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Restaurants’ outdoor signage plays an irreplaceable role in attracting potential diners, as it conveys important functional and symbolic meanings of the businesses. The purpose of this study is to investigate the effect of typographic design elements of outdoor signage on consumers’ perceptions of authenticity. This study also tests the linkage between authenticity and willingness to dine, as well as the moderating effect of frequency of dining in ethnic restaurants on the relationship.

Using a 2 (simplified vs traditional Chinese characters) × 2 (calligraphy vs computer font) × 2 (vertical vs horizontal text flow) between-subject design, the authors did two experiments with 786 Chinese diners. Restaurant authenticity and willingness to dine are dependent variables, and openness to ethnic cuisine is the control variable.

Display characters and text flow significantly affect restaurant authenticity. Furthermore, the results of this study demonstrate that display characters interact with typeface to influence restaurant authenticity. Consumers’ perceived authenticity significantly increases their willingness to dine. The frequency of dining in ethnic restaurants moderates the relationship between restaurant authenticity and willingness to dine.

Ethnic restaurateurs should pay attention to the outdoor signage design, as it affects potential consumers’ authenticity perceptions. Specifically, in Mainland China, traditional Chinese characters and vertical text direction increase potential consumers’ authenticity perceptions.

This study extends the semiotic theory and applies the cue–judgment–behavior model in the hospitality literature. This study also provides new understanding of authenticity by identifying the influence of typographic design on authenticity, which confirms the semiotic theory that certain semiotic cues affect consumers’ judgments.

Discusses a recent survey of companies which shows that, although 73 per cent of the respondents had implemented total quality initiatives, 63 per cent of these initiatives were failing. Suggests that many organizations are trying to implement too many quality improvement activities too fast without taking the time to develop systematic, long‐term implementation strategies. Gives guidelines on critical success factors for continuous improvement, empowerment, learning and training.

Improving the resilience of the construction sector helps countries recover quicker from crises and can assist with improving community resilience and recovery. This study aims to explore ways in which the construction sector might improve its resilience.

This paper examined past disasters and the role construction plays to understand what and how better construction resilience can be built, and the impact this will have on recovery and reconstruction.

The findings showed that after a crisis, the construction sector is called upon to manage building and infrastructure recovery and reconstruction. Construction organisations are needed by the community, as they provide physical resources, people, materials, logistics, management and technical expertise and rebuilding. To ensure that recovery and reconstruction programs are successfully implemented, it is necessary for the construction sector to be resilient. To achieve improved resilience in the construction industry, disaster resilience management needs to become mainstreamed into construction processes.

Although larger organisations have some preparation to respond to crises, including having emergency or disaster plans, smaller companies struggle to achieve a reasonable level of resilience. It appears that senior management and key people in construction organisations are familiar with the procedures but that the majority of staff in organisations lack knowledge and skills.

Understanding the role the construction sector plays in disasters and providing directions for improving construction sector resilience will ultimately improve recovery and reconstruction outcomes.

This paper discusses how communities rely on services provided by construction organisations to enable them to recover from emergencies and crises. Pre-disaster construction company resilience impacts on the ability of construction companies to function post-disaster.

This paper focuses on a number of cases and shows where and how the construction sector has worked in disasters and provides a new analysis of the role the industry plays, and the various disaster stages where the industry has maximum impact.

The purpose of this paper is to draw attention to the concept of job burnout and what can be done to solve the problem.

This paper presents a literature review and practical strategies to jumpstart a stalled job.

The findings suggest that there are techniques that can be incorporated into one's life to make work meaningful once again.

The paper draws attention to the fact that in time one may experience job burnout and aids in determining what can be done to turn the experience around.

With the large number of publicized TQM failures being announced, many people are now predicting its downfall. Suggests that organizations should decide why and what they wish to improve before pronouncing it a failure. Discusses why TQM is coming under severe criticism. Asserts that the emphasis placed on measures used to evaluate the initiative will depend on the reasons for adopting total quality in the first place. Considers the motivation implications and the cost of quality. Suggests a number of questions that organizations should ask themselves. Contends that improvement through total quality is measurable and will be reflected in competitiveness and bottom‐line results.

The purpose of this article is to provide an interview with Professor M.S. Rao.

The interview is conducted by an independent interviewer.

Professor M.S. Rao is a leadership development practitioner with over 30 years' experience. He has written 16 books, including Secrets of Your Leadership Success – The 11 Indispensable E's of a Leader, and Smart Leadership: Lessons for Leaders. In his book Soft Leadership: Make Others Feel More Important, Professor Rao advances his model for soft leadership, blending characteristics of soft skills training with traditional leadership theory. This approach is endorsed by management guru David Ulrich, who provided the foreword for the book. Professor Rao also maintains two popular blogs, http://profmsr.blogspot.com (Where Knowledge is Wealth) and http://professormsraoguru.blogspot.com (Knowledge Grows When Shared).

The paper provides useful information from a leading figure regarding soft leadership.

