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This paper aims to explore the extent to which four elements of the value chain – marketing, research and development, procurement, and operations – are associated with product quality and product innovation.

A survey of 194 managers of Australian firms, and multivariate analysis using structural equation modeling was used to test the hypotheses.

The elements of the value chain differ in their association with product outcomes. Marketing and production are related to product quality, but surprisingly while research and development is related to product innovation, marketing is not. Procurement is related to both product quality and product innovation.

The paper shows that individual elements of the value chain are related to specific competitive strategies and how these elements are related to each other, suggesting the need to direct effort within the firm for better, targeted performance. The results are limited by the sample size and geography of the survey.

Specific value chain functions tend to be associated with specific performance outcomes. This suggests that managers might gain by targeting specific elements of the value chain as their organizations strive for specific competitive goals.

This paper seeks to help managers and decision makers to assess the relationship between the different attributes of the value chain and product quality and innovation. It is often not feasible for managers to emphasize all the elements of the value chain simultaneously, and this paper provides an important step in looking at these individual linkages.

This paper aims to examine the ten competitive dimensions of service in terms of relative importance and contribution to business performance, using the Importance‐Performance Analysis (IPA) matrix.

Empirical data for this study was drawn from 190 managers of Australian service organisations, with primary responsibilities related to day‐to‐day corporate operations. The targeted service organisations encompassed various sectors, including: transportation, communications, banking, insurance, health care, education, wholesale, retail, and professional services.

Based on the four quadrants of the IPA matrix, the results suggest that customer retention and productivity need to be maintained, while innovation and speed may receive a lower priority. Brand image and cost‐effectiveness fall into the areas which need improvement, while quality by conformance and delivery are identified as “potential overkillers”. Furthermore, this paper tests the difference between high‐ and low‐performing firms and shows that low‐performing firms generally place a similar level of importance on the ten competitive dimensions as high‐performing ones, yet are not successful in converting what is important into performance.

This paper contributes to strategic management in service organisations by mapping the level of importance of the ten competitive dimensions of service against their effectiveness in improving business performance.

The findings could help firms identify the competitive dimensions within their organisation that are effectively‐resourced, under‐resourced, or over‐resourced and provide guidance for, “fighting the good fight”.

This paper contributes to knowledge by identifying the competitive priorities held by service firms and their effectiveness in improving business performance.

Using sociolinguistic methods and ethnography, looks at the continuous and in process relationship between everyday talk and school leadership. Through close discourse analysis of three distinct situations, demonstrates how administrative talk shapes and is shaped by a school’s contexts, creating constant possibilities for educational leaders. Discusses implications for understanding how and why moral leadership is tenuous and problematic using Dewey’s notion of mortality as the nurturing of educational ideas: that is, in practice, moral leadership is not always reflexive or progressive.

In order to understand how collegiate athletics fits within the wider problem of sexual violence on college campuses, the purpose of this paper is to start with an examination of the overall scope of the issue of sexual violence in the USA and the larger culture that produces it. Next, the relevant laws and adjudication of sexual violence operant in American colleges are outlined. Finally, college athletics is placed into this bigger context by highlighting a number of particular cases to illustrate a broader understanding of collegiate athletes involved in sexual violence.

The author examines the history of rape laws and adjudication and the federal laws relevant to institutions of higher education. The author investigates the debate over adjudication of sexual violence within the criminal justice system or through campus systems. The author read previous literature to determine links between sexual violence and collegiate athletes and highlights particular cases that have gotten significant media attention for clues to the rape prone culture that can be fostered within collegiate athletics.

This analysis highlights how collegiate athletics can be a context that creates a rape prone culture and that universities and the criminal justice system need further reform to overcome long-standing beliefs in rape myths which perpetuate sexual violence, discourage reporting by victims of sexual violence, deter bystander intervention and underplay the impact of sexual violence on victims. Thus, structural changes are needed within collegiate athletic cultures as well as on college campuses to address sexual violence.

College campuses and athletic departments must address climates that create rape prone cultures. There remains a need for systematic data collection of perpetrators of sexual violence, along side data collection of experiences of sexual violence. College campuses and athletic departments must have in place procedures and policy that adhere to federal law, whereby athletes are not treated differently from non-athletes and victims are offered appropriate services that recognize the trauma of sexual violence. Further progress toward a standard of affirmative consent is needed to move toward greater sexual autonomy for everyone.

There is evidence that collegiate athletes are disproportionately represented among the population of sexual violence perpetrators on college campuses. Thus, it is vital to understand this population and that connection. The value of this work is to explicate the complicated adjudication process between university disciplinary processes and the criminal justice system.

Aim of the present monograph is the economic analysis of the role of MNEs regarding globalisation and digital economy and in parallel there is a reference and examination of some legal aspects concerning MNEs, cyberspace and e‐commerce as the means of expression of the digital economy. The whole effort of the author is focused on the examination of various aspects of MNEs and their impact upon globalisation and vice versa and how and if we are moving towards a global digital economy.