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The purpose of this paper is to examine the employment policies and practices of Turkish banks and how these practices affect the hiring and promotion of women. Turkey's banking sector consists of state‐owned, private, and foreign banks. The overall restructuring of this sector along with the increase of foreign banks is an opportunity to enquire whether human resource (HR) policies of foreign banks have a differential effect on women's employment.

Data were collected in three phases. Phase 1: employment data for all three bank types were analyzed with particular reference to women's employment. About 12 of the largest banks were selected for in‐depth study representing each of the three bank categories. Phase 2: bank‐specific data were collected from the HR directors including: bank structure, personnel and recruitment policies, management levels, women in each level and professional employment application. Phase 3: structured personal interviews were conducted with the HR directors in the 12 selected banks.

The HR departments of foreign banks use different assessment and selection criteria compared with Turkish private and state‐owned banks. These criteria emphasize rank‐in‐person, which enhances the upward mobility of employees. Because of their flexibility, they may advantage female employment.

Survey data from female employees by type of bank would demonstrate a close relationship between organizational structure and women's career advancement. However, this study only interviewed HR managers. The methodology does not indicate whether and to what extent women in three banking types perceive the effect of structure on their career advancement.

HR practices of the three categories evidences that foreign banks in Turkey add a variety of competencies of their prospective employees in their application forms. These additional dimensions may improve the recruitment and promotion of women into management positions. It is argued that employment applications that include individual or rank‐in‐person characteristics rather than job‐based criteria advantage women.

This is the only study that examines women's employment stratified by Turkey's three banking categories. The effect of culture and structure on employment practices and how this influences the mobility of women are explored.

Dependence on access to European markets through subcontracting relationships with European firms has exposed subcontracting clothing and textile producers in less developed economies to the vagaries of international market competition. This paper aims to examine the problems that such exposure creates and the requirements for developing marketing activities through the concept of the alliance life cycle as a viable solution for a sample of Tunisian clothing and textile firms.

The inductive reasoning of this research was implemented through qualitative research based on a range of tools derived from a case study and a dual ethnographic approach.

The main results showed that life cycle stages of the subcontracting firms reflected Schumpeter's creation and destruction cycle of innovation. Therefore, subcontracting firms could learn from their activities with their business customers so that they developed marketing competences in innovative processes. The findings also demonstrated that some of the firms in the Tunisian clothing and textile industries were more successful than others.

This research focused mainly on subcontracting alliances with implications for future study of other alliances for different industries.

The life cycle approach could be of great interest to subcontracting managers in the post Multi Fibre Arrangement era. This approach is relevant mainly for decision makers in providing them with a framework within which they might optimise their marketing strategies and their implementations.

The research originality resides in its Schumpeterian perspective in considering business‐to‐business relationships. The value of the paper is to focus on the evolutionary aspects of relationships between contractors and subcontractors and the patterns of the marketing development within these relationships.

Proposes models of a descriptive and interpretative type which examine the temporal sequences of the activities and decisions taken in the textile apparel chain with reference to design. Examines the opportunities for improvement and also identifies the obstacles that interfere with the realization of quick response (QR) in design. Analyses, using the proposed models, the possible interventions along the chain as regards design activities and interaction between these and the production and sales activities. Highlights the following: the reduction of design lead time, through the parallelization of fabric and garment design and through the use of information technology; the reduction of the variety of production input without penalizing the variety perceived by the final consumer; and the acquisition, during design, of preliminary information on future sales, in order to rationalize the offer and carry out the initial assortment of production input.