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The purpose of this study is to revisit the conventional wisdom about a key contribution [i.e. strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, threats (SWOT) analysis] in the field of strategic management. The societal context and the role of academics, consultants and executives is taken into account in the emergence of SWOT analysis during the 1960–1980 period as a pivotal development within the broader context of the satisfactory, opportunities, faults, threats (SOFT) approach. The authors report on both the content and the approach, so that other scholars seeking to invigorate indigenous theories and/or underreported strategy practices will thrive.

Applying a historiographic approach, the authors introduce an evidence-based methodology for interpreting historical sources. This methodology incorporates source criticism, triangulation and hermeneutical interpretation, drawing upon insights from robust evidence through three iterative stages.

The underreporting of the SOFT approach/SWOT analysis can be attributed to several factors, including strategy tools being integrated into planning frameworks rather than being published as standalone materials; restricted circulation of crucial long-range planning service/theory and practice of planning reports due to copyright limitations; restricted access to the Stanford Research Institute Planning Library in California; and the enduring popularity of SOFT and SWOT variations, driven in part by their memorable acronyms.

In the spirit of a renaissance in strategic planning research, the authors unveil novel theoretical and social connections in the emergence of SWOT analysis by combining evidence from both theory and practice and delving into previously unexplored areas.

Caution is advised for scholars who examine the discrete time frame of 1960–1980 through mere bibliometric techniques. This study underscores the risks associated with gathering incomplete and/or inaccurate data, emphasizing the importance of triangulating evidence beyond scholarly databases. The paradigm shift of strategic management research due to the advent of large language models poses new challenges and the risk of conserving and perpetuating academic urban legends, myths and lies if training data is not adequately curated.

The purpose of this paper is to advance understanding of the key elements of a new business model (BM) for independent retailers, which reflects their current competitive position within the retail ecosystem. It is a conceptual paper, drawing on theory and practical examples of strategy changes made by independent retailers during COVID-19.

This conceptual paper builds on existing research into retail BMs and independent retail strategies during COVID-19. It incorporates findings from a significant review of UK Independents’ performance during the pandemic, titled “Against All Odds, a Grimsey Review research paper (2021)”. It highlights changes in business format, activities and governance during the pandemic, alongside managers’ reflections on the impact of these changes on their businesses. This paper advances theory by adapting current conceptualisations of a retail business model with insights from value co-creation found in Service-Dominant logic (Vargo and Lusch 2008; Vargo et al., 2023).

This BM identifies a set of design principles and design elements/themes, which allows for a clearer delineation of the sources of competitive advantage for the sector moving forward. Design principles include the adoption of a hybrid format with resource configuration capturing co-creation activities and governance co-ordinated by institutions and institutional arrangements. Consumers lie at the heart of value co-creation. Design elements/themes need to be underpinned by value drivers including flexibility and agility, a dynamic IT capability and collaboration and community engagement.

This paper makes a two-fold contribution. Firstly, drawing on theory and practical examples of change made by business owners during the pandemic, the authors develop a new BM for independent retailers that captures key elements and relationships relevant to their competitive position in the sector. Secondly, the authors draw on the model to advance a set of propositions to be tested by further research to support a more stable and sustainable future for the sector.

Racial and ethnic minorities have long been underrepresented in the superhero genre. Empirical examination of the effects of this underrepresentation, however, has been limited. The purpose of this research was to identify if “being White” is a component of the superhero prototype.

Across three different studies, participants recruited through CloudResearch’s Connect platform and Amazon’s Mechanical Turk viewed different versions of comic panel compilations and responded to questions about their perceptions of characters shown in the panels.

When using measurements similar to those typically used to test for prototypicality, we found no evidence that “being White” is a component of the superhero prototype. However, when using less conspicuous questions, we found that participants exposed to a not-White character were more likely to recall the character’s race and correctly identify the purpose of the research, providing some indication that “being White” is a component of the superhero prototype. Our findings suggest that when studying race, researchers may need to transition from traditional experimental designs to less conspicuous methods.

In a time where research on diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) has been confounded by social desirability bias, our findings demonstrate how researchers can use less conspicuous methods within traditional survey methodology to examine DEI questions.

The purpose of this paper was to examine how mid- and upper-level police commanders' occupational perceptions shifted after the COVID-19 pandemic, upsurge in police protests, and perceived crime increases in 2020. We assess the extent to which these events altered police leaders' perceptions of stress, satisfaction, burnout and turnover intentions.

