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THE Reference Department of Paisley Central Library today occupies the room which was the original Public Library built in 1870 and opened to the public in April 1871. Since that date two extensions to the building have taken place. The first, in 1882, provided a separate room for both Reference and Lending libraries; the second, opened in 1938, provided a new Children's Department. Together with the original cost of the building, these extensions were entirely financed by Sir Peter Coats, James Coats of Auchendrane and Daniel Coats respectively. The people of Paisley indeed owe much to this one family, whose generosity was great. They not only provided the capital required but continued to donate many useful and often extremely valuable works of reference over the many years that followed. In 1975 Paisley Library was incorporated in the new Renfrew District library service.

This study aims to investigate the approaches to and the actions of integrated thinking (IT) based on stakeholder engagement practices to mitigate the perception of IT as an “abstract construct” and to overcome the “silos” thinking of managing, communicating and reporting.

The research develops a single case-study of a leading Italian company in the sustainability setting: Lavazza. The authors gathered in-depth information with semi-structured interviews on their approaches to IT and actions of IT and the related stakeholder engagement practices which involved over time.

This study addresses the concept of IT, arguing for integrated circularity as a strategic mindset, which builds upon open communication and collaborative partnerships with stakeholders for value creation.

The limitations of this study stem from the nature of a single case study, thus the findings are most relevant to those companies operating in comparable sectors with similar historical and organizational characteristics.

The study provides a systematic framework of IT approaches and related actions based on stakeholder engagement practices that define a company as an integrated thinker. This can be used by managers and companies to implement an integrated logic of thinking and reporting.

This is a pioneering study in this area as there are very few ones that take into account the relationship between the IT of design and reporting from a stakeholder perspective. The more IT is embedded in the business, the fuller the consideration of key stakeholders’ interests is incorporated as a relevant part of conducting business.

The purpose of this paper is to analyze the relationship between organizational performance and the pattern of strategic decisions formalized in the planning of a Brazilian heavy construction company between 2006 and 2014. In this period, the company experienced a recurrent pattern of maintaining strategic decisions, despite the systematic decrease in performance and investments in the formal strategic planning (SP) and monitoring of results. The research focus is on strategic inertia and the influence of social determinants on the relationship between performance and the strategic actions negotiated in formal planning.

This is a single-case study. The exploratory-descriptive research comprises data collection on performance and strategic decisions from the period between 2006 and 2014. The analysis was guided through documentary material and data collected from 16 interviews conducted with members of the middle to top management concerning performance, goals, and strategic initiatives. The interviewees’ statements were used to apprehend the interpreted dimension of SP expressed in the meanings attributed to this process. The analysis adopts a sociological base, and strategic inertia is the underlying phenomenon that guides this analysis.

The results show the interactive effect caused by political, cognitive, discursive, and ceremonial mechanisms obstruct the company’s strategic decisions. This case study illustrates that the conditions for the phenomenon of path dependence were created, reinforcing the strategic inertia observed in the maintenance of a reproduced pattern of strategic initiatives and goals, even though the performance was recurrently unsatisfactory. In this case, strategic inertia showed a complex relationship between the interpreted performance and strategic actions negotiated in formal planning, conditioned by mechanisms of trajectory reinforcement that interfered with the conditions for strategic change.

Strategic inertia demonstrates a complex relationship between the interpreted performance and strategic actions negotiated in formal planning, conditioned by mechanisms of trajectory reinforcement that interfere with the conditions for strategic change. Future research on social mechanisms from the perspective of strategy-as-practice could be developed to capture the tacit components, language, power games, and other relevant categories in the social interaction of strategy development at the organizational level. In addition, future research could focus on investigating the extent to which path dependence is contingent, assuming that it is a temporary and, therefore, reversible process.

This work contributes to the view of SP from the social perspective and shows that the relationship between performance and strategy has biases that can compromise performance. The work highlights implications for maintaining strategic initiative patterns, which shape a path whose function is less associated with its effects on performance and more associated with the commitment to instrumental results, due to the social nature of organizations.

