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The environmental laws have placed manufacturing concerns in a quandary regarding compliance with the complex and far‐reaching web of regulations which affect practically every aspect of production operations. Although variations from the mandates imposed may result in rather substantial consequences for offenders, many companies do not achieve full compliance for various reasons. If full compliance is possible, reasons for noncompliance must be examined. The relationship between compliance and quality of the manufacturing process or finished product must be explored to determine whether companies might sacrifice compliance for a more efficient process or higher quality product. Moreover, intentional noncompliance for economic benefit may provide companies with an advantage over competitors that spend vast resources to satisfy environmental obligations. This paper addresses the results of a survey completed by over 200 manufacturing firms located primarily in Tennessee to determine effects of compliance with environmental regulations on manufacturing operations.

People who are interested in evaluating and rating microcomputer technology need a single, composite measure which is rich enough to enable comparing machines of widely differing time periods, features and formats. Traditionally, computers are modeled by describing four primary features ‐ their CPU, available memory, and input/output (I/O) capabilities. Applying this general model to portable microcomputers, this paper uses a scoring model methodology to develop a composite measure for the portable microcomputer marketplace and then evaluates the model’s longitudinal performance. The technological scoring model methodology is a very pragmatic and highly subjective technique to derive a relative measure for identifying long‐term technological trends and rating/ranking individual machines one with another. Furthermore, employing the scoring model offers some unique challenges to the technological forecaster. However, the scoring model does seem to be a useful approach (at least for portable microcomputer technology) if used with due caution.

The current state of environmental laws has placed business in a quandary regarding compliance with the myriad regulations directed at everything from the manufacture of new products, substances, or chemicals to the generation and disposal of waste. A variation from the guidelines imposed may result in liability, civil and criminal, for the unwary violator. In addition to possessing knowledge of current regulations affecting operations, managers must also track numerous future changes applicable to their processes in order to avoid missing the effective date of a new requirement. In general, vast resources must be expended in complying with the environmental laws. Perhaps the industry that most feels the sting of the environmental regulations is manufacturing. This paper will address the results of a survey completed by over 200 manufacturing firms located primarily in Tennessee to determine effects of compliance with environmental regulations on business operations.

In this research, hospitals with varying type, size and operational characteristics are grouped into distinct strategic groups. The competitive methods emphasised by these groups are studied. Also, the extent of effective implementation of quality improvement tools is examined. The purpose of this paper is to discuss these issues.

Utilizing a sample of 109 hospitals, cluster analysis is used to accomplish the objective of this study.

Four strategic groups of hospitals were identified. These groups tended to emphasize different competitive methods and quality improvement efforts implementation profiles.

The findings of this study have important implications for the relationship between operational performance and strategic effectiveness in a hospital operational environment.

The findings of this research tend to emphasize the importance of patient's service and satisfaction to strategic effectiveness. Also, the findings stress the importance of clinical effectiveness at the operational level.

This study empirically examines operational and strategic performance‐related issues in a hospital operational environment.

COVID-19 vaccinations face a backdrop of widespread mistrust in their safety and effectiveness, specifically via social media platforms which constitute major barriers for the public health sector to manage COVID-19 (and future) pandemics. This study provides a more nuanced understanding of the public's engagement behavior toward COVID-19 vaccinations.

Using Netnography, this study explores the public's interactions with vaccine communications by the WHO via Facebook. From WHO posts about the COVID-19 vaccination 23,726 public comments on Facebook were extracted and analyzed.

Building on crisis communication, health and engagement literature, this paper identifies and conceptualizes seven patterns of engagement behavior toward the COVID-19 vaccination and develops the first framework of relationships between these patterns and the extant vaccine attitudes: vaccine acceptance, hesitancy and refusal.

This paper helps policymakers identify and adapt interventions that increase vaccine confidence and tailor public health services communications accordingly.

This research offers the first typology of patterns of engagement behavior toward COVID-19 vaccinations and develops a framework of relationships between these patterns and the existing understanding in health literature. Finally, the study provides data-driven communication recommendations to public health service organizations.

This issue is a selected bibliography covering the subject of leadership.

This study examined the human and social capital factors associated with higher post‐succession firm performance in family enterprises in Singapore. We also investigated the moderating influence of the board of directors in terms of its service role as stewards of the enterprise. We found that a successor’s industry experience and diversity of network ties were positively associated with firm performance and boards that focused their role as advisors to the successor enhanced post‐succession firm performance.

Uncertainties caused by political risks can drastically affect global supply chains. However, the supply chain management literature has thus far developed rather limited knowledge on firms' perception of and reactions to increased political risks. This study has two main purposes: to explore the relationship between extant risk exposure and perceived firm-specific political risk and to understand the impact of firm-specific political risk on firms' vertical integration and diversification strategies.

The authors developed a unique dataset for testing our hypotheses. Specifically, the authors sampled manufacturers (SIC20-39) listed in the United States from 2002 to 2019. The authors collected financial and diversification data from Compustat, vertical integration data from the Frésard-Hoberg-Phillips Vertical Relatedness Data Library and political risk data from the Economic Policy Uncertainty database. This data collection process yielded 1,287 firms (8,329 observations) with available data for analysis.

A two-way fixed-effect regression analysis of panel data revealed that firms tend to be more sensitive to political risk when faced with income stream uncertainty or strategic risk. By contrast, exposure to stock returns uncertainty does not significantly influence firms' sensitivity toward political risk. Moreover, firm-specific political risk is positively associated with vertical integration and product diversification. However, firm-specific political risk does not result in higher levels of geographical diversification.

This study joins the literature that systematically explores the antecedents and implications of firm-specific political risk, thus broadening the scope of supply chain risk management.

Miles and Snow’s (1978) model posits that organizational performance is dependent upon the degree of consistency (fit) that managers establish between organizational and environmental elements. However, different interpretations of the concept of fit coexist in the literature. We argue that in this model, consistency can be defined as a pattern of “equivalent covariance”, which is operatively created through the use of confirmatory factor analysis. The form of fit as covariance leads to the view of “configuration as quality”, in that the basic subject is the study of the interrelationships among organizational and environmental elements. The concept of fit as covariance is decidedly different from the traditional concept of fit as difference, which regards configuration as a typology or taxonomy. The covariance perspective of configurational theory is underused; for this reason, we apply this analytical perspective to a sample of 229 companies. The empirical results confirm that consistency positively influences organizational performance.

HAS BRITAIN really lost its sense of purpose? Has it no noticeable industrial policy?