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Developments at all levels between project and policy have a potential impact on human health. Health‐impact assessment (HIA) is a discipline that seeks to assess these impacts to safeguard and enhance human health. There is a growing consensus about the scope, methodology and context for HIA but there are also many unresolved issues. This paper reviews the main trends as they vary between the healthy public policy, environmental assessment and environmental epidemiology communities; and between retrospective and prospective, developed and developing economies and urban/industrial versus rural settings. There are unresolved issues associated with the nature of evidence, the link with economic appraisal, and with the core biophysical and social health determinants. The nature of the evidence used is examined and some resolutions are proposed. The growing number of guidelines testify to a demand by development agencies for HIA, but increased consensus is required to ensure that quality assessments are delivered.

This paper, which is based on experience from a recent, large, social‐marketing intervention to improve reproductive health in Orissa, India, reviews evidence of harmful effects of improper disposal of male condoms, e.g. ingestion by cattle, effects on humans (e.g. rag pickers), length of time to biodegrade, drain blockage, screen‐cleaning and disposal costs to waste‐water treatment systems. Evidence of impact on the aquatic environment, of hormones from oral contraceptive pills excreted in urine was examined. Given the dearth of published and anecdotal data on the subject, it is concluded that further evidence of the magnitude and severity of the problem in Orissa and similar places in less developed countries is required to facilitate planning of mitigation actions that can be incorporated into social marketing of reversible contraceptives.

A central goal of strategic management is to understand why some organizations outperform others. Based on the literature, we test the links among strategic resources, firm’s strategic orientation, and performance using data from 1,201 Spanish small and medium‐sized enterprises. The results can guide managers to invest in the appropriate resources since there is evidence that technology, innovation, quality, and human resource management leads to better company performance. It is also shown how strategic resources varies according to strategic orientation.

Despite the rapid growth and lure of the service sector, entrepreneurs are well advised to consider the numerous competitive challenges encountered when owning and operating a service business. The unique nature of services (i.e. intangibility, heterogeneity, perishability, simultaneity) serves as a backdrop to accentuate the competitive landscapes in the service sector. To frame the analysis and discussion of the competitive environment for service businesses, the article applies Porter’s conceptualization of the five sources of competition – rivalry among existing intra‐industry firms; new entrants; substitutes; suppliers; and buyers. Discusses implications and suggestions for service entrepreneurs throughout the article.

The ability to develop and manage effective networks is a crucial entrepreneurial competence, allowing entrepreneurs to share experiences, ideas and knowledge to improve business performance. Despite growing recognition of the value of networks and networking, there has been little comparative research performed to explore ways in which male and female entrepreneurs develop and utilise networks. This chapter considers the development and use of networks in technology-based sectors, seen as important for wealth and employment creation, where women represent an underutilised source of entrepreneurial potential. An enhanced understanding of the issues surrounding male and female venturing, particularly within this sector, could offer opportunities to identify how levels of both genders’ entrepreneurial engagement might be increased. Also, if, for example, research identified that men and/or women network in ways which could limit enterprise development, this is of importance at both the micro and wider macro-policy levels. A qualitative methodology is used to explore the nature and dynamics of male and female entrepreneurial networks. Discussion of the findings focuses on the aspects of network quality where it has the potential to impact upon its value to the entrepreneur and his/her business. Patterns identified in the networks developed by male and female entrepreneurs are explored, and implications for policy and practice are considered.

While most extant research focused on different dimensions of the entrepreneurs’ social network such as the size and quality of the network, the focus of this paper is on the extent to which entrepreneurs utilize their personal network with suppliers, competitors, customers, and government officials to support the operations of their ventures. This paper also takes into account the effects of industry level determinants that can influence the relationship between entrepreneurs’ personal network usage and young firms’ performance.

The paper employs confirmatory factor analysis and moderated hierarchical multiple regressions on a sample of 246 young firms in Kuwait.

The results indicate that entrepreneurs' personal network usage is positively associated with young firms' performance. The results also reveal that industry dynamism strengthens this relationship, while in hostile industries the relationship between network usage and young firms' performance becomes weaker.

The present study provides insights into how the extent of utilization of an entrepreneur's personal network affects the firm's performance. Furthermore, by unpacking how industry dynamism and industry hostility influence the entrepreneurs' ability to reap benefits from their personal networks, this paper enriches the research on the role of industry factors in the performance of young firms.

For a new technology-based firm, the ability to learn is crucial to their growth process. However, firms constantly face the challenge of maintaining the ambidexterity of two different learning activities, namely learning by exploiting existing competencies and learning through exploring new ones. The purpose of this study is to examine how small technology-based firms at incubators perform both activities. Using the index of network openness, we argue that firms perform ambidexterity by maintaining a balance between a high and low level of network openness. Our first hypothesis was constructed as firms pursuing explorative learning will develop a high level of network openness while those pursuing exploitative learning will develop a low level of network openness. In the second hypothesis, we argue that firms need to balance network openness. Developing too low level of network openness will not add more benefits as the cost for maintaining relationship increases. Similarly, developing too high level of openness may potentially hinder firms’ progress as firms face distractions and difficulties in maintaining a wide variety of relationships. Using the empirical data from new technology-based firms located at the Daresbury SIC, we confirm the hypotheses. The result also found a trend of a curvilinear relationship between network openness and the firms’ performance which confirm the second hypothesis. The overall findings have illustrated how a network has a positive impact on helping small and new technology-based firms perform learning ambidexterity.

The librarian and researcher have to be able to uncover specific articles in their areas of interest. This Bibliography is designed to help. Volume IV, like Volume III, contains features to help the reader to retrieve relevant literature from MCB University Press' considerable output. Each entry within has been indexed according to author(s) and the Fifth Edition of the SCIMP/SCAMP Thesaurus. The latter thus provides a full subject index to facilitate rapid retrieval. Each article or book is assigned its own unique number and this is used in both the subject and author index. This Volume indexes 29 journals indicating the depth, coverage and expansion of MCB's portfolio.

In 1990/91, survey responses were gathered from 621 independent businesses located in Great Britain. A follow‐on telephone survey was conducted with 150 surviving firms in 1997. This survey gathered information surrounding the propensity of firms to export their goods or services abroad as well as other performance and goal outcomes. Organizational and external environmental variables collected in 1990 are used to explain within a multivariate statistical framework the propensity of a firm to be an exporter in 1997, and the intensity of internationalization activity. Data collected in 1990 is also used to explain variations in several performance variables (i.e. whether exporting was regarded as a path to firm growth; profit performance reported in 1997 relative to competition; and the propensity to report employment growth over the 1990 to 1997 period).