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In this article, we reflect on how smart technology is transforming service research discourses about service innovation and value co-creation. We adopt the concept of technology smartness’ to refer to the ability of technology to sense, adapt and learn from interactions. Accordingly, we seek to address how smart technologies (i.e. cognitive and distributed technology) can be powerful resources, capable of innovating in relation to actors’ agency, the structure of the service ecosystem and value co-creation practices.

This conceptual article integrates evidence from the existing theories with illustrative examples to advance research on service innovation and value co-creation.

Through the performative utterances of new tech words, such as onlife and materiality, this article identifies the emergence of innovative forms of agency and structure. Onlife agency entails automated, relational and performative forms, which provide for new decision-making capabilities and expanded opportunities to co-create value. Phygital materiality pertains to new structural features, comprised of new resources and contexts that have distinctive intelligence, autonomy and performativity. The dialectic between onlife agency and phygital materiality (structure) lies in the agencement of smart tech–enabled value co-creation practices based on the notion of becoming that involves not only resources but also actors and contexts.

This paper proposes a novel conceptual framework that advances a tech-based ecology for service ecosystems, in which value co-creation is enacted by the smartness of technology, which emerges through systemic and performative intra-actions between actors (onlife agency), resources and contexts (phygital materiality and structure).

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the unexplored part of the historical evolution of travel agencies in Spain, from the end of the 20th century to the 21st century. When examining promotion strategies, the study focuses on the change in marketing and public relations strategies based on the incorporation of information and communication technologies and, in particular, the use of the internet.

This study draws on a qualitative analysis of the different strategies used by traditional agencies and online agencies in Spain from the mid-19th century to the present. This analysis shows how traditional communication strategies survived at the beginning of the 21st century, together with other more innovative ones, while some disappeared, being eliminated by the new online travel agencies, which created a particular conception of marketing and communication. This paper is divided into the following parts: the introduction; the beginnings of travel agency promotion in the 20th century; the evolution of promotion in travel agencies since the late 20th century; communication innovation at the beginning of the 21st century; online travel agencies; and conclusions.

This study shows that although online agencies did not manage to position themselves with a large turnover, they generated advantages and sharpened their imagination to create a new, more economical advertising model, eliminating the costs of public relations and advertising campaigns. In addition, they allowed clients to have greater independence when making their reservations, while enabling them to monitor the tastes of potential and real clients and add blogs so that consumers could express their degree of satisfaction with the product or services provided by the agency.

The focus of attention is the travel agency sector in Spain and, more specifically, communication. Studies on travel agencies and their marketing have been very scarce and partial, impeding professionals in the tourism sector from having a broad vision to direct their promotional and public relations actions. The originality of this article lies in its making a comparison between two different visions of tourism marketing and, specifically, of travel agencies, that is, the traditional vision and the innovative one. It thus helps all professionals in the sector to value and improve their marketing and communication strategies.

We present the results of one of the only in-depth studies of a police agency’s internal and external response to the coronavirus pandemic of 2020 (COVID-19). This study emphasizes the importance of law enforcement agencies conducting comprehensive case studies and after-action assessments to prepare, prevent and respond to prolonged public health crises and showcases the profound (and lingering) effects of COVID-19 on police organizations.

This multi-method case study combines document analysis, a workforce survey, a community survey, interviews and analysis of administrative data to detail and assess the agency’s internal and operational responses to the pandemic and the reactions of employees and community members to those responses.

Despite agency strategies to mitigate the pandemic’s effects, employees cited very high stress levels one year after the pandemic and a third of sworn officers considered leaving the policing profession altogether during the first two years of the COVID-19 pandemic. Several policies intended by the agency to protect employee health and maintain staffing needs kept workforce levels steady but may have increased feelings of organizational injustice in both sworn and non-sworn individuals, with variation across racial and gender groups. A jurisdiction-wide community survey indicated general support for the police department’s responses but a preference for in-person rather than telephone-based responses to service calls. Officers, however, preferred continuing remote responses even after the pandemic subsided.

