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Inner Game business courses include a considerable proportion of the time spent on a tennis court. We use tennis as a learning metaphor for the following reasons; the rules of the game are simple, the environment is bounded, the game need not be strenuous and it is safe. It provides participants with the opportunity to experiment with learning methods with the minimum interference from repetitious patterns of behaviour, preconceived ideas about the ‘right’ method and fears of the consequences of failure. A physical outer game such as tennis provides instant feedback for participants in terms of ‘how it felt’ and ‘what was the result produced’. It also encourages the development of observational skills of self and others. Whilst we do present Inner Game theory and employ a variety of Inner Game business exercises, the classroom can never wholly replace active subjective experience such as that provided on the tennis court. Most businessmen find the physical activity on our courses welcome and that it also stimulates learning. Finally it is our declared intention that participants enjoy their course not merely as a welcome break from office routine, nor just because maximum learning is achieved in that state but because enjoyment itself has intrinsic value.

To present the internal dialogue of a TQM practitioner using the conceptual lens of reflective practice.

This study used a pragmatic philosophical approach to collect qualitative critical reflection data and quantitative career construction data from stratified and purposively sampled respondents, using structured questionnaires. The qualitative data were analyzed through reconstruction, while the quantitative data were analyzed through co-construction using the percentage agreement value and Wilcoxon–Mann Whitney test.

Five questions were found to be valuable for steering the internal dialogue for critical reflection, thus recommended as a must-have in a TQM practitioner's toolkit. This study found the career adapt–abilities scale to be a valuable tool for assessing the career construction of a TQM practitioner. This was supported by a 64% agreement and non-significant difference between the two groups of raters used, p < 0.05 (U = 3356.5, W = 7451.5, Z = 1.9826), two-tailed.

The pragmatic philosophical stance used in this study lends it to a certain level of subjectivity. However, the inputs from the three other participants neutralize the subjectivity. Most notably, this study is not about consensus-seeking but rather verifiable/testable self-reflection.

The theory-informed results presented in this study are useful for the continuing professional development of TQM practitioners.

This study provides insights for applying an individual-level self-assessment tool for TQM implementation.

This chapter coins the term Development through Mega-Events (DME) in order to propose a next step for developing social legacies in accordance with the principle of social development.

This chapter’s argument for DME is developed using quantitative, indicator-based data from the Olympic Games Impact (OGI) study as well as relevant literature from the sub-fields of Sport for Development and Peace and Sport Mega-Events.

We discuss the absence of a baseline understanding of the properties of sport mega-events. Also absent are progressive efforts to achieve sustainability by means other than competition among prospective bidders. We recommend that hosts tie social legacies to public policy objectives that are concomitant with the properties of the sport mega-events. Retrospectively applied, OGI data from 2010 reveals social inclusion as one potential social legacy that reflects the nature of the Olympics and the policy realm in the host region.

This chapter is original work. It would be of interest to potential host communities, policymakers, and researchers.

The purpose of this paper is to study the issue of contingency evolution of acquisition organization systems with the game group link method.

The concept and method of the game group link are used to analyze the evolution law of acquisition, to find a basis for the contingency evolution of acquisition organization system.

Studies prove that the contingency evolution of acquisition organization systems has the following basic laws: continuous evolution laws adapted to environmental requirements; laws of coordinated evolution as a whole, law of evolution from gradual change to sudden change; evolution path is determined by concrete situations; evolution pattern is determined by dynamic conditions; and law of evolution promoted by innovation.

Research results of this paper have significance in inspiration and theoretical instruction in respect of effectively increasing evolution profits of acquisition organization systems, promoting realization of purpose of acquisition organization systems, actively boosting evolution, and continuous development of acquisition organization systems.

It is shown that the acquisition process is the reasoning game process, development game process, and production game process conducted in turns by the main participating bodies of acquisition during the full life cycle of equipment. This process has clear features of “link,” and a correlated game link is formed among its different stages.

The paper proves that the acquisition process is a process of multi‐stage complex games and evolution game, with the full life cost control as the key issue in face of a fixed budget.

Gives a brief documentation of the development of the FM industry in the 1970s and 1980s to its current position in the early 1990s. Considers how facilities management professionals can do something positive to help businesses survive in the current recessionary climate. Argues that a fluid ever‐changing organic core business needs highly critically tuned non‐core support services equally dynamic and tailor‐made to suit. In just over a decade, the FM industry has learned things which will radically change the workplace; applying that learning means more training, more education and dissemination of good practice.

This interview with Adam Bryant and Kevin Sharer, the authors of “The CEO Test: Mastering the Challenges that Make or Break All Leaders,” examines the relationship between the leaders and followers and the key challenges that tend to determine leadership success or failure.

The authors told S&L’s interviewer Brian Leavy: “We focus specifically on leading others - illuminating seven of the most common make-or-break challenges, and then showing how to navigate them effectively.”

The authors' research found that “It’s the leader’s job to capture the essence of what matters and then be able to boil down the strategy to just a handful of memorable ideas so that everyone understands, remembers and knows how to contribute to its success.”

Leaders have to learn that listening is a multidimensional practice that requires commitment and constant attention, and the aim is to get a true sense of the nature of their organization and its dynamics.

Much of the on-going outpouring of leadership literature tends to focus on the personal qualities and characteristics of the individual leader. Less studied are the dynamics of the relationship between the leader and the led, or the nature and content of the role itself and the key tasks associated with it. One exception is "The CEO Test: Mastering the Challenges that Make or Break All Leaders" by Adam Bryant and Kevin Sharer. Their "overarching framework to mastering the inner game of leadership is to embrace it as a series of paradoxes,” is an original perspective.

Mohan Dixit, Head, Sales and Marketing, India Operations, EuroMotoCorp Pvt. Ltd., an automobile manufacturing multinational company headquartered in Munich, Germany. This case outlines the harried nature of his life: professional problems (decrease in the market share, not being able to say ‘no’, unable to delegate, pressed for time, member of too many committees) and personal issues (weight gain, not able to spend time for his personal interests) and family problems (work-life balance issue). The case can be taught through different angles, including individual behaviour, transaction analysis, time and stress management, career management and general management. Apart from this, the case discusses the emotional instability of Dixit and the automatic cycle of behavior of Dixit in various situations and events. The case also discusses the ‘ego-self’ and the ‘natural—self’ of a person and how the two should be balanced for a good quality of life. The case thus delves deep into the psychology of a person and discusses how his/her thoughts or inner talk should be managed for a content and successful personal and professional life.

The meaning of management is partly the management of meaning. Management is an activity in which people collaborate not just over what they do but also how they mean: how concepts like “effective” are defined and made actual through work, and how knowledge can properly be applied to management situations. Such knowledge is not merely intellectual; it takes in values and belief systems and the intentionalities of discourse. Management is also an area in which over‐arching paradigms of what is best to know and do demonstrate pluralistic and collaborative features. What is known, and what is best to know, therefore, are built up through negotiation and reformulation. This occurs in settings characterised by organisational cultures and authority structures like line management, and in these we find meanings being negotiated for many complex cognitive, ideological and interpersonal reasons (such as to avoid “loss of face”). In professional information training, it is important to develop knowledge of, and skills in, the management of meaning, using negotiative strategies and tactics.