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Globally, urban planners and decision makers are pursuing place-based initiatives to develop and enhance urban infrastructure to optimise city performance, competitiveness and sustainability credentials. New discourses associated with big data, Building Information Modelling, SMART cities, green and biophilic thinking inform research, policy and practice agendas to varying extents. However, these discourses remain relatively isolated as much city planning is still pursued within traditional sectoral silos hindering integration. This research explores new conceptual ground at the Smart – Natural City interface within a safe interdisciplinary opportunity space. Using the city of Birmingham UK as a case study, a methodology was developed championing co-design, integration and social learning to develop a conceptual framework to navigate the challenges and opportunities at the Smart-Natural city interface. An innovation workshop and supplementary interviews drew upon the insights and experiences of 25 experts leading to the identification of five key spaces for the conceptualisation and delivery at the Smart-Natural city interface. At the core is the space for connectivity; surrounded by spaces for visioning, place-making, citizen-led participatorylearning and monitoring.The framework provides a starting point for improved discussions, understandings and negotiations to cover all components of this particular interface. Our results show the importance of using all spaces within shared narratives; moving towards ‘silver-green’ and living infrastructure and developing data in response to identified priorities. Whilst the need for vision has dominated traditional urban planning discourses we have identified the need for improved connectivity as a prerequisite. The use of all 5 characteristics collectively takes forward the literature on socio-ecological-technological relationships and heralds significant potential to inform and improve city governance frameworks, including the benefits of a transferable deliberative and co-design method that generates ownership with a real stake in the outcomes.

The paper reports upon the findings of a national survey of Personal Business Advisors (PBAs). It examines the nature of the client‐PBA relationship in terms of how relationships are established with growth firms and how they are maintained over the long term. Results show that a range of different approaches are currently used to identify growth businesses. Other findings indicate that the current role of the PBA is a broad one, extending beyond the client focus originally envisaged by the DTI. It is argued that financial targets are an important influence upon the nature of the client‐PBA relationship.

The application of technology in both its “hard” (for example through computing technology) and “soft” (for example through instructional design ) forms has enhanced the range of training methods available to practitioners. Much rhetoric has surrounded the use of techniques such as distance learning and computer‐based learning methods. The study aimed to explore the attitudes of managers to these “modern” approaches and other more “traditional” methods. A questionnaire survey of over 200 managers in organisations of all sizes and from a range of sectors was conducted. The data suggest that distance learning is not widely used as it is perceived as less effective, whereas at‐job learning, as well as being widely used is also perceived as being the most effective method. An analysis in terms of firm size revealed more similarities than differences between larger and smaller firms. The theoretical and practical implications of the results are discussed.

This paper seeks to explore linguistic nuances in responses to the definition of marketing for entrepreneurs in technology and non‐technology firms located in the US and UK. The present study focuses on an open ended marketing question and applies a hermeneutic analysis to the data. The results appear to suggest that differences exist between US and their UK counterparts on how they define marketing, such that UK firms “individualize” their application of marketing while the US firms “professionalize” the function.

The way organizational actors use language to think about and communicate their organizational experiences is central to how organizational actors enact organizational paradox. However, most inquiries into the role of language in the organizational paradox literature has focused on specific components of language (e.g., discourse), without attention to the complex, multi-level linguistic system that is interconnected to organizational processes. In this chapter, we expand our knowledge of the role of language by integrating paradox research with research from the linguistics discipline. We identify a series of linguistic tensions (i.e., generalizability-specificity, universalism-particularism, and explicitness-implicitness) that are nested within organizational paradoxes. In the process, we reveal how the organizing paradox of control and autonomy is interconnected to other paradoxes (i.e., performing, learning, and belonging) through the instantiation of linguistic paradoxes. We discuss the implications of our findings for research on paradox and language.

Global social restrictions driven by COVID-19 exposed the vast potential of digital technologies for remote mental health and wellbeing provision. To combat the youth mental health crisis, practitioners, researchers, and policy makers must seek innovative solutions. The digital adaptation of evidence-based, in-person programmes offers one such promising approach. Co-authored by a young person, this chapter discusses democratising the research agenda and presents an exploratory study with co-production at its heart. The aim of the project was to inform the development of digitalised resources based on the robustly evidenced Super Skills for Life psychosocial intervention for adolescents. ‘Key ingredients’ for effective online content are presented by the young person developer, alongside their personal reflections on co-production research. This case study illustrates how collaboration with intervention recipients can augment programme development and expand access to evidence-based support. Not only extending reach but offering a choice of support pathways to a digital generation.

The Plaintiff, a self‐employed sales agent, was engaged on 21st November, 1980 by the Defendant, a financial services company selling life assurance and pension policies. The terms of his engagement were contained in two successive contracts of which the latter provided, inter alia, (1) that he should be an independent contractor remunerated by commission payable on premiums generated by business introduced by him; (2) that the relationship between the two parties was that of agent and principal and (3) that that agency was an exclusive one ie the plaintiff was not entitled to act as agent for any other principal. In addition, Clause 10(g) of that contract provided as follows:

Little is known about how experiential entrepreneurship education approaches contribute toward enhancing the engagement of students in the learning process. Using a purposive and convenience sample of individual student reflective journals, the purpose of this paper is to critically evaluate how the process of constructive misalignment enhances the level of student engagement through a team-based experiential entrepreneurship education assessment.

Data were gathered from a purposive and convenience sample of reflective journals, an individual “performance assessment” element of three Masters-level courses (courses 1, 2 and 3) that included an “active” group business ideas generation presentation and a report. These texts were analyzed through content analysis that critically evaluates and summarizes the content of data and their messages.

While expected learning outcomes included teamwork and communication, the higher levels of active learning and student engagement related to innovation and generating a business idea was much more modest. Rather, the study finds that significant learning opportunities were apparent when students experienced unexpected aspects of constructive misalignment, such as linguistic–cultural challenges, nonparticipation and freeriding.

Building on Biggs’ (2003) model of constructive alignment in course design and delivery/assessment, this paper elucidates various unexpected and surprising aspects. It suggests that constructive misalignment could provide major learning opportunities for students and is thus more likely in these team contexts where entrepreneurship students experience constructive misalignment. Educators should, therefore, continue to design experiential entrepreneurship courses and their performance assessments through team-based approaches that achieve higher levels of engagement as well as more active learning.