This work deals with social mechanisms that influence strategic decisions. Since organizational performance depends on strategic decisions, the social nature of strategic inertia has causal implications to economic and social impact of organizations.

This work argues in favor of the influence of self-reinforcing mechanisms of path dependence in the relationship between performance and strategic decisions. The results extended the predominantly structural approach of path dependence by considering interpretive aspects related to the political, discursive, cognitive, and ceremonial dimensions of strategic inertia.

Customer engagement is a concept that has emerged recently to capture customers' total set of behavioral activities toward a firm. The purpose of this paper is to study the effect of customer engagement behaviors on perceived relationship benefits and relationship outcomes.

An online survey of members of a gaming Facebook brand community, resulting in 276 usable responses from gaming customers.

Customer engagement was divided into “Community Engagement Behaviors” (CEB) and “Transactional Engagement Behaviors” (TEB). In addition, three relationship benefits were identified: social benefits, entertainment benefits and economic benefits. The engagement behaviors largely influenced the benefits received. Furthermore, the mediation analysis results show that the influence of CEB on satisfaction is partially mediated by social benefits and entertainment benefits, while the effect of TEB on satisfaction is fully mediated through the same benefits. The effect of CEB on loyalty is mediated through entertainment benefits.

The findings are limited to one brand community. The findings have implications for further research on customer engagement.

The paper's findings give ideas about how firms can utilize Facebook communities to enhance satisfaction and loyalty by offering the right kinds of relationship benefits. Managers are encouraged to study customer engagement behaviors on, and perceptions of, all channels and to utilize this information for the development of their social media strategies.

Customer engagement is a newly introduced concept on which scarce empirical research exists, and there is very little evidence of its effect on customer relationships. This is the first paper to study customer engagement empirically on a Facebook brand community, and to relate customer engagement to relationship constructs.

ELSEWHERE in this number we list libraries which have Esent us copies of their annual reports which we are glad to have. Now and again we are able to elaborate on these, but in the present issue that has not been possible. We would say, however, that these reports are deserving of the attention of librarians generally, and of students at the library schools. They are records of work in progress, and they do suggest the development of library policy. The best of them are of textbook value.

Nowadays, the agri-food sector is facing several challenges due to a rapid technological change which calls for knowledge sharing (KS) practices to enhance businesses’ performance. This has spurred a collaborative approach and the creation of networks. Since there still is a paucity of research on the quality degree of KS, the purpose of this study is to offer an empirical research on the quality degree of KS by exploring outcome expectations and social exchange dimensions. Theoretically, it is examined by a double lens of social capital and social cognitive theory.

This study offers an empirical analysis of 313 directors of 11 “consortia” in the agri-food sector in Italy by using the fuzzy expert system. The model allows to aggregate multi criteria dimensions of KS and rates its quality.

As resulted, the quality degree of KS is influenced by outcome expectations – personal and community expectations – and three forms of dimensions of social exchange: structural, relational and cognitive. The paper ends with a discussion of research findings, its limitations and implications.

As there is still a paucity of research on the determinants of quality degree of KS, the research adopts a double lens of social capital and social cognitive theories to explore what are these determinants.

This paper explores the link between skill and qualification mismatch and labor productivity using cross-country industry data for 19 OECD countries. Utilizing mismatch indicators aggregated from micro-data sourced from the recent OECD Survey of Adult Skills (PIAAC), the main results suggest that higher skill and qualification mismatch is associated with lower labor productivity, with over-skilling and under-qualification accounting for most of these impacts. A novel result is that higher skill mismatch is associated with lower labor productivity through a less efficient allocation of resources, presumably because when the share of over-skilled workers is higher, more productive firms find it more difficult to attract skilled labor and gain market shares at the expense of less productive firms. At the same time, a higher share of under-qualified workers is associated with both lower allocative efficiency and within-firm productivity – that is, a lower ratio of high productivity to low productivity firms. While differences in managerial quality can potentially account for the relationship between mismatch and within-firm productivity, the paper offers some preliminary insights into the policy factors that might explain the link between skill mismatch and resource allocation.