To the best of our knowledge, this is one of the only in-depth case studies that examine a police agency’s internal and external responses to COVID-19 and the sworn, non-sworn and community reactions to those responses.

First I would like to thank you for the great honour of being allowed to state my point of view on some, in my opinion very important, problems of tourism to‐day.

In recent years much attention in the UK has been given to encouraging the establishment and development of viable small firms in order to generate job creation and economic growth. Enterprise agencies, set up by local companies, local authorities and others interested in developing the economic life of the community, have taken a major role in advising and guiding individuals who are starting their own small businesses. Enterprise agencies illustrate the growing importance of the concentration of effort within a community based upon local resources, as opposed to more traditional approaches aimed at bringing in jobs from outside the area by attracting inward investment. Reference is made to the type of services rendered by the agencies which small firm managers and directors find most useful when establishing their businesses. Observations are made about how the counselling relationship develops between the agency and the small firm in the critical early months. With over 250 enterprise agencies in existence, the UK is among the most active of EEC countries in taking positive local initiatives which aid the development of small firms.

The specific objectives of this research were to gain an understanding of the causes of advertiser account switches in New Zealand and Singapore and compare these results with Michell’s USA and UK studies. The main finding of this study is the reasons for broken agency‐client relationships are complex and very varied. However, Michell’s five general reasons for account switches: poor agency performance; changes in agency policies; changes in client policies; changes in agency management; and changes in client management, appear to explain most failed agency‐client relationships (although few respondents had all of the above problems at once). This report has been useful in highlighting the differences in New Zealand and Singapore agency‐client relationships.

When we say that a tourist agency is an indispensable participant on a tourist market, we have just stated a fact accepted by both tourist theory and practice. Yet, there are, relatively speaking, few researches and analyses of tourist agencies work, still less such that would try to scientifically deal with the problems of a tourist agency's operation. With this lack of tourist technical literature in the field of the agency's role in tourism, the absence of theoreticians and those who work in practice can easily be noticed especially in area of sales on a tourist market. It is difficult to answer the question why it is so, nor can we enter into such discussions now. The aim of this contribution is to point out the importance of a process of the agency's work and give arguments for it.

Almost all estate agencies that are involved in residential property sales recognise the commission income from a sale when the commission concerned is actually received. This practice is at variance with generally accepted accounting practice, which requires recognition of income to occur on the signing of the agreement or when the sales contract becomes firm (i.e. unconditional). The South African Revenue Services (SARS) has required the few estate agencies that apply generally accepted accounting practice in their financial statements to align their income tax accounting with their financial accounting. This alignment results in tax being paid on the commission that is due from the sale of properties that have not yet been transferred. This paper debates the issue of the recognition of income. It provides suggestions for the improvement of disclosure in estate agencies’ financial statements. Furthermore, it suggests changes to estate agencies’ standard sales contracts to the effect that income is deemed to have been earned upon the registration of the transfer of a property.

Maintains that the purpose of this study – which was a general survey of the relationships between UK advertisers and their advertising agents – was to identify the nature of the interests of organisations and of individuals charged with the maintenance of contact between them in the production of advertising material. Chronicles the study that took the form of a survey of attitudes and opinions of members of client and agency organisations. Concludes that the main interpretation to be drawn from the research data with respect to formalisation is that there exists a valid case for more specificity in client‐agency associations.

Isolates the importance of economic level and cultural level and cultural perceptions in influencing agency selection overseas by major US companies. Recounts that many study findings, relating particularly to the use of local or US‐based advertising agencies, are examined. Particular concern is to whether or not such factors as the advertiser's attitudes towards cultural factor importance and market area economic development, are considerations in the placing of preparing and placing non‐domestic advertising. Looks at the role of culture and statements to prove advantages and disadvantages in these. Concludes that if a firm uses either US‐based agencies for overseas representation or foreign‐based agencies, its management is displaying some concern for the cultural and other differences forced between markets.