This study employs repeated cross-sectional survey data of over 900 police leaders who attended the FBI’s National Academy (FBINA) program. Respondents are distinguished by whether they attended the FBINA program before or after operations were suspended due to COVID-19. Bivariate tests were conducted to compare pre- and post-respondents' perceptions of stress, satisfaction, burnout and turnover intentions.

The findings indicate that post-pandemic respondents had higher turnover intentions than pre-pandemic respondents. The groups had no significant differences regarding stress, satisfaction and burnout perceptions.

The findings suggest that despite facing a global pandemic, police protests and perceived increases in crime, police leaders demonstrated high stability and resiliency. The data comprised law enforcement leaders who participated in the FBINA program; thus, the findings may not be generalizable to all officers.

This study is one of the first to assess changes in police leaders’ work perceptions following the COVID-19 pandemic, the rise in police protests and perceived increases in crime in 2020.

The growth of last-mile delivery presents challenges like environmental impact, operational inefficiencies and risks of theft or damage. This study explores parcel locker adoption as a potential solution, focusing on the roles of information framing and consumer characteristics in influencing consumer adoption. It offers insights into prioritizing benefits (environmental, security, convenience) in information framing and which consumer traits, such as regulatory focus and gender, to consider in designing and promoting parcel locker networks.

We test our hypotheses with three scenario-based experiments. The first focuses on the key parcel locker benefit of environmental sustainability framing, the second on security framing and the third on convenience framing.

Our results show that consumers are more likely to use parcel locker delivery when exposed to loss-framed environmental or security information, particularly when they are male. Additionally, promotion-focused individuals, particularly males, are the most likely users when presented with loss-framed messages emphasizing the inconvenience and insecurity of home delivery.

Our findings produce a middle range theory of gender and regulatory focus in the context of consumer participation in parcel locker delivery. Specifically, we find that gender and regulatory focus influence consumer reactions to information disclosure, with loss-framed information more strongly influencing consumer intent for promotion-focused individuals.

Managers seeking to introduce parcel lockers or expand existing parcel locker networks should incorporate security and convenience into their locker network decisions. Initial locker bays should be located in or near sites that experience high consumer traffic from promotion-focused males. Additionally, information disclosed should highlight these security and convenience benefits compared to the relative inconvenience and risk associated with home delivery.

While information disclosures often emphasize the environmental benefits associated with parcel locker use, likely users find other benefits more convincing. Highlighting these alternative factors and incorporating them into parcel locker network design will still allow for environmental benefits, including carrier CO2 reduction, to emerge from increased parcel locker use. As locker networks become more established, expanding the network to cater to additional consumers may allow service providers to focus information on environmental benefits.

Prior research assumes an existing parcel locker network or consumer base when studying network design and adoption. This study highlights the importance of tailoring information to consumer characteristics, emphasizing network features that best align with potential parcel locker users. Specifically, we found gender and regulatory focus to influence consumer reaction to information disclosure, where loss-framed information is the most influential particularly for promotion-focus individuals.

This study aims to assess how envy, both directly and indirectly, through negative behaviors such as ostracism, negative word-of-mouth and alignment with the negative behaviors of superiors, influences innovative behavior based on the cultural dimension of individualism versus collectivism.

The data was collected using a survey applied to 305 individuals between October 2022 and June 2023. The model developed was analyzed and validated using partial least squares estimation with structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) and PLS-SEM multigroup analysis techniques.

The results suggest that for individualistic individuals, negative word-of-mouth exerts a greater positive mediating influence on the relationship between envy and ostracism, and that envy exerts a greater positive influence on both alignment with the negative behaviors of superiors and on ostracism. In addition, the results indicate that negative word-of-mouth and ostracism together negatively influence the relationship between envy and innovative behavior.

This research provides empirical evidence that envy triggers negative behavior in both individualistic and collectivist individuals. Thus, in practical terms, envy can be considered as something more primitive that goes beyond the accepted values of sociability, especially in the organizational environment.

The main contribution of this research is to understand the effects of envy on innovative behavior, based on a conceptual model that considers the mental programs that differentiate one group of individuals from another. In addition, it presents theoretical and empirical implications that provide descriptive evidence of behaviors, making it possible to broaden the psychological understanding of them. In this specific sense, this research differs from other organizational studies, whose objectives are to standardize behavior.

