data from certain provinces in Southwest China, the authors propose a hybrid accumulation operator and a hybrid accumulation grey univariate model as a more accurate and reliable methodology for forecasting energy consumption. This method can provide valuable decision-making support for policy makers involved in energy management and planning.

The hybrid accumulation operator is proposed by linearly combining the fractional-order accumulation operator and the new information priority accumulation. The new operator is then used to build a new grey system model, named the hybrid accumulation grey model (HAGM). An optimization algorithm based on the JAYA optimizer is then designed to solve the non-linear parameters θ, r, and γ of the proposed model. Four different types of curves are used to verify the prediction performance of the model for data series with completely different trends. Finally, the prediction performance of the model is applied to forecast the total energy consumption of Southwest Provinces in China using the real world data sets from 2010 to 2020.

The proposed HAGM is a general formulation of existing grey system models, including the fractional-order accumulation and new information priority accumulation. Results from the validation cases and real-world cases on forecasting the total energy consumption of Southwest Provinces in China illustrate that the proposed model outperforms the other seven models based on different modelling methods.

The HAGM is used to forecast the total energy consumption of the Southwest Provinces of China from 2010 to 2020. The results indicate that the HAGM with HA has higher prediction accuracy and broader applicability than the seven comparative models, demonstrating its potential for use in the energy field.

The HAGM(1,1) is used to predict energy consumption of Southwest Provinces in China with the raw data from 2010 to 2020. The HAGM(1,1) with HA has higher prediction accuracy and wider applicability compared with some existing models, implying its high potential to be used in energy field.

Theoretically, this paper presents, for the first time, a hybrid accumulation grey univariate model based on a new hybrid accumulation operator. In terms of application, this work provides a new method for accurate forecasting of the total energy consumption for southwest provinces in China.