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The paper aims to provide practical suggestions to practitioners of human resources (HR) that show how employees can be a source of competitive advantage for the firm.

This paper is based on earlier research and practical experience.

That resource-based theory can be practically applied to HR management to develop employees to be a source of competitive advantage.

This paper provides HR practitioners with concrete examples to improve practice and work strategically for the benefit of employees and the wider firm.

This paper shows how a theory of strategy translates into everyday practice for HR practitioners.

This paper aims to demonstrate the practical application of resource-based theory to the work of HR practitioners and to show how employees can be a direct source of competitive advantage for the firm.

The popular models of competitive strategy seem to reduce employees to invisible units of production – an inconsequential, undifferentiated mass. Even criticisms of Porter’s model do not appear to notice that he forgot about the workers. The idea that a firm’s internal resources, especially its employees, could play a part in generating competitive advantage is not considered. This is despite a great deal of scholarly research demonstrating that employees do not just contribute to competitive advantage; they can themselves be a direct source of competitive advantage.

This paper is valuable to HR practitioners, HR consultants, organizational development specialists and strategic planners.

This paper aims to demonstrate how appreciative inquiry methods can be applied by managers to developing and reviewing business strategy as an alternative, more inclusive and positive approach than is traditionally adopted.

Two cases are presented emanating from consulting projects undertaken by the author.

The cases highlight that appreciative inquiry methods can be applied practically to matters of strategy in different types of organizations.

The practical implications are far reaching. Appreciative inquiry is a fully inclusive method of organizational research. It can be easily and inexpensively adopted and run by management teams, and all employees can be active participants in the process.

The paper is the first that specifically marries appreciative inquiry with business strategy development and review for practitioners and that presents practitioner-oriented cases.

The purpose of this paper is to provide HR practitioners with a model to engage employees in organizational improvement initiatives, which is positive, creative, and inclusive.

The design for this paper is based upon the author’s experience and reading, and the approach is to provide and explain a model with practical examples.

The author found that the appreciative inquiry method has wide applications with regard to improving organizations of all sizes and industries.

The findings of this paper are valuable to HR, organizational development, change managers, practitioners, and consultants. The model is easy to apply and inexpensive.

The purpose of this paper is to describe how the under‐developed state of human resource management (HRM) seems likely to thwart the economic and social development behind Kazakhstan's ambition to be a top 50 nation by 2020.

The paper explains the background to Kazakhstan's Vision 2020, the current state of HRM in the country and the progress HRM specialists need to make if they are to be able to support the nation's rapid economic and social development.

The paper reveals that Kazakhstan needs quickly to develop a labor force with the skills and knowledge capable of delivering Vision 2020 while at the same time radically accelerating the competence, connectedness and co‐ordination of HRM specialists across the nation so that they can develop a shared practice.

The paper urges the need for these specialists to implement the modern policies and practices that organizations rely on to maximize and strategically deploy their human capital.

The paper highlights how HRM can support a nation's entire economic and social development.

The paper describes the state of HRM in a little‐discussed country.

Demonstrates how to build commitment and retain employees through a career-development strategy.

Shows how organizations often mismanage career development and how they could do better.

Describes the five “Ps” of poor career development, the foundations of a career-development strategy and a number of career-development activities.

Highlights the importance of beginning early, communicating clearly, partnering employees, facilitating internal movements and taking action frequently.

Advances the view that employee disengagement and high employee turnover are expensive and often avoidable.

Argues that the lack of career development continues to be a major cause of employee dissatisfaction and turnover and shows how this can be avoided.

The aim of this viewpoint is to highlight the importance of corporate identity.

The article lays out five key principles to shape a corporate image.

Corporate identity is the sum of all things that tell stakeholder groups what a company thinks of itself and how it aims to be perceived by others. It is the practice of fashioning an image that clearly represents where the business strives to position itself in the market place, an image that is consistent with, and supportive of its brands, products, and services.

Reference is drawn from post‐communist Kazakhstan serving to highlight how corporate image can be misjudged in smaller communities and the negative effects this can have on business.

The article provides sound practical advice on the need for organizations to develop a corporate image and how to achieve this.

This paper aims to explore the inherent tensions of the franchisor‐franchisee relationship from the viewpoint of business strategy. It also aims to highlight seven areas of the partnership that can be developed to promote cooperation on a shared strategic direction that delivers improved business outcomes

The literature is reviewed and the author's extensive experience in franchising is drawn on. The Seven C Approach is discussed as a guide.

The paper finds that by adopting an approach based on communication, cooperation, consultation, collaboration, coordination, concession and competence franchisors and franchisees can work through their differences on strategy formulation and implementation.

The paper has real and immediate practical benefits for franchisors and franchisees in that it provides a seven‐step guide for improving the working relationship between the two. This will result in greater trust and better business outcomes.

This paper distills the theory into a compact, practical and easily implementable seven‐step process for improving the franchising relationship. The result is a useful guide for franchising businesses based on research and experience. A new strategy model is developed for practitioners and is presented here for the first time.

This article promotes the versatility and usefulness of critical incident technique (CIT) as a method for addressing organizational problems and challenges.

A brief overview of CIT is provided and a worked example is given from the author's professional experience. A process map is outlined to assist organizations plan the course of a CIT intervention.

CIT is a practical tool that can be used by organizational members to resolve a diverse range of issues across any industry.

CIT has tended towards a three‐question approach to guide the intervention process and analyze the issue at hand. This paper proposes that practitioners need to address a fourth question. The fourth question is designed to help organizations prioritize a proposed CIT intervention.

The purpose of this paper is to highlight the global dearth of training options to support women entrepreneurs and to forward a set of recommendations to better meet the learning needs of women who own their businesses.

The paper provides a thorough literature review on the topic, which examines the learning and training experiences of female entrepreneurs in a wide range of disparate societies.

The absence of leaning, training and professional development opportunities for women entrepreneurs is found to be an almost universal phenomenon. In the few examples where training has been planned and provided, the results have been very significant. Further, women and their businesses are disadvantaged by the lack of training available and that this comes at a high cost to their businesses.

The implications are that countries are hindering economic activity, growth and prosperity by ignoring the professional development needs of women business owners.

The topic of professional development opportunities for women entrepreneurs, especially a comprehensive international comparison, appears to be a first in the literature. The value of the piece is that agencies supporting small business and/or women can identify ways in which they can improve service delivery and outcomes.