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The impact of Covid-19 on students and teachers, on courses and programs, and on schools and universities is unparalleled in the history of education. Indeed, many authors have gone as far as to contend that the pandemic resulted in a paradigm shift in education. This chapter explores this contention by first looking at the history of paradigm shifts in education writ large, and then the implication of those shifts on teacher education, in general, and on practicum mentoring, specifically.

In this chapter, the author explores and discusses the transformation of management from the perspective of complex systems, systems change and the Taoist yin-yang theory. Modern complex organizations require innovative management practices that move beyond traditional approaches. Consequently, many organizations are experiencing a management shift towards more holistic and sustainable methods. This shift encompasses changes in organizational structures and modes of inquiry. Organizations are transitioning from rigid hierarchies to more collaborative and agile configurations while adopting a systemic approach to management that acknowledges the interconnectedness and interdependence of all organizational aspects. Simultaneously, there is a paradigm shift in management thinking, replacing the conventional focus on ego-action with eco-action, which emphasizes the integration of diverse perspectives and the cultivation of self-awareness and introspection. This shift in mindset is embodied in the yin-yang paradigm, highlighting the importance of balance and harmony between contrasting forces.

This chapter suggests that enhancing sustainable development in the age of technologies requires reflection about the relationship between business practice and sustainable development, as well as clarification of the relationship between sustainability and sustainable development. At the core of business activity is the definition of sustainable development defined by Brundtland (1987) as ‘meet[ing] the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs’. Although that captures only one aspect of the sustainability story and its relationship to sustainable development, it nonetheless shapes business approach in research and in sustainability practices. To illustrate the contradictions and tensions in practice so far, this chapter uses three lenses: measurement in environmental, social and governance (ESG) investment, the problem of scalability and the challenge of bias in artificial intelligence (AI). It is not clear that we need a paradigm shift, but a shift in mindsets around sustainability business practice will be needed if sustainable development is to be enhanced in the age of technologies.

To answer the questions: what roles windows of opportunity act in the catchup process of latecomers, what strategies latecomer enterprises should adopt to size windows of opportunity to catch-up with incumbents even going beyond?

This paper studies the catch-up history of the Chinese mobile phone industry and proposes a sectoral innovation system under scenario of technology paradigm shifts. Then a history-friendly simulation model and counterfactual analysis are conducted to learn how different windows of opportunity and catch-up strategies influence the catch-up performance of latecomers.

Results show latecomers can catch up with technology ability by utilizing technology window and path-creating strategy. However, catching up with the market is not guaranteed. Demand window can help latecomers to catch up with market as it increases their survival rates, different sized windows benefit different strategies. However, it also enlarges incumbents' scale effect. Without technology window technology catch up is not guaranteed. Two windows have combination effects. Demand window affects the “degree” of change in survival rates, while the technology window affects the “speed” of change. Demand window provides security; technology window provides the possibility of a breakthrough for technology ability.

The findings of this paper provide theoretical guidance for latecomer enterprises to choose appropriate catch-up strategies to seize different opportunity windows.

This paper emphasizes the abrupt change of industrial innovation system caused by technology paradigm shifts, which makes up for the shortcomings of previous researches on industrial innovation system which either studied the influence of static factors or based on the influence of continuous changes.

The post-COVID environment presents significant challenges for organizations. Unfortunately, many leaders and organizations are living in “post-pandemic.” Leaders must reframe their approaches to employee relationships and the nature of the workplace. Employee experience, which combines, user experience, design thinking and organizational development, provides a methodology and perspective that is needed to address these significant changes. The purpose of this paper is to readdress employee experience and how its approach challenges conventional approaches to human resources (HR) and employee engagement and demonstrate how it can serve as an indispensable tool for transitioning to the new workplace.

Employee experience has become ubiquitous in organizations, but unfortunately the underlying sources and philosophies that distinguish this approach are often neglected. This paper demonstrates the new, irreversible organizational world created by COVID-19, reviews the origins of the concept, reviews the six principles previously introduced and then explicates three philosophical paradigmatic shifts that must be undertaken to take advantage of employee experience and address the new organizational challenges.

Employee experience can serve as a strategic tool for addressing post-COVID-19 organizational challenges. Past ideas about engagement will not work. Three shifts deriving from employee experience’s roots in user experiences, design thinking and emergent organization development must be adopted. Instead of thinking structurally in which things are primary, leaders need to take a relational perspective which insists on relational primacy. Because experience is holistic and embodied, a phenomenological perspective must take the place of the usual behavioral perspective. Finally, leaders and HR must see the task ahead as a collaborative codesign with employees, insisting on radical participation.

As with the medical challenges with the COVID-19 virus itself, the organizational challenges are new and have never been faced before. It is difficult to shift paradigms, challenge assumptions and redirect effort while maintaining operating organizations. Often, leaders and organizations are ill-equipped to address very novel situations from past experience and education. Much more research and practical implementations need to be conducted to continue to evolve the concept.

Organizations are facing many crises beyond the supply/demand economic issues caused by COVID-19. The social issues within the organizational world are often overlooked but having significant impact. Cultures have been attenuated and disrupted, employee expectations have changed and the remote job market has expanded opportunities for employment. As a result, retention, performance, loyalty and satisfaction have been negatively impacted. If organizations want to continue growth and productivity, they need to find new ways of working and operating.

