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The purpose of this study is to examine the applicability of Watkins and Marsick’s model of learning organization in the school context and explore the relationship between the learning dimensions and perceived organizational outcomes.

Using the instrument, Dimensions of the Learning Organization Questionnaire (DLOQ), the study collected data from 322 teachers and professional staff in K-12 schools. Confirmatory factor analysis and structural equation modeling provide validity evidence for using the DLOQ in schools.

The study results indicate the learning organization is a multidimensional concept and the quality of the school as a learning organization is related to improved organizational performance as perceived by school personnel.

The study measured perceived organizational outcomes using a sample in an urban school district. Future research is encouraged to expand the study sample and to collect actual performance data to strengthen the findings.

The study provides reliability and validity evidence for an instrument that school leaders and practitioners can use to assist their evaluation of the school’s capacity as a learning organization to leverage improvement in school performance.

The study emphasizes an integrative approach in evaluating schools as learning organizations (SLOs) and extends the evidence base for the DLOQ studies. It offers empirical support for the significance of developing SLOs.

The purpose of this study is to investigate the nature of organizational commitment and the impact on executive's motivational level in providing job satisfaction within a learning organization.

A management development model examines the relationship between the measurable constructs. The model explores the relationship between the executive's motivation level and their outcome with job satisfaction and organizational learning.

The results indicate there is a goodness‐of‐fit for the research model. The path coefficients explained a significant amount of variation along with the identification that organizational commitment is a significant attribute in the management development model.

Limitations include the self‐report methodology that measures perceptual data with a series of questionnaire items.

The study examines executive's perceptions and the significance of organizational commitment. Management development specialists will recognize the dynamics of organizational commitment and its linkage with motivation and job satisfaction in a learning organization. There are practical applications for management development specialists and the model supports an environment in which employees are encouraged to use new behaviors and operation processes within the learning organization.

The U.S. Congress has been struggling to create a comprehensive energy program. A key component of the present attempt, recommended by President Carter, is a synthetic fuel program. In July of 1979, the President asked for an $88 billion “crash program” to encourage development of synthetic fuels. To date, a three month struggle to reach a consensus between House and Senate conferees has brought only limited results. Compromise is emerging in the form of a proposal for a “synthetic fuels corporation.” The body would have the authority to disperse $20 billion in the form of federal loan guarantees and purchase agreements with more money to become available later.

This study aims to investigate student mentors' perceptions of peer mentor relationships in a health professions education program.

The design uses embodied hermeneutic phenomenology. The data comprise 10 participant interviews and visual “body maps” produced in response to guided questions.

The findings about student mentors' perceptions of peer mentor relationships include a core theme of nurturing a trusting learning community and five related themes of attunement to mentees, commonality of experiences, friends with boundaries, reciprocity in learning and varied learning spaces.

The study contributes original insights by highlighting complexity, shifting boundaries, liminality, embodied social understanding and trusting intersubjective relations as key considerations in student peer mentor relationships.

In line with the growing emphasis on workplace learning, there has been a tendency to abandon traditional Tayloristic models of work organization in favor of more humanistic, flexible and integrated work systems. This study focusses on facilitators of learning in a company that is based on the principles of Toyota production system (TPS). In this paper, the authors are focussing on one central aspect of the TPS, that is, workplace learning. The purpose of this paper is to analyze the role of empowering leadership, teamwork, innovative climate as facilitators of learning in this specific context.

Questionnaires (focussing on workplace learning, empowering leadership, teamwork and innovative climate) were distributed to 643 factory workers in the company Scania in Sweden. A total of 487 persons answered the questionnaire, which amounted to a response rate of 76 percent.

The result indicates that empowering leadership was the best predictor, followed by teamwork and innovative climate.

From this study, the authors can conclude that the already known predictors of learning can also be applied in a TPS setting. The key features in the TPS company constitute a foundation for learning.

