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This paper aims to conceptualise and measure the technical aspects of the division of labour (DoL) with a new survey indicator of technical complexity (ITC) at work.

Two technical criteria skills and functions are used to distinguish positions in the DoL and to cluster and rank them into a 28‐category ordinal survey ITC. The indicator's construct‐validity is tested by assessing the correlation between these criteria and occupational activities' levels of substantive and organizational complexity, as uncovered by categorical principal component analysis. Criterion‐validity is assessed by testing the indicator's ability to predict occupational prestige, absolutely and relatively to other indicators.

The indicator shows high levels of construct and criterion‐validity.

The paper contributes to a better understanding and measurement of technical constraints in the DoL, facilitating a future evaluation of their impact on class inequalities.

The purpose of this paper is to examine how women small business owners’ (SBOs) business start-up motivations influence their network content.

Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 28 women SBOs who were recruited through purposeful sampling methods. Interview data on their start-up motivations were used to categorise them into three types: classic, forced and work-family. The interviews explored the network contents of the three categories of participants.

There were many similarities between network contents of classic and forced SBOs, as both groups had started their business for financial reasons rather than family reasons. All the participants’ networks contained information and advice, economic transactions, intangible support and strong ties. However, the sources and types of network content were different for the classic and forced SBOs when compared to work-family SBOs.

This study has limitations that tend to be commonly found in exploratory studies, such as a small sample size. However, the findings lay the groundwork for future quantitative studies that examine associations between SBOs’ motivations for starting a business and their network contents.

This research responds to calls for studies aimed at developing a more nuanced understanding of SBOs’ networking behaviour. The study provides empirical evidence of a relationship between the motivations for starting a business and the network content of SBOs. The findings can be used by businesswomen’s network organisations in their mentoring and training interventions.

This study aims to investigate the uptake and usage patterns of information and communication technologies (ICTs) by women small business owners (SBOs).

Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 25 women SBOs who were recruited through purposeful sampling methods. Interview data on communication technologies participants used were broken down into six main categories: internet search, internet advertising, online transactions, telephone, email and fax. Participants were also asked questions regarding proximity between them and different business contacts, and whether technology influenced how they communicated with these individuals.

All participants had moved up from having a basic website to transacting goods and services online. ICTs were used to acquire tangible and intangible resources as well as for informal learning. Geographical distance between SBOs and individuals within their business and convenience of ICT failed to affect participants’ preference for face-to-face communication with key business contacts.

This study has limitations that tend to be commonly found in exploratory studies, such as a small sample size. However, the findings lay the groundwork for future quantitative studies that examine the potential influence of other factors, such as gender and culture, on adoption of ICT by SBOs.

This study responds to a call for research that develops a more nuanced understanding of how women SBOs use ICTs in their business. The findings can be used by policymakers and development agencies in their teaching and training interventions.

The purpose of this paper is to test a conceptual framework explaining the role of relationships and trust in enabling the purchase of business advice by small business owner–managers from their external accountants.

The study uses a semi-structured interview approach with 20 small- and medium-sized enterprise (SME) owners and accountants in London and Melbourne.

The interview data support the conceptual framework’s central proposition that relationships and trust, rather than being antecedents of demand for advice, are necessary conditions for enabling latent demand. SMEs with greater propensity to trust are more open to buying business advice but not necessarily from their accountant.

A limitation of the fieldwork is that it is based on a non-random and limited sample of accountants and SMEs.

Accountants in public practice can no longer assume that the already established relationships with their clients, developed while providing compliance services, will automatically lead SME clients to purchase business advice.

The paper contributes to the accounting literature by developing a conceptual model of relationships and trust that will assist the profession in better understanding the complex dynamics of the accountant–client relationship. The conceptual model distinguishes, for the first time, the antecedent factors of demand for business advice from the enabling roles of relationships and trust. Fieldwork interviews also yielded new insights into how SMEs’ decisions to purchase business advice are influenced by specific personality traits of SME owner–managers and additional antecedent demand factors not identified in the extant literature – economic conditions, environmental turbulence and business life-cycle.

This paper investigates the linking between employees' working life (EWL) and job performance of ethnic minority Bangladeshi restaurants in Greater London.

The authors use in depth face-to-face interviews of 40 participants working in 20 Bangladeshi restaurants (BRs) following a convenience sampling method. A thematic analysis technique, with the help of QSR N10, developed two key themes related to EWL and performance.

These themes highlight several aspects of the relationship between EWL and performance. First, EWL is “beyond” the UK tradition; employers show a domineering attitude; however, employees continue to work due to lack of skills and competence. Second, employees perceive and present themselves as satisfied; however, this satisfaction is not reflected in the business performance of BRs. Third, the analysis shows that business owners “trap strategy” constrains employees to develop their skills for mobility to other industries. Hence, employees express satisfaction with their existing situation on the basis that it is the best they can hope for, given their specific skills and competence, and need for some security in the UK. Fourth, non-financial performance, for example, job autonomy, sense of fulfilment is related to EWL.

The paper provides a framework to promote a better understanding of the linking between employees' working life and performance of UK ethnic minority restaurants. Also, the paper makes recommendations for further research, including an examination of the applicability of the findings to SMEs operated by other ethnic groups in the UK.

