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When young people start work in unskilled jobs variations in their competence are soon apparent. The key point is that these variations are seldom in job skills but usually in the areas of personal behaviour and attitude. This is what emerged as significant from the A—Z study of young unskilled workers undertaken by the Industrial Training Research Unit.

‘It's John Wellens on the phone,’ said our switchboard, interrupting a non‐interruptable meeting. ‘He wants to check the word superemployability on our Conference advertisement. What does it mean?’

We issue a double Souvenir number of The Library World in connection with the Library Association Conference at Birmingham, in which we have pleasure in including a special article, “Libraries in Birmingham,” by Mr. Walter Powell, Chief Librarian of Birmingham Public Libraries. He has endeavoured to combine in it the subject of Special Library collections, and libraries other than the Municipal Libraries in the City. Another article entitled “Some Memories of Birmingham” is by Mr. Richard W. Mould, Chief Librarian and Curator of Southwark Public Libraries and Cuming Museum. We understand that a very full programme has been arranged for the Conference, and we have already published such details as are now available in our July number.

In the performance measurement and management research field, the applicability of performance measurement systems (PMS) in nonprofit organizations (NPOs) and public administration has been considered a challenge. The diversity of these organizations makes it difficult to define proper terminology and organizational characteristics. PMS evolution has not yet been able to capture all performance dimensions of a public administration and, especially for NPO considering its dynamic and multiple goals. The purpose of this paper is to provide a conceptual framework that identifies and classifies the factors that influence the design of PMSs in NPOs and public administration.

The study was developed through a systematic literature review (SLR). A set of 29 papers were intensely studied, and the results provide a multi-disciplinary and holistic set of factors.

A set of ten factors that influence the design of PMSs in NPO and public administration were found. They were categorized into three groups: factor related to purpose, stakeholders and management.

The study synthesized the literature and provided a conceptual framework of the factors that influence the design of PMSs in NPO and public administration. No individual paper collected in the SLR shows a similar organization of the factors as the present paper. The set of factors indicates the importance of this study for NPO and public administration, and how complex a PMS in an NPO and public administration can become. The conceptual model presented can further assist practitioners in developing design process observing the role that the identified factors play.

The purpose of this study is to propose a comprehensive benchmarking approach to help subsidiaries of a company to implement continuous improvement (CI).

The proposed approach classifies subsidiaries of a company into the three stages of CI. After that, the proposed approach employs data envelopment analysis (DEA)-super slacks-based measure (SBM) model and Malmquist Productivity Index (MPI) to evaluate the operational efficiency of the subsidiaries and selects benchmarking targets and sets benchmarking goals based on the operational efficiency for benchmarking of input and output criteria. Then, the proposed approach suggests a four-step benchmarking process for benchmarking of detailed efficiency. Finally, the proposed approach makes the subsidiaries achieve CI by implementing the input and output benchmarking and the efficiency benchmarking.

The results show that the proposed approach can help subsidiaries of a company to implement a staged benchmarking which considers input and output criteria and Malmquist productivity and efficiency comprehensively.

Generally, benchmarking is implemented in many aspects. However, due to the restriction of a company’s resource level, a practical and staged benchmarking is preferred. This study proposes a comprehensive approach to benchmark systematically and gradually, and provides a more reasonable benchmarking process for implementing CI.