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States that firms in many industries are seeking strategic partnerships with suppliers, distributors and customers. Discusses Customer‐Linked Strategy (CLS), a type of partnership being used by some firms. Evaluates the advantages and disadvantages of CLS and specifies appropriate circumstances for adopting CLS, together with information on implementing the partnership. Considers the consequencesof CLS and finds that it is of great benefit to many firms. Recommends that those businesses not currently using the technique but whose situation is suited to the strategy should reconsider their action.

Many industrial firms are adopting new selling methods such as telemarketing, national account management, and the like. Unfortunately, there are few guidelines for division managers who pioneer the use of these techniques in their firms, particularly in terms of changes in appraisal, coordination, and planning systems that accompany the adoption of new selling methods. This article details the development and implementation of new selling methods at an industrial firm, and provides guidelines to managers for using these techniques in their own firms.

For half a century, neuroscientists have used Shannon Information Theory to calculate “information transmitted,” a hypothetical measure of how well neurons “discriminate” amongst stimuli. Neuroscientists’ computations, however, fail to meet even the technical requirements for credibility. Ultimately, the reasons must be conceptual. That conclusion is confirmed here, with crucial implications for neuroscience. The paper aims to discuss these issues.

Shannon Information Theory depends upon a physical model, Shannon’s “general communication system.” Neuroscientists’ interpretation of that model is scrutinized here.

In Shannon’s system, a recipient receives a message composed of symbols. The symbols received, the symbols sent, and their hypothetical occurrence probabilities altogether allow calculation of “information transmitted.” Significantly, Shannon’s system’s “reception” (decoding) side physically mirrors its “transmission” (encoding) side. However, neurons lack the “reception” side; neuroscientists nonetheless insisted that decoding must happen. They turned to Homunculus, an internal humanoid who infers stimuli from neuronal firing. However, Homunculus must contain a Homunculus, and so on ad infinitum – unless it is super-human. But any need for Homunculi, as in “theories of consciousness,” is obviated if consciousness proves to be “emergent.”

Neuroscientists’ “information transmitted” indicates, at best, how well neuroscientists themselves can use neuronal firing to discriminate amongst the stimuli given to the research animal.

A long-overdue examination unmasks a hidden element in neuroscientists’ use of Shannon Information Theory, namely, Homunculus. Almost 50 years’ worth of computations are recognized as irrelevant, mandating fresh approaches to understanding “discriminability.”

Presents a portfolio model for multi‐sales channel effort deployment. Shows how the approach can help sales management restructure sales channels. Notes that combining an organization′s selling effort into multiple sales channels can be facilitated through an analytical approach that considers variations in customer requirements, buying power and contact costs. Concludes that implementing a successful multiple sales channel strategy offers impressive productivity opportunities.

The performance of large-scale projects is often challenged due to major environmental changes that occur during their life. However, literature has paid little attention to the governance adaptations required to respond effectively to these changes. This paper aims to study changes in the project environment over time, the corresponding governance adaptations and their impact on project performance.

To ensure triangulation between two sources of evidence, we used both primary and secondary data sources and examined 14 projects through 2 studies, the first focused on seven documented, illustrative case projects and the second on interviews with senior and project managers involved in seven additional projects.

We found the key environmental changes that should trigger appropriate governance adaptations to be market evolutions, technological advancements and sociopolitical events. However, we also found that these necessary governance adaptations are not commonly implemented timely, sufficiently or effectively.

The paper distills the dynamics of large-scale projects in achieving project effectiveness and raises theoretical propositions on the combination of environmental changes and deficient governance adaptations that, over time, turns efficient projects into ineffective projects and discusses implications for theory and practice.

The principal aim of the present study was to identify and model the subject structure of the research area on collaborative information behaviour (CIB).

A qualitative, inductive and exploratory approach was adopted, and the method of thematic analysis was used. This study was based on the analysis of 79 publications selected from the Library, Information Science and Technology Abstracts (LISTA) database in April 2019.

Collaborative and collective information behaviours were differentiated, and the subject structure of the CIB research area was identified to contain collaborative activities oriented to both information access and content, their various conditions, means of conducting, experiences of selected communities and metascientific research on the area itself.

The limitations result primarily from relying on the research material selected from the database (LISTA) focussed mainly on the issues of library and information science.

This study contributes by proposing an original model of the CIB research area representing its subject structure and providing a coherent list of subjects of interest to CIB researchers. Hopefully, it will also contribute to the harmonisation of terminology related to this research area and thus facilitate communication between CIB researchers and accelerate the cumulative development of scientific knowledge on CIB.

In the last half-century, individual sensory neurons have been bestowed with characteristics of the whole human being, such as behavior and its oft-presumed precursor, consciousness. This anthropomorphization is pervasive in the literature. It is also absurd, given what we know about neurons, and it needs to be abolished. This study aims to first understand how it happened, and hence why it persists.

The peer-reviewed sensory-neurophysiology literature extends to hundreds (perhaps thousands) of papers. Here, more than 90 mainstream papers were scrutinized.

Anthropomorphization arose because single neurons were cast as “observers” who “identify”, “categorize”, “recognize”, “distinguish” or “discriminate” the stimuli, using math-based algorithms that reduce (“decode”) the stimulus-evoked spike trains to the particular stimuli inferred to elicit them. Without “decoding”, there is supposedly no perception. However, “decoding” is both unnecessary and unconfirmed. The neuronal “observer” in fact consists of the laboratory staff and the greater society that supports them. In anthropomorphization, the neuron becomes the collective.

Anthropomorphization underlies the widespread application to neurons Information Theory and Signal Detection Theory, making both approaches incorrect.

A great deal of time, money and effort has been wasted on anthropomorphic Reductionist approaches to understanding perception and consciousness. Those resources should be diverted into more-fruitful approaches.

A long-overdue scrutiny of sensory-neuroscience literature reveals that anthropomorphization, a form of Reductionism that involves the presumption of single-neuron consciousness, has run amok in neuroscience. Consciousness is more likely to be an emergent property of the brain.

The purpose of this paper is to target the problem of awareness of the history of cybernetics as a field with different actors inside and outside cybernetics. It provides a short overview on research and literature during the last two decades and pleads for a multiplicity of historical views.

Historical research, review of literature.

While it can be found that there was a growing historical interest in cybernetics, this cannot be claimed for the history of the American Society of Cybernetics (ASC) as an organization and a productive network. One reason seems to be the lack of archival sources. The article provides a proposal to reconstruct such an archive for the history of the ASC.

Stimulation of historical awareness for and in cybernetics.

The purpose of this paper is to explain how managers incorporate long-term thinking in their decision-making processes as an antipode to a widely criticized managerial short-termism. For this purpose, the authors present a model of the influence of institutional, cultural and individual temporal factors on managerial long-term orientation (LTO).

This conceptual paper is based on a multidisciplinary review of the literature on the causes of managerial LTO.

It is proposed that managerial LTO is influenced by cultural and institutional factors on both a societal and an organizational level, as well as by managers’ individual temporal predispositions and the strengths of relational commitments with different stakeholder groups. It is further expected that managerial LTO has an influence on sustainability-related managerial behavior.

As the presented model reveals the main factors that orient managers toward the long run in their decisions, it can also be used as a framework to evaluate policies to curb managerial myopia on both an organizational and a societal level.

As sustainability is intrinsically linked with the ability to think and act in the long term, understanding the factors that influence managerial LTO can also contribute to building more sustainable organizations.

One of the main contributions of this paper is that it highlights the link between reciprocal relationships and LTO, an aspect that has not yet been the focus of the literature on the temporal orientation of managers.