There is little research into how teachers think about and teach creative writing and its redrafting and how this might differ depending upon the age of the pupils being taught. This paper aims to compare the creative writing conceptualisations and practices of primary school teachers (5–11-year olds) and secondary school teachers (11–18-year-olds) in England through a qualitative survey. This comparison enables to think about the influence of policy on creative writing in primary and secondary schools as well as what professional development could look like for these teachers to improve the teaching of creative writing.

A qualitative survey exploring the creative writing and redrafting pedagogies and conceptualisations was responded to by primary school teachers (n = 18) and secondary school teachers (n = 19). Taking an ecological view of creative writing and teacher identity, the authors undertake a comparative analysis of the survey data using the 5A’s theory of creativity (Glaveanu, 2013) and a view of professional identity existing within “landscapes of practice” (Wenger-Trayner, Wenger-Trayner, 2015). This enables to illuminate how and why creative writing is contextually afforded, or otherwise, in primary and secondary landscapes of practice.

This analysis demonstrates how the redrafting of creative writing is marginalised in both landscapes of practice and how redrafting is largely conceptualised as a technical rather than critical or creative action. The authors show how teachers, particularly in primary school, aim for their pupils to produce “products” rather than engaging in the “process” of creative writing. This analysis also shows that whilst creative writing is overall more marginalised in the secondary school landscape, it is often taught through process approaches. In both landscapes of practice, the re-drafting of creative writing is largely taught through product approaches.

This research is potentially skewed by the fact that we recruited our participants through networks relating the teaching of English, including creative writing. What is worrying about this limitation, however, is that the picture of creative writing in schools in England probably leans more to a product approach than the picture this research has uncovered.

Professional development for teachers in both landscapes is needed in relation to pedagogical actions for creative writing and its redrafting. Some of the key differences we have outlined in conceptualisations and practices between primary and secondary schools landscapes, notably the overuse of product-based teaching actions in primary landscapes, and some of the differences we have outlined within discrete landscapes of practice, notably how some primary school teachers feel more confident to challenge the product-based approach, with one conceptualising redrafting as “creative”, indicate that professional development should involve teachers working across schools.

Policy needs to be reformed to move away from the technicist view of creative writing held in both landscapes of practice. Linked to this, the way creative writing is assessed as a product in secondary schools needs to change – the re-introduction of portfolio-based coursework (Bishop, 1990) would provide the affordance of redrafting as an action central to creative writing processes.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is a rare piece of research which compares primary and secondary school teachers’ approaches to teaching creative writing. It shows that primary school teachers can be formulaic in the way they teach creative writing, using product approaches. However, in secondary schools the picture is different: teachers, particularly those, who are writers themselves, give students more agency in redrafting and shaping their writing. This indicates how professional development should involve primary and secondary school teachers in dialogue with one another to cross boundaries of practice.

The increasing energy consumption in residential buildings poses significant challenges to sustainability, economic efficiency, and environmental health. Despite the availability of numerous energy-saving strategies, their adoption remains inconsistent due to various barriers such as cost, awareness and technical limitations. This paper aims to assess energy-saving strategies mitigating high energy consumption in residential buildings.

The study adopted a quantitative research methodology. A carefully developed study questionnaire was distributed to a group of 20 Delphi experts to collect quantitative data. These experts possess extensive experience in the areas of energy use, energy management and energy savings. The questionnaire was also issued to the end users to gather quantitative data. The collected data were analyzed using descriptive analysis.

The study results indicate a strong preference for certain energy-saving measures, with energy-efficient appliances, occupant behavior adjustments and heating, ventilation and air conditioning (HVAC) system upgrades emerging as the most frequently adopted strategies. Measures such as installing smart thermostats and energy-efficient windows also ranked highly, reflecting their perceived effectiveness in reducing energy consumption. However, strategies like weatherizing buildings and using smart power strips were less frequently implemented, suggesting lower prioritization or barriers to adoption. The findings further emphasize the importance of HVAC-related maintenance and upgrades, highlighted by their top rankings and frequent use, while simpler actions, such as insulation and turning off lights, were ranked lower despite their potential for energy savings.

The study’s limitations include reliance on self-reported data, potential bias in participant responses and a lack of consideration for contextual factors such as regional climate, socioeconomic conditions and technological access that may influence the adoption of energy-saving measures.

This research is distinctive in its integration of the Delphi method with questionnaires to holistically evaluate and assess energy-saving measures for reducing excessive energy use in residential structures. By integrating expert consensus with empirical data from diverse residential contexts, it provides a comprehensive and nuanced understanding of effective energy management practices.