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This paper aims to reveal the effects of birth order in decision-making style, conflict handling style and propensity for participative decision-making. The intention is to open the perspective of birth order research in organizational studies, as an important individual difference of managers.

A survey was conducted with 230 managers from different industries in Kosovo. Self-report measures were used for decision-making style, conflict handling style and participatory decision-making constructs.

Results indicate that only children are more avoidant and spontaneous decision-makers. Firstborns are rational in decision-making and prefer problem-solving in conflict handling. Middleborns are intuitive decision-makers and use compromising in conflict handling. Lastborns make decisions rationally and use both compromising and problem-solving in conflicting situations. In addition, lastborns appeared to have a more positive attitude toward participative decision-making, followed by middleborns, firstborns and only children.

Birth order affects managers’ behaviors in decision-making and conflict situations. Relationship dynamics in sibships are reflected in organizational settings, affecting how people behave in decision-making and conflict handling.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study to attest how birth order influences the ways managers make decisions, handle conflicts and involve others in decision-making. As birth order cannot be changed, such knowledge is critical.

The purpose of this paper is to propose the use of social impact assessment (SIA) principles to evaluate the contribution of cultural heritage to social sustainability, supporting both a people-centered and socially responsible approach to heritage management.

Specifically, the paper explores SIA as a methodological tool for post-project evaluation, used to define projects’ contributions to aspects of social sustainability through analyzing impacts of participation in a rural context case study, that of the Scapa Flow landscape heritage scheme in Orkney Islands, Scotland, UK.

Based on research findings from the thematic analysis of 40 semi-structured interviews on impacts (with heritage managers, planners and participants in the scheme), the paper proposes a combination of heritage value assessment process with social impact identification to achieve a context-relevant assessment of social sustainability. Existing research around social capital and sense of place supports the analysis of relevant impacts and heritage values. Findings support overlaps between socio-environmental impacts, when looking at the role of heritage for community well-being in rural contexts.

The qualitative approach allows for a context-relevant, bottom up impact assessment and allows for multiple stakeholders perceptions to be included.

The proposed methodological approach has greater implications for the work of institutions and professionals involved in project evaluations that can inform participatory heritage project planning, ensuring high social relevance.

Application of SIA principles in heritage sector can increase social benefits of heritage projects and enable wider community participation in processes of heritage management.

Through this case study, the effectiveness of SIA principles when applied in cultural heritage project evaluation is discussed, reflecting on a novel methodology for impact assessment in heritage.

Disaster management is not merely a subject to be taught in class rooms but a habit to be practiced not only by the individual but by the community as a whole. Participation of each and every component of society in practicing disaster management is the key to success. The purpose of this paper is to address this issue.

Uttaranchal is a newly created state of India having 80 percent of its geographical area under mountainous terrain. The State is prone to various natural disasters such as earthquake, landslide, flash flood, etc. People and the government have learnt a lot from the past experiences and thus a strategy of community based disaster management is being developed to manage the disasters. The analysis is based on the data/information collected for the last seven years (1999‐2005).

Democracy, by definition, means participation in governance. However, while we have practiced representative democracy for over half a century now we are still far away from a participatory democratic‐mode.

The period under study is short for developing any hypothesis but sufficient care has been taken to consider vital factors.

Community participation in disaster is a common phenomenon in the countries like India. Considering the vast potential of community and putting its participation into practice in different stages of disaster management (prevention, preparedness, mitigation, response and rehabilitation) will certainly help the disaster managers to make a safer society.

Participation in practice is far more complex than in theory. Every sound theory in turn is invariably based on good practice. Practice, good practice, entails intensive and extensive attention to details; the nuts and bolts of it.

The purpose of this paper is to describe the design and implementation of an agile planning and operations framework for an academic research library, designed to facilitate an ongoing organizational conversation about the organization’s strategic intent and how it plans to move from intention to reality. The goals motivating the implementation of such a framework include creating iterative, open-ended planning and management processes that enable increased flexibility and openness to unforeseen opportunities, as well as the ongoing integration of library faculty, staff, and external stakeholder voices into planning, management, and assessment discussions.

The framework seeks to harmonize planning, management, and assessment processes over 18-24-month rolling time horizons, during which organizational efforts and investments would be reviewed and revised in an iterative fashion.

The authors share results and analyses from stakeholder assessments used to develop foundational mission, vision, values, and strategic directions documentation and discuss the structural, cultural, and organizational development challenges confronted and gains experienced in implementing the framework.

Many academic libraries are exploring new approaches to strategic planning, ways to enhance organizational health, and manage change. The authors are unaware of an academic or research library that has attempted to design and implement a similar approach to strategic planning and its assessment. The agile planning framework provides an alternative to traditional “waterfall” approaches to strategic planning for libraries.

