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Louise Lingwood, Darren Bennett and Julie Bevan describe the Recovery in Action Project, an exciting two‐year programme to embed recovery in the day‐to‐day practice of four voluntary sector agencies.

Consumer boycotts are a powerful way to get businesses to change their policies, if rather difficult to harness. The author looks in detail at the position of Barclays Bank in South Africa, and at Nestlé′s marketing of baby milk to the Third World. The author concludes that management should be aware of their social responsibilities not least because of the economic and corporate image damage which can be inflicted by a concerted consumer campaign.

At the heart of health and social care services is the pursuit of safety and dignity. Legislation and organizational policies are the main way in which statutory and independent organizations’ are tasked with enabling adults with mental health services along the road to recovery. Safety is an intrinsic motivator and basic need.

There is increased political recognition that social policy including the Mental Health Act 2007, which is a cornerstone, is in need of reform. A Conservative Manifesto pledge to reform mental health legislation is based upon the need to mitigate discrimination.

The chapter will explore the interrelationship between “poor outcomes” within the black community and safety; consider the opportunities to move from organizational complacency as a result of new policy and legal frameworks; and promote the view that developing a new discourse around safety is an integral part of improving outcomes for service users, particularly those who are poorly served currently.

A literature review plus reference to case studies will form the basis of the chapter ent and modern racism?

This study explores the efficacy of social movements thinking for mobilizing resources toward sustainable change in large-scale systems such as health and social services.

The study proceeds from a critical realist perspective employing a qualitative multi-case study approach. Drawing on the tenets of grounded theory (i.e. constant comparative analysis and theoretical sampling), data from semi-structured interviews and field notes were analyzed to facilitate theoretical integration and elaboration.

One case study explores the emergence of social movements thinking in mobilizing a community to engage in sustainable system change. Data analysis revealed a three-stage conceptual framework whereby building momentum for change requires a fundamental shift in culture through openness and engagement to challenge the status quo by acknowledging not only the apparent problems to be addressed but also the residual apathy and cynicism holding the system captive to entrenched ideas and behaviors. By challenging the status quo, energy shifts and momentum builds as the community discovers shared values and goals. Achieving a culture shift of this magnitude requires leadership that is embedded within the community, with a personal commitment to that community and with the deep listening skills necessary to understand and engage the community and the wider system in moving forward into change. This emergent conceptual framework is then used to compare and discuss more intentional applications of social movements thinking for mobilizing resources for large-scale system change.

This study offers a three-stage conceptual framework for mobilizing community/system resources toward sustainable large-scale system change. The comparative application of this framework to more intentional applications of social movements thinking to planned change initiatives offers insights and lessons to be learned when large-scale systems attempt to apply such principles in redesigning health and social service systems.

This paper aims to evaluate the aims and methods of appraisal, and the difficulties encountered in the appraisal process.

The paper uses a review of the literature to evaluate the development of appraisals and argues that the critical area of line management development that was identified as a critical success factor in appraisals has been ignored in the later literature evaluating the effectiveness of performance appraisals.

The review identifies the lack of theoretical development in appraisal and argues the psychological approach of analysis and a more critical realisation of appraisal, re‐evaluating the challenge to remove subjectivity and bias in judgement of appraisal.

Further evaluation of key interpersonal skills is required for appraisal systems to develop performance.

The use and design of performance pay in public and private services linked to appraisal have not always improved organisational performance and can contribute to reduced motivation.

Little research has evaluated the current increases in using appraisals and the changes in focus from appraisal to performance management. The paper adds value to the existing body of knowledge and offers insights for practitioners and researchers.

As Joe Shams moved towards the exit he caught a glimpse of a familiar cover‐pic half‐hidden behind a porta‐reader. Recognising it as a copy of Philip K Dick's Counter clock world, he knew that it had been planted there by the library's security division in another of their far from subtle attempts to trap a ‘Dick‐'ead’.

The aim is to explore users' reactions to health information web sites from the perspective of trust, retrieval of relevant information and ease‐of‐use, and to establish the link between perceived quality, trust, and usability.

An analysis of three Australian health web sites was undertaken. A usability test was conducted on those three web sites resulting in 207 completed user evaluations. The evaluations included both quantitative and qualitative data.

The three investigated health information web sites do not meet the needs of health consumers. More details such as how information is selected to engender greater trust need to be provided. The retrieval of relevant information could be improved through the implementation of functionality such as spell checking and information differentiation. Finally, ensuring web sites are easy to use contributes to the level of trust users have in a web site.

This was a relatively small study investigating only three generic Australian health web sites, the results however suggest that a larger study looking at other health web sites is needed.

For government agencies developing health information web sites more attention needs to be paid to the design of these web sites if users are to be encouraged to use the web site and return. The research suggests that effective health information web sites must be perceived to be of reliable quality, be trustworthy, have some level of intelligence to assist in the retrieval of relevant information, and be easy to use.

Although there is much research relating to the relationship between web site design and trust for e‐commerce transactional web sites this work has not been undertaken for web sites designed for information retrieval, in particular little work has been done of health information web sites. This paper fills in some of the gaps.