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A structured sticker for examination of women in labour was introduced at Arrowe Park Hospital in 1998 to improve documentation of examination findings. This study was undertaken to assess whether the use of the sticker improved documentation of examination findings and second, compliance of sticker use. A retrospective analysis was performed on 64 cases randomised by random number generated on Arcus Quickstat from 470 women who were induced by prostaglandin during 1 January 1998 to 31 December 1998 at Arrowe Park Hospital. Women were induced by prostaglandin were chosen as the study population to obtain data from early labour. A total of 229 examinations were performed in these areas. Statistical analysis was undertaken on Arcus Quickstat, and χ² and Fisher’s exact tests were applied to check for statistical significance.

The objective of this paper is to assess the use of performance measurement systems in firms implementing just‐in‐time (JIT). A mail questionnaire, with a response rate of 85 percent, was sent to larger New Zealand manufacturing companies. A total of 36 percent of the sample of companies had implemented a JIT programme. JIT firms were found to use non‐financial performance indicators to a greater extent than non‐JIT firms. For JIT firms there was a significant positive correlation between use of non‐financial performance indicators and organisation performance. A significant positive correlation was also found between the use of non‐financial performance indicators and organisation performance for all firms in the survey. Results from this study suggest that there are benefits in adapting the accounting performance measurement system to support and enhance JIT implementation. The study indicates potential benefits from the use of non‐financial performance measures for both JIT and non‐JIT firms.

The purpose of this paper is to know, from a three-dimensional perspective (operational, emotional and behavioral), the process of “putting down roots” related with the implementation of Kaizen until it becomes sustainable. The research aims to know how this “putting down roots” process is carried out, what transformations occur, what elements are involved and what role they represent in achieving sustainability.

For this purpose, a methodology based on the case study has been used, an interpretive approach to reality has been adopted as a paradigm and the Grounded Theory has been applied as an analytical technique.

The results suggest the existence of a transformation process that leads to creating new habits, beliefs and feelings, a phenomenon that the authors identify as a three-dimensional learning process (operational, emotional and behavioral).

This type of learning is perceived as a transition toward an organizational culture that ensures the roots of the Kaizen principles, which is essential for its sustainability and which favors the creation of talent and the well-being of employees, two challenges that the Kaizen of the twenty-first century must face.

The document includes innovative contributions to the Kaizen sustainability phenomenon, as it is dealt with from a three-dimensional perspective that underlies the inhibitors and enablers known in the current literature.

In the year 1900 Koch expressed the view that human and bovine tuberculosis were distinct diseases, that the bacillus of bovine tuberculosis could not produce this disease in the human subject, and that the bacillus of human tuberculosis could not set it up in the bovine species. As is now well known. these conclusions have not received the slightest confirmation from other workers in the same field, and it may be said that the consensus of scientific opinion is now to the effect that the bacilli of human and bovine tuberculosis are identical—at any rate, so far as the effects attributed to them are concerned. The Royal Commission appointed in 1901, and consisting of the late Sir MICHAEL FOSTER, Drs. SIMS WOODHEAD, SIDNEY MARTIN, MACFADYEAN, and BOYCE, have issued a further interim report on their investigations. The first interim report was published in 1904, the conclusions stated in it being to the effect that the human and animal diseases were identical, and that no characteristics by which the one could be distinguished from the other had been discovered. The report now issued shows that these conclusions are confirmed by the results of a very large number of fresh experiments. The main conclusions set forth in the present report are as understated :—

Bill Gates, who feels that with respect to Windows and CDROMs, he overestimated in the short‐run, and underestimated in the long‐run, would probably expect Broadband Network Technology (BNT) to arrive in less than a decade. No matter when BNT arrives, there is a fundamental question that has to be raised and answered, which is the theme of this chapter: the UTILIZATION of the exploding multimedia content of the Information Superskyway. How will people USE 1,000 times the current content, arriving 1,000 times as fast? We discuss nine imperative issues of utilization. (1) Use of Content on the Information Superskyway. More than 20 years before IT became a household word, the US National Science Foundation issued a Request for Proposal entitled: “Systems Approach to Evaluate the Use of Science and Technology Information in the Electronic Alternative to Paper‐based Communication.” The same approach is germane toward the use of the entire IT content today. (2) Use of IT Data in Corporate Decision‐Making. In 1972, IBM headquarters removed the computer consoles placed next to the desk of senior executives because the computers were hardly used in two years. How can nonuse be avoided? (3) Networks obsoleting skills, structure. The fusion of computers and communications empowers all the workers to form, dissolve, and re‐form networks based on their relative competitiveness. With the ability to source globally, virtual corporations can be formed, dissolved, and re‐formed based on their competitiveness and credibility. (4) Significant resource commitment to unproven technology. With the very survival of Great Britain at stake, the non‐specialist Churchill had to lay all the technology eggs in the single basket called the “radar,” trusting that “the promises made by our scientists for the still unproven radar would be kept.” It would remain unproven for four years yet. (5) Sensitivity of significant resource commitment to technology forecast. Far more tenuous than the “promises for radar” was Einstein's opinion that nuclear‐energy could be released. Roosevelt launched the atomic bomb project on that opinion. Had he sought a second opinion from an eminent physicist like Niels Bohr, he would have questioned Einstein's opinion as scientific arm‐waving. (6) Sensitivity of significant resource commitment to technology‐generated market forecast. Churchill's reliance on Lindemann for technology advice is echoed in IBM CEO Watson's reliance on Birkenstock. In 1948, the latter encouraged the former to stand up against Watson, Sr. and abandon punch cards for magnetic tape. In 1956, he persuaded Watson, Jr. to negotiate with Texas Instruments to cut down the price of IC to $1.50, making it economically feasible to use IC in System/360. (7) Protection of Primogeniture of Ideas on the Internet. In order not to inhibit the inventor from collaborative interactions, the paternity of seminal ideas has to be unambiguously established when interactive exchanges are instantaneous, as on the Internet. (8) Inter‐disciplinary (synergistic) linguistics. The prerequisite to any inter‐disciplinary communication is the ability of each to understand one language in addition to one's own discipline. A truly inter‐disciplinary language would enable those in different disciplines to communicate with everyone else, enabling synergy to be generated. (8) Putting the Content in the Context. The explosion of instantaneous data racing thousand times as fast as at present is sand without substance, unless the symbols written in sand are given substance by the context of the decision‐maker. The data should be ordered and processed to answer questions of the type: Must I expand the external boundaries; if so, in which direction? Must I expand the internal boundaries; if so, in which direction?

In the last seven years eight young engineers have benefited from the BRA Travel Award. Most have been from academic backgrounds. Now the BRA wants to encourage more industry‐based engineers to apply.

Be wary of bandwagons, involving either trendy industries or hot business concepts. The fit is more important than the glitter. Be wary also, once a band‐wagon has been boarded, of jumping off too soon to ride one that looks newer or more attractive. Management by zigzagging around will eventually leave you and your company victims of terminal whiplash, an inability to maintain focus on any growth objective long enough to achieve it.

Wolverhampton‐based IMI Marston, a wholly owned subsidiary of IMI plc, employs over 500 personnel in five product groups. Its highly successful Aerospace Heat Transfer Group designs and manufactures heat exchangers for a wide marketplace and for a variety of applications. Looks at the increasing complexity of avionics equipment, and the need to dissipate heat in order to maintain a stable operating environment and examines the design, material and process selection in developing materials and products for this sector.