The nature of work, organization and employee/organization relationship is in transition. Because much of people’s lives are spent in the workplace, this shift has significant implications for relationships within and beyond the workplace. COVID-19 has also had an impact on mental health, life satisfaction and other aspects of the human experience. Experience in the workplace and outside the workplace are converging and impacting each other. The new reality cannot be ignored or denied.

Many organizations, leaders and HR practitioners are approaching the new reality with outdated and ineffective tools from the pre-COVID-19 world, tools that were questionably effective then. Reclaiming the revolutionary underpinnings of employee experience is a necessary but often neglected action.

This chapter aims to explore the novelty and utility of political economy discourse, termed “neo-statism,” as an analytical lens for comparative research in higher education. Analysis is framed within the context of Hong Kong’s transition from a British colony to a Special Administrative Region under China’s sovereignty, and its shifting academic paradigms from a more or less spontaneous philosophy rooted in liberal capitalist economy to embracing neo-statism, which involves market-conforming and state-sponsored approaches to economic and social restructuring whereby the state regulates higher education in support of national integration and global power projection. The statist regulation depends heavily on its deployment of discursive legitimacy, strategic distribution of resources, organizational synergy, and elite cohesion articulated through higher education policy, research projects, and cross-border academic exchange and cooperation. The Hong Kong case suggests that comparative research in higher education should advance from the methodological aspects of the comparative approach to exploring wider theoretical spectrum, for understanding emerging politico-economic factors shaping academic paradigm in comparative contexts. Moreover, scholars who engage in the trendy internationalization in higher education should move beyond the logics of neo-liberalism, and pay closer attention to the new geopolitical realities that are changing the normative and interactive dimensions of international higher education at large.

This chapter explores a pathway towards achieving a sustainable and inclusive future through the implementation of systems innovation, systems leadership and systems change. The author highlights the importance of understanding complex systems and identifies several models that can be employed to drive systems change, including the iceberg model and multi-level perspective. The author stresses the significance of systems leadership and innovation in creating a sustainable and inclusive future. This means that leaders and managers need to shift their mindset from reductionism to systems thinking. Reductionism views complex systems as a collection of separate parts that can be studied independently. In contrast, systems thinking acknowledges the interconnectedness of all parts and how they influence each other. When they embrace systems thinking, leaders and managers can make systems innovation and drive systems change to achieve sustainable and inclusive growth. Achieving a sustainable and inclusive future requires a collective effort from individuals, organizations and governments. It demands a comprehensive understanding of the interdependencies and interactions within complex systems, as well as a willingness to adopt new ways of thinking and leading. This chapter presents a compelling case for adopting systems innovation, systems leadership and systems change as critical components in building a sustainable and inclusive future.

The authors draw on this approach to explore the consequences of compassion and altruism in the workplace for firm performance, using organizational resilience as a mediating variable.

In recent years, a paradigm shift has been proposed in the organizational sciences that includes a change from self-centeredness to interconnectedness. This emergent management paradigm considers that employees are not only motivated by self-interest but also by other-centered values, such as altruism and compassion for others. This alternative proposal suggests the need for a more humanistic perspective for management. To carry out the research, the authors applied a structural equation model to a sample of highly innovative companies from different sectors.

The results confirm that compassion at work leads to a climate based on altruism, which indirectly increases firm performance by means of organizational resilience. This study contributes to the organizational literature by revealing some benefits of promoting altruism and compassion in organizations.

This study therefore provides a detailed analysis of the consequences of altruism and compassion in organizations and reveals some organizational conditions that can drive firm performance. Moreover, this study is the first to suggest and empirically validate that a work climate based on altruism enhances organizational resilience. In turn, organizational resilience enables the firm to take appropriate actions to convert unexpected and adverse situations that potentially threaten its survival into sources of opportunity and growth.

As the skills economy becomes the norm, learning focused on skills, learners who understand those skills and can iterate the learners to potential employers, and hiring personnel who prioritize skills when making personnel decisions create a visible currency that can be leveraged by all the stakeholders. This paper seeks to analyze those emergent skills, show the skills' impact on the self-organizing skills ecosystem and illustrate how the skills provide a conduit to wholesale global change by creating a talent pipeline designed to generate economic vitality.

Through a system thinking lens and by exploring related skills ecosystem literature, this paper explores the concept of the self-organizing learn-earn skills ecosystem and the role technology plays in the development, implementation and continuation of the process. Tools such as customer, actor, transformation, worldview, owner and environment (CATWOE) and levers have been implemented to probe the maturity, challenges and opportunities the emerging ecosystem provides.

As the ecosystem evolves, there is much to be done to align stakeholders to reach the ecosystem's full potential. However, by applying a systems lens to the work in progress, greater clarity and definition can be achieved, thereby generating more forward momentum to propel the skills movement toward the intended outcomes.

While there are many recent publications that define the elements, parameters and attributes of the referenced skills ecosystem, this article aggregates information, through a system thinking lens, to provide a deeper, more cohesive analysis.