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Anyone who has been a member of academia for any considerable length of time will resonate with de Bono and Machiavelli. Our universities do not usualloy befriend change and innovation; in fact, these institutions usually ignore them.

Recent market volatility has provided a fundamental challenge to those arguing for the central role of intellectual capital as a source of organisation value. Using perceptual data relevant to the importance of intellectual capital as a source of enterprise value gathered in two studies conducted before and after the recent market ‘downturn’ respectively, this paper provides empirical evidence in support of the continuing and central importance of intellectual capital. The findings from these two studies also demonstrate consistency in the composition of the human, internal and external components of intellectual capital. The Irish software/telecom sector provides an ideal research frame work for any such investigation. In recent years Ireland has established itself as the largest software exporter in the world and this sector has been one of the primary engines of growth in an economy that has experienced real growth of over 40% in 6 years, a rate unparalleled in the developed world.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the Irish banking crisis and explain how various factors contribute to a collapse in asset prices, an economic recession and the near failure of the banking system. The paper seeks to document the dangers of pro‐cyclical monetary and government policies, particularly in an environment of benign financial regulation and pent‐up demand for credit.

The paper maps the Irish banking crisis against its general background. It describes the roots of the crisis, with particular attention given to government and monetary policies, the practices of the financial regulator and banks during the property bubble, together with the difficulties associated with the international sub‐prime crisis.

While the global financial crisis exacerbated matters, the banking crisis in Ireland was largely a home‐grown phenomenon. The crisis stemmed from the collapse of the domestic property sector and subsequent contraction in national output. Its root cause can be found in the inadequate risk management practices of the Irish banks and the failure of the financial regulator to supervise these practices effectively.

The paper documents the “Celtic Tiger” phenomenon of the last decade: the Irish economic and property miracle, its sharp decline, and the sub‐prime crisis. It delineates one of the most severe banking and economic crisis in a developed country since the great depression with a number of key policy lessons for rapidly expanding economies.

The aim of this paper is to discuss a unique and significant article about advertising that was published in Dublin in 1910.

The article, entitled “The advertising problem” (reproduced in its entirety in the Appendix) is analysed and contextualised.

It is demonstrated that at least some early Irish advertising practitioners had a reflexive understanding of the tools of marketing and advertising as used then in Ireland and abroad, and that their own use of such tools served not only manufacturers and other clients, but also the ideological project of an Irish-Ireland.

This analysis has a particular value in rebutting clearly any possible assumption that advertising and marketing practices in Ireland in the early twentieth century were simply “quaint”.

Presents Path.Finder, a locally managed health care information system built in response to the need for better communication of current research evidence and clinical practice guidelines. Concludes that this system will improve patient care by providing up‐to‐date, clinically useful information which is relevant locally. The technology and the information management system have been developed in parallel.

Describes the way benchmarking data are used in a district general hospital to influence clinical practice. Wirral Hospital Trust is a site for the Electronic Patient Record Project; as such there is a large amount of patient‐based data available for research and internal benchmarking. Includes working examples of internal benchmarking which have been used by both clinicians and hospital management to improve hospital effectiveness. Discusses the ways in which this information is being used to develop initiatives such as clinical pathway development.

The emergence of the information and communications technology (ICT) sector in Ireland over the course of the past decade has paralleled a period of exceptional national economic growth. This has raised questions regarding wealth distribution, power and governance. This paper seeks to identify some of the characteristics of the governance culture in this sector in Ireland. It deals specifically with issues such as board composition, non‐executive directors and the perceived role and usefulness of accounting information in the decision‐making process.

Questionnaire feedback from chief financial officers (CFOs), focusing specifically on the board of directors of indigenous, private firms.

The research indicates that firms operating in this sector adopt structures and cultures similar to those in more traditional sectors. However, there is evidence that Irish ICT firms have responded positively to calls for the roles and responsibilities of non‐executive directors to be recognised and accommodated. It also confirms the continuing centrality of accounting information to the decision‐making process.

The research represents an initial survey of firms operating in this sector. As such it is concerned with identifying overall patterns and contours. It is unusual in seeking feedback from CFOs and, as such, offers some unique insights. The findings will be of interest to those operating in the ICT sector and those seeking to identify the governance features that characterise this emerging and dynamic area.

Following Marx and Engels' identification of the “essential condition of capital”, the purpose of this paper is to begin an initial critical exploration of the essential condition of intellectual capital, particularly the ownership rights of labour.

Adopting a critically modernist stance on unitarist HR and OB discourse, and contextualised within a background on the stock option phenomenon and recent accounting regulation, the paper argues that the fundamental nature of the capital‐labour relation continues resiliently into the IC labour (intellectual capital‐labour) relation.

There is strong evidence that broad‐based employee stock options (ESOPs) have become institutionalised in certain firms and sectors – but the future of such schemes is very uncertain (post 2005 accounting regulation). Overly unitarist HR/OB arguments are challenged here with empirical evidence on capital's more latently strategic purposes such as conserving cash, reducing reported accounting expense in order to boost reported earnings, deferring taxes, and attracting, retaining and exploiting key elements of labour.

Research supports the positive benefits of broad‐based employee stock ownership schemes. Further research on the benefits of such schemes and the reasons why they are or are not implemented is now required.

From the perspective of labour, nothing appears to have really changed (yet) in terms of the essential condition of intellectual capital.

This paper explicitly raises the issue of the ownership rights of labour to intellectual capital.

In this theoretical, empirical and occasionally speculative paper we argue that human interaction is the critical source of intangible value in the intellectual age. This argument is supported with some perceptual evidence on the dimensions of intellectual capital (IC) from the Irish ICT sector. Key findings are that almost two thirds of organizational value is perceived to be intellectual and that half of this IC value is perceived to stem directly from the people dimension. Drawing on the system/lifeworld distinction in Habermas’ Theory of Communicative Action we claim that the dominant tenets of market and hierarchy are changing in both nature and scope in an increasingly knowing‐intensive economy. We argue strongly that these tenets must be complemented with ideas of community and lifeworld that place human interaction at the center of a more enlightened economic and social equation.

The Fifth Annual Total Quality Conference presented this Spring by the Unified Technologies Center of Cleveland featured some of the most influential contributors to the theory and practice of quality management as well as representatives from each of the 1991 Baldrige Award winners.