Drawing on and theorizing continuous change, the purpose of this paper is to investigate the antecedents of continuous change behavior in schools. Relying on conceptual discussions about organizational change (OC), three sets of variables including context (workload, participatory management, trust), process (knowledge sharing, social interaction) and outcome (job satisfaction) were identified as antecedents of continuous change.

To test the predictive value of the antecedents for continuous change, a correlational study was design and structural equation modeling was used to test the direct and indirect relationships among study variables. The data were collected from a sample of 648 primary and secondary public school teachers.

The results showed that context, outcome, and process factors function through direct and indirect paths to contribute to the prediction of continuous change behavior. Moreover, knowledge sharing either directly or indirectly played a central role in the prediction of continuous change behavior.

These results suggested that a widened knowledge base provides the basis for ongoing experimentation with, alteration, and modification of work categories in schools. Providing such factors in schools seems to facilitate the ongoing improvement of work practices in schools, even in the absence of a planned change intervention.

This study is one of the first empirical studies tested the predictive value of antecedents of continuous change in school organizational context, where OC is the norm and change failures are very common.

Social participation of university refers to the creation of knowledge and participatory processes with local communities in solving community problems in order to achieve sustainable development. Identifying the university's social participation strategies was the main purpose of the present study.

In order to achieve this aim, the qualitative method was used. The study area is Semnan province and Semnan University. The statistical sample included two groups of internal beneficiaries of the university (including staff, deputies and faculty members of the university) and external beneficiaries of the university (including managers and experts of local organizations, education, province and municipality). The sampling was purposefully performed based on the theoretical saturation criterion, holding an interview with 29 participants. Data analysis was performed in three stages of open, axial and selective coding.

The results of the research showed that the university can participate with its local community in developing the university vision according to the needs of the local community, holding workshops and scientific conferences, concluding joint research contracts, expert and researcher exchange, environmental leadership training, participatory management and teamwork, indigenous manpower, institutionalizing regional participation, solving community issues and problems, creating associations and non-governmental companies in the community, mission orientation, directing education and research towards solving problems and meeting the real needs of the province according to land management, supervising research activities, conducting comprehensive studies in the field of mineral potentials, organizing workshops for farmers' awareness, monitoring the employment of graduates, creating and developing new fields according to the needs of the province and region, educating citizens and cultural zing to reduce production and segregate household waste, opening the university's social space for the growth and supply of youth, educating the province's handicrafts to housewives, especially in the deprived areas, sensitizing programs in the field of environmental protection, and reviewing educational content based on the community needs.

Biosocial and economic policy of universities was another result of the present study. The university intends to make citizens aware of social and environmental problems and to provide the necessary education in the fields of air pollution, soil salinity, drinking water supply, cultivation pattern refinement, agricultural mechanization, and waste and waste management. The university should also promote entrepreneurship among students and faculty members and attract economic resources to the university through innovation and commercialization circles, and develop the province's economic infrastructure in various fields of tourism, agriculture, industry and mining.

Carris Reels, a reel-manufacturing company headquartered in Vermont, had long-standing goals of being employee owned and governed. They also had a strong organizational (ownership) culture. The Corporate Steering Committee (CSC), a committee composed of representatives from management and non-management employees, and the board of directors had a decision to make about adding two new members to the board. With these new members, the board of directors would be made up of both members of management and non-management employees. Was Carris forfeiting wiser outside counsel in favor of company insiders? What about for the future of the company?

The data for this case were collected from discussions and informal interviews with Carris Reels employees, and archival data from the company intranet which includes an archival of company newsletters, meeting minutes and announcements. Information on the Employee Stock Ownership Plan (ESOP), board of directors, the CSC, and ESOP trustees from these sources were also used.

This case is suitable for strategic management, and social responsibility and social enterprise-focused courses for upper-level undergraduates and MBA students.

The sources, development, and outcomes of a strong organizational culture are important to this case. Schein (1989) and others (Harris and Ogbanna, 1999) address the role of a company’s founder in development of the company’s culture. Research addressing ownership and participation in the context of an ownership culture indicates positive outcomes to employees and to their companies (Logue and Yates, 2005; Ownership Associates, 1998).

One of the most contentious issues in management is participatory decision‐making (PDM). While studies abound centred on hypothetical benefits, characteristics of involved individuals, its moral foundation and other aspects, few have investigated the pattern of utilization of avenues for PDM. This study investigates the relationship between nine avenues for teacher involvement, and the degree of actual and desired participation, plus decisional deprivation experienced by the respondents on a 30 item Critical Decision Inventory. Teachers' biographical characteristics; level of instruction, sex, teaching experience, academic qualifications and size of district of employment were also correlated with the utilization of avenues for participation. The major findings were (i) a high correlation between sex, level of instruction and avenues used; (ii) teaching experience was not supportive of earlier research; (iii) district size did not support previous studies; (iv) academic qualifications did not produce conclusive results.