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The runaway shop (a plant closure to avoid labour problems) has been seen as a feature of industrial change in the USA. Evidence of the runaway shop has also been noted in the UK. This paper analyses two data sets from the UK. The first, drawn from data relating primarily to the early 1980s, demonstrates that manpower difficulties can affect the closure of plants in multiplant manufacturing firms in particular local labour markets. A second data set, relating to the latter half of the 1980s, presents a contrasting result in that manpower problems had little effect on the closure of plants by British multiplant manufacturing firms. It is suggested these contrasting results may reflect the reduced power of organised labour in the more recent past.

The whole kingdom from north to south at the time of writing is enveloped in freezing Arctic weather, reminiscent of the North Russian campaign of long ago. The normal winter is relatively mild, mainly a Westerly pattern, occasionally wild and windy, wet with a rare cold “snap”. There are variations in the pattern, damp and warm in the south‐west, few frosts and rarely any snow; in the north of the country, Scotland, much colder, with the south‐east partaking of the weather pattern of the land mass of the Continent. The variations appear more of the mild weather in the South and colder, appreciably, in the North; recalling service personnel stationed at Gosport who did not need an overcoat all winter, whereas in the North, many found it necessary to wear a light overcoat tor most of the year, the south‐east corner of England, obtaining no help from the warming Gulf Stream, often gets the worst of the weather, which it has done to a very considerable extent in this winter.

With the launch of the Feminist International Assistance Policy (FIAP), the Canadian government named solidarity as a shared value and a driving motivation behind the FIAP. This paper explores how development workers understand and apply solidarity to their work, uncovering the opportunities and constraints they face.

In-depth, semi-structured interviews were conducted with 42 development workers from Canada’s federal development agency between 2019 and 2020. Transcribed data were coded by the author to identify how workers made sense of solidarity within the development industry.

The majority of workers were unsure of how to define or operationalize solidarity, demonstrating confusion. Commonality was routinely mentioned as a facet of solidarity, but workers understood this term in diverse ways, with some considering commonality as a precondition that inhibited a sense of solidarity with development partners in the global South due to differences in living conditions. About a quarter identified power and privilege as necessary considerations in the process of building solidarity, showing potential for bonds across the inequalities that define development. About 40% of workers identified the institutional structure of the organization as an obstacle to solidarity.

This paper presents original data from Canadian development workers, providing the first study of their understanding of solidarity as a development ethic. It shows the gaps between rhetoric and practice while recommending ways for development organizations to meaningfully engage with solidarity in their work.

Literature reviews are a pervasive aspect in research. An ever mounting field such as Lean Six Sigma requires a perpetual touch on the subject to accentuate insights that can be researched about. The purpose of this paper is to address the published literatures in the field of Lean Six Sigma through multiple criterion for an enhanced understanding of the subject matter through summarizing its current trends, uncovering existing literature gaps and revealing opportunities for future research in the field.

The literature review on Lean Six Sigma field spans around 17 years that includes peer-reviewed journals from management, business, engineering, healthcare, manufacturing, military among the many disciplines. The study uses a content analysis approach in which several dimensions of the literature were analysed: purpose or focus of study, years of publication, journal name or publications, methodologies, theories used, country of study, industry sub-sectors, active authors in the field, critical success factors, barriers and challenges and the most contribution of Lean Six Sigma papers by universities.

Eleven important findings from the analysis were summarized among them; the field of Lean Six Sigma had begun to grow significantly since the new millennium particularly after the 2004-2007 or 2008 period; standalone concepts of Lean and Six Sigma are highly researched compared to the integrated concepts; large proportion of perspective, conceptual and descriptive based studies; lack of empirical validity on the fusion between Lean and Six Sigma; lack of theoretical based studies, etc.

The study is limited to 102 journals in commonly searched databases in the subject matter which produced 261 journal papers. This study seeks to broaden the summary of studies done under the keyword “Lean Six Sigma”.

The review analysis uses a content analysis approach in search of valuable gaps in existing research. The study found 261 papers from 102 journals that were published over the past seventeen years (2000-2016). This paper provides scholars, practitioners and managers with insights on the present trends and focus of Lean Six Sigma in addition to what else are lacking in the subject matter, which could pave the way for future research and practical endeavours.