The purpose of this paper is to present a longitudinal, qualitative study exploring changes in the attributional constructions of sense-making in the perceptions and lived experiences of the glass-ceiling among a cohort of female mental health nurses in the National Health Service who participated in a 12-month multi-faceted career and leadership development pilot programme compared to a matched control group.

The authors interviewed 27 female mental health nurses in the UK who participated in a multi-faceted development programme specifically designed to support female nurses secure career advancement and 27 members of a matched control group who did not experience the programme. Participants engaged in semi-structured telephone interviews at three separate time points (six months apart) over a 12-month period.

Programme participants differed in their attributional constructions of sense-making in relation to the glass-ceiling over time compared to the matched control group, e.g., triggering understandings and awakenings and re-evaluating the glass-ceiling above when promoted. Findings are used to theorise about the glass-ceiling as a concept that shifts and changes over time as a function of experience.

Practical implications include important organisational outcomes in relation to fostering the career advancement and retention of talented female leaders at all career stages.

The authors present the first known longitudinal, qualitative study to explore changes in attributional constructions of sense-making in perceptions and experiences of the glass-ceiling among female nurses over time compared to a matched control group.

While the general trend in the UK is towards an increase in female owned small businesses, during the last few years the number of North West of England businesses owned by women has fallen by 12.5 per cent. Aims to investigate the barriers preventing women from entering into growth businesses in the North West. The research included discussions with 12 service providers as well as in‐depth interviews and focus groups with 99 potential and established female business owners. The main barriers blocking women’s ownership of small businesses involved the widely held stereotype of business owners as “white, middle class, males”, cultural differences, a shortage of premises for new businesses and the lack of appropriate childcare.

The purpose of this paper is to analyze and contextualize the outcomes of competence development as a restructuring strategy in a company that was significantly affected by the economic recession in 2008.

In the context of restructuring, increased globalization has expanded international competition that in turn has put additional pressure on organizational transformation, restructuring, reorganization and rationalization.

The result indicates that the experience of learning, commitment and job satisfaction have decreased between T1 and T2 (no difference regarding self-efficacy).

From this study, the authors can conclude that the outcomes of competence development programs are not easily interpreted. Depending on the purpose of the intervention, the results can be interpreted in different ways. It is important to approach the issue of competence development with a wise degree of skepticism.

The purpose of this paper is to guide future researchers and practitioners into the process of interviewing in the Chinese context.

The methodology used is an empirical critical reflection.

The authors identified 11 major themes such as how to get an interview, antecedents of the interview, building rapport, complexity, language, interview settings, interview procedure, stages, probing and sensitive topics, selection of respondents and post-interview.

The location of the interviews.

Guide foreigner researchers and managers on how to conduct interviews in China.

The context matters, and only with a specific approach some can perform well and achieve the interview objectives. Doing so, the researcher or practitioner will not create situations that might be problematic for her/him and the interviewee. Based on the above, the authors’ research decreases potential social tensions that interview situations can create.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, no other researcher has studied the specificities of interviewing in China, which brings originality and value to the authors’ research.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the relevance of human resource development (HRD) for law firms in the UK. It examines how the characteristics of legal professional practice in the UK, including the partnership structure, long established methods of targeting solicitors and the law society, may act as barriers to the implementation of HRD.

The paper uses an exploratory case study research approach to investigate characteristics and issues influencing the adoption of HRD in a Scottish legal firm. Primary data are collected via semi‐structured interviews with a cross‐section of representatives.

Despite recognition of the importance of learning, the characteristic elements of law firms, including the partnership structure; the pervasiveness of time‐billed targets in the solicitor community; and HR's profile and acceptance among the solicitor community, remain as barriers to the applicability of HRD. The research also exposes variability on the level and scope of development opportunities, an emphasis on technical skills development, and a lack of solicitors' self‐managed learning ability.

While the research findings provide a useful insight into the barriers to HRD in one legal firm, this does not allow for any generalisations being drawn from the study.

The paper explores the suitability of workplace learning to support legal professional development.

There is a dearth of research into HRD in legal practices in the UK. The paper contributes to the contextual influences that limit the applicability of HRD to legal professional practices.