The purpose of this paper is to elicit the expectations for resilient post-disaster rebuilds from Caribbean project end-users. In anticipation of future climatological, meteorological, hydrological or geophysical disasters disaster, key stakeholders can articulate and incorporate strategies for resilience development, thus leading to improved end-users’ satisfaction and confidence.

This paper engages the results of a systematic literature review that identified 24 empirical resilience factors for post-disaster reconstruction projects. These factors informed a semi-structured questionnaire to elicit the perspectives of Caribbean end-users on a seven-point Likert scale. The quantitative analysis of both factor ranking and principal component analysis was performed to identify correlations and provides further interpretations on the desires of the end-users for resilient rebuilds.

The results presented in this paper highlight the collective perspectives on the Caribbean end-users on what they perceived to be aiding more resilient reconstruction projects. They identified reconstruction designs mindful of future hazards, policies that aid climate change mitigation, active assessment of key structures, readily available funding sources and ensuring stakeholder’s unbiased interest as the top-most empirical factors. Factor analysis suggested collaborations with inclusive training and multi-stakeholder engagement, critical infrastructure indexing and effective governance as the critical resilience development factors.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this paper is first of its kind to explore the perspective of the Caribbean people regarding disaster reconstruction projects. It addresses developmental avenues for measurement indicators towards resilience monitoring and improvement. Additionally, the perspectives can provide construction industry professionals with tools for improved operational resilience objective-setting guidance, for Caribbean construction.

The purpose of this paper is to develop an illuminated polymeric optical fibre (POF) garment – the LUMI jacket – with accessibility and wearability improvements. This paper demonstrates how wearable technology can be seamlessly integrated into daily life.

An interdisciplinary approach involving design and technological techniques was adopted. Both garment design approaches and textile technologies were used to optimise the performance of a POF jacket. A group of tactile sensors was developed to create an easy-to-access interactive function. A POF fabric sample and garment were washed and examined to prove that a POF garment could be made part of a domestic laundry routine.

As a result, an illuminated POF garment – the LUMI jacket with textile-based switches – was created. Compared with current POF garments, the LUMI jacket’s wearability and accessibility were highly improved.

This project explored an unobstructive POF-illuminated garment to address the functional and wearable barriers to adoption. The interaction between wearer and garment is accessible. Electronics and textile touch sensors were seamlessly integrated into garment. Washability of POF garment was proved. This research explores how e-textiles can fit into everyday life.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the literature on resilience factors applied to post-disaster reconstruction projects and to develop a guiding framework to assist in their strategic selection and application.

A systematic review was undertaken on the literature’s account in four major bibliographic databases to elicit resilience factors contributing to improving post-disaster reconstruction projects' robustness. Through summative content analysis and open-coding of research outputs over the past decade, the factors identified informed the development of a conceptual framework that can significantly impact the built environment’s resilience development process.

The review found 24 resilience factors open-coded into five criteria groups: governance, innovations, reconstruction approaches, resource management and stakeholder expectations. While these factors have influenced reconstruction projects, the recently increased participation of clients and end-users in construction management accentuates their strategic selection and applications.

The research focused on English language articles; therefore, any claim to a comprehensive resilience factors listing can be amiss. The framework provides a platform for developing clear measurement indicators for allocating project resources and determining resilience deficiencies.

Results confirm the designs and assessment of a resilient built environment extends beyond the traditional structural characteristics, but includes the ability of the integrated network of buildings and infrastructure to support the continuous delivery of the community’s social and economic services in normal and post-disaster settings.

The review is very specific as it attempts to develop a novel conceptual framework for guiding developers and practitioners in the application of resiliency to post-disaster reconstruction projects.

There are three purposes to this article: first, to offer a training approach to employee learning and performance improvement that makes use of a step‐by‐step process of skill/knowledge creation. The process offers follow‐up opportunities for skill maintenance and improvement; second, to explain the conceptual bases of the approach; and third, to demonstrate the efficacy of the approach as it is applied in the field.

The methodology consists of two major features: the explication of how the template approach is applied, in general; and then the performance of two groups of employees is compared following training. One group was trained in the template approach while the other group was trained using more traditional methods. Conventional performance measures were used to assess group differences.

Following training the two employee groups were compared. The hypotheses stated that there would be no differences in performance on these measures: gross sales attained; manager rating of employee performance; and customer satisfaction with regard to sales representative's; product knowledge; helpfulness in the business context; and overall performance. Significant differences were noted for manager rating, product knowledge, and overall performance.

This study was exploratory in nature with a limited range of performance measures. The sample sizes were not large. The use of different pairs of trainers for the sub‐samples helps to dampen trainer bias but helps create differences in training conditions that could influence employee learning and performance.

Study results demonstrate that the training approach has merit and warrants further study. The study depicts how a partnership among trainers, managers, and employees can lead to successful training outcomes.

The training approach has substantial implications for management development regarding learning and change. The template approach adds to the repertoire of training methods. It also helps to reinforce the growing body of research that bases learning and performance improvement on script‐based methods.