This paper adds to the scarce literature on the working life of people in Bangladeshi restaurant businesses in the UK and the relationship between EWL and business performance.

Research and dissemination of the results has always been an important activity for those in the academic community. The Research Assessment Exercise (RAE) has brought the whole area of research publication and dissemination into sharp relief, and striving for high research rankings seems, for some, to have become an end in itself. Some argue that the RAE has restricted the wider dissemination of research as academics focus on refereed journal articles to the detriment of other forms of output, eg professional articles, consultancy, books and practitioner conferences. The RAE has intensified interest in the purpose and process of publication in most discipline areas and has created considerable controversy regarding the status of different publication channels. The small business research area is no exception. This research provides a profile of the UK small business research community, it explores their perceptions regarding research and establishes the esteem that various publication channels are held. Defining precisely what constitutes the area of small business research is problematic. Indeed, providing a specific boundary would create a false precision, small business research overlaps with areas such as entrepreneurship and innovation, and it also draws upon a range of disciplines. Nevertheless, relative limits were placed on this research by the nature of the people who were asked to express their opinion and the questions they were asked. The attitudes were sought through a survey of active UK researchers (97 per cent of respondents had published in the area, 81 per cent were academics, 7 per cent were policy makers and 4 per cent business practitioners) listed on the Institute of Small Business Affairs/Small Business Research Trust database. The title and nature of these organisations suggests that those listed at least identify with the notion of small business research as an area. In addition, the questionnaire emphasised small business research throughout, and no mention was made of entrepreneurship, innovation or associated areas. Ninety‐eight questionnaires were returned, representing a 47 per cent response rate. The community was found to be more stable and mature than expected, but small business researchers held other research areas in greater esteem and most regarded themselves as empiricists rather than theorists. The implications of these results are explored for the next RAE and for the future of small business research.

This article examines access to finance for SMEs in the Baltic States and the South Caucasus countries following the financial crisis of 2007 and is set within the context of the rule of law for businesses.

The article uses the cross-sectional dataset from the Business Environment and Enterprise Performance Survey (BEEPS) for 2009 to examine access to finance for SMEs and the court system in the Baltic States and the South Caucasus countries. An ordered probit estimation technique is used to model access to finance and the court system in the Baltic States and the South Caucasus countries. The analysis draws upon institutional theory to explain access to finance for SMEs.

The results show variations from one Baltic State and South Caucasus country to another in relation to fairness, speed of justice and enforcement of court decisions. The analysis suggests that if access to finance is not an obstacle to business operations and the court system is fair, impartial and uncorrupted, it determines the likelihood of strength in entrepreneurship. Additionally, the results show that, within the Baltic region, businesses experiencing constraints in accessing finance are more likely to have females as their top managers. However, for the South Caucasus region, there was no gender difference.

This research is based on evidence from the Baltic States and the South Caucasus region. However, the findings are relevant to discussions on the importance of the context of entrepreneurship, and more specifically, the rule of law. The institutional theory provides an explanation for coercive, normative and mimetic institutional isomorphism in the context of access to finance for SMEs. Coercive institutional isomorphism exerts a dependence on access to finance for SMEs. In coercive institutional isomorphism, formal and informal pressures are exerted by external organisations such as governments, legal regulatory authorities, banks and other lending institutions. These formal and informal pressures are imposed to ensure compliance as a dependency for successful access to finance goal.

This research creates awareness among entrepreneurs, potential entrepreneurs, business practitioners and society that reducing obstacles to access finance and a fair court system improve entrepreneurial venture formation. This has the potential to create employment, advance business development and improve economic development.

This paper makes an original contribution by emphasising the significance of access to finance and a fair court system in encouraging stronger entrepreneurship. The institutional framework provides a definition for coercive institutional isomorphism to show how external forces exert a dependence pressure towards access to finance for SMEs.

FORTUNATELY few local authorities in recent years have distinguished themselves in the manner that Tunbridge Wells has done in the matter of the appointment of a public librarian. Our readers are familiar with the facts that an advertisement for a librarian appeared for whom a salary of £300 yearly was offered, which is rather less than N.A.L.G.O. expects an ordinary municipal clerk of 30 to receive. When some fifty or more candidates had been put to the trouble, expense and jeopardy (in some cases) of making application for the post, a section of the Tunbridge Wells Council, of whom the spokesman was Sir Robert Gower, discovered that the salary was ridiculously too high, and actually persuaded the Council to disown the advertisement and to re‐advertise the post at £150! Not only so, but each candidate received a letter asking him if he wished his application to stand at the new salary. Comment is needless. As we say, it is fortunately rarely that ignorance and impertinence are so publicly flaunted; and we hope that no trained librarian or library assistant will be found willing to accept the starvation position offered.

June 22,1972 Damages — Remoteness — Negligence — Economic loss — Contractors damaging cable supplying electricity to factory — Physical damage to metal in factory's furnace as result of power cut — Loss of profit from “melt” and from further melts which would have taken place if no power cut — Whether economic loss recoverable — Whether economic loss attaching to physical loss recoverable — Doctrine of parasitic damages.