1. The Committee was informed that the manufacture of shredded suet from imported premier jus is subject to control by licence and that it is a condition of the licences that the product shall contain not less than 83 per cent. of fat. This figure was adopted in 1931 by the Council of the Society of Public Analysts and Other Analytical Chemists pending the establishment of a legal standard. 2. In the manufacture of shredded suet premier jus the fat is forced into shreds or granules and a cereal or amylaceous filler is added so as to form a coating over the particles of fat, thus preventing them from adhering together and at the same time retarding the development of rancidity. 3. The amount of filler taken up by the shredded fat depends primarily on its stickiness, which in turn depends on the temperature at which the manufacturing process is conducted. Manufacturers must give special attention to the problem of securing uniformity of distribution, otherwise part of a batch will take up more than its share of the amount of filler allowed by the manufacturing formula. In spite of all practicable care, complete uniformity cannot be ensured and some tolerance is therefore necessary to allow for unavoidable variations. 4. The proportion of filler used in the past by different manufacturers has varied considerably. A purchaser of shredded suet is primarily purchasing fat and it is desirable that the fat content shall be the maximum that can be included whilst still retaining good keeping properties. The Committee is of the opinion that shredded suet, to be of satisfactory quality, should not contain substantially less than 85 percent. of fat, and that a product approximating to this standard will have the necessary keeping properties. The Committee is satisfied that the allowance of 2 per cent. for uneven distribution on and among the shreds, which was adopted by the Council of the Society of Public Analysts in 1931, is reasonable, and understands that it is considered adequate by the manufacturers of shredded suet. 5. A small amount of suet (i.e., natural unrendered fat), received by butchers as part of their meat allocation, is chopped or minced, and in the latter case mixed with cereal filler and sold under the description “shredded suet.” By whichever method it is prepared it differs from the shredded suet made from premier jus by reason of the presence of membrane and moisture. If made by chopping it will contain more fat than the product made from premier jus, but if made by mincing and admixture with a filler it is likely to contain less owing to the membrane and moisture in the raw material and the impracticability of analytical control. 6. It was suggested to the Committee that the use of the description shredded suet for the products made by butchers was misleading and that the name should be restricted to the product made from premier jus. The Committee is, however, of the opinion that the general public would be equally satisfied whether the product supplied in response to a demand for shredded suet had been prepared with premier jus or suet. Further, it is considered that a purchaser of shredded suet is not prejudiced if he receives a product containing membrane and moisture provided he also receives the appropriate amount of fat. It therefore does not appear to the Committee that there is any necessity, from the viewpoint of protecting the public in regard to quality, for recommending the imposition of this restriction. 7. The Committee noted that the statement issued by the Council of the Society of Public Analysts included an expression of opinion that “the nature of any admixture to suet should be declared.” This recommendation is, however, outside the terms of reference of the Committee and no comment is therefore made thereon. 8. The Committee accordingly recommends that shredded suet should be required to contain not less than 83 per cent. of fat.

Gender, race, and class-based meanings inform longstanding divisions and status hierarchies within the culinary profession, such as those between public and private and amateur and professional cooking. Private and personal chefs’ work in homes disrupts these divisions and hierarchies. Given their precarious position, how do these chefs negotiate their standing within the profession?

This chapter draws on interviews with 41 private/personal chefs. Eight were primarily private household employees, while all others were primarily self-employed.

The chefs negotiated their status by making distinctions between themselves and commercial chefs, along with other private/personal chefs. The chefs both challenge and reinforce the dichotomies and criteria shaping status evaluations within the culinary profession. Similarly, they both contest and reinforce gender, race, and class hierarchies.

The chefs’ conceptual distinctions can potentially (re)produce or challenge material inequalities. Moreover, while the fields of private/personal cheffing create opportunities for more adults to cook for a living, the traditional status hierarchies remain largely the same. It is likely that as long as those hierarchies persist, the chefs’ conceptual distinctions will continue to challenge and reinforce them.

Research on private/personal chefs has been minimal, so this chapter fills this gap. It also adds to scholarship connecting workers’ status struggles and gender, race, and class inequalities. The case of private and personal chefs sheds new light on how gender, race, and class intersect to inform status evaluations within the culinary profession.