Search results

Anecdotal evidence about electronic document management systems implies that they sound good, but implementation is difficult. This paper seeks to utilise the assertions of Hughes and King that the document is a social artefact and to ask what this might mean for electronic document management systems.

After analysing the layers of information contained in documents, the study argues that documents are “wrapping” for content that ensures the provision of social knowledge required for interpretation of the document's content.

Some information systems writers argue that the need for social knowledge in a task negates the possibility of the automation of it. So it can be argued that the “electronic document” is an oxymoron; that only part of what we know to be a document can be provided electronically. The paper concludes that greater success might be achieved by discarding the idea of electronically delivering documents and instead focusing on the delivery of content.

The article explores the fundamental nature of electronic systems and the resulting implications for the form and structure of electronic objects within such systems – a significant issue, which is transferable to the record‐keeping arena.

Describes an innovative programme designed to learn or improve skills – The Sharing Museum Skills Award – which was later extended to the archives and libraries sector. Funding was made available for the secondment of paid staff or volunteers. Benefits were gained by the secondees, their host organisation and mentors, and the community.

A centre specialising in mid‐career change has opened in Croydon, the activities of which will appeal locally and to organisations mainly in London and the South‐East. Run by an independent firm of professional career counsellors, Career & Personal Development Associates, it provides a wide range of services to help people solve the variety of problems that affect them in mid‐career. The four main kinds of problems comprise: first, failure to appreciate personnel strengths, needs and goals relevant to working life; secondly, not making effective use of personal strengths due to difficulties with motivation, unhealthy levels of stress, and so on; thirdly, not defining and researching job markets as thoroughly and as imaginatively as possible; fourthly, ineffective patterns of communication both in writing curricula vitae and in job interviews. The firm provides group and individual counselling, coaching in skills of job market research, writing, and interviews. Videotape interview practice and a word processing cv service are part of the standard package provided to adults. Psychological testing services are also available.

My early life was punctuated by turning points and transformations that gradually led to a surprising and late-blooming academic career – my first “real” sociology position began when I was 44. Here I trace six different trajectories of scholarly work which have compelled me: feminist women's health and technoscience studies; social worlds/arenas and the disciplinary emergence of reproductive sciences; the sociology of work and scientific practices; biomedicalization studies; grounded theory and situational analysis as qualitative research methods; and symbolic interaction-ists and -isms. I have circled back across them multiple times. Instead of seeing a beautifully folded origami of a life, it feels more like a crumpled wad of newspapers from various times. Upon opening and holding them up to the light in different ways, stories may be slowly discerned. I try to capture here some of the sweetness and fragility of these moments toward the end of an initially stuttering but later wondrously gratifying career.

Man has been seeking an ideal existence for a very long time. In this existence, justice, love, and peace are no longer words, but actual experiences. How ever, with the American preemptive invasion and occupation of Afghanistan and Iraq and the subsequent prisoner abuse, such an existence seems to be farther and farther away from reality. The purpose of this work is to stop this dangerous trend by promoting justice, love, and peace through a change of the paradigm that is inconsistent with justice, love, and peace. The strong paradigm that created the strong nation like the U.S. and the strong man like George W. Bush have been the culprit, rather than the contributor, of the above three universal ideals. Thus, rather than justice, love, and peace, the strong paradigm resulted in in justice, hatred, and violence. In order to remove these three and related evils, what the world needs in the beginning of the third millenium is the weak paradigm. Through the acceptance of the latter paradigm, the golden mean or middle paradigm can be formulated, which is a synergy of the weak and the strong paradigm. In order to understand properly the meaning of these paradigms, however, some digression appears necessary.

Man has been seeking an ideal existence for a very long time. In this existence, justice, love, and peace are no longer words, but actual experiences. How ever, with the American preemptive invasion and occupation of Afghanistan and Iraq and the subsequent prisoner abuse, such an existence seems to be farther and farther away from reality. The purpose of this work is to stop this dangerous trend by promoting justice, love, and peace through a change of the paradigm that is inconsistent with justice, love, and peace. The strong paradigm that created the strong nation like the U.S. and the strong man like George W. Bush have been the culprit, rather than the contributor, of the above three universal ideals. Thus, rather than justice, love, and peace, the strong paradigm resulted in in justice, hatred, and violence. In order to remove these three and related evils, what the world needs in the beginning of the third millenium is the weak paradigm. Through the acceptance of the latter paradigm, the golden mean or middle paradigm can be formulated, which is a synergy of the weak and the strong paradigm. In order to understand properly the meaning of these paradigms, however, some digression appears necessary.

Presents over sixty abstracts summarising the 1999 Employment Research Unit annual conference held at the University of Cardiff. Explores the multiple impacts of globalization on work and employment in contemporary organizations. Covers the human resource management implications of organizational responses to globalization. Examines the theoretical, methodological, empirical and comparative issues pertaining to competitiveness and the management of human resources, the impact of organisational strategies and international production on the workplace, the organization of labour markets, human resource development, cultural change in organisations, trade union responses, and trans‐national corporations. Cites many case studies showing how globalization has brought a lot of opportunities together with much change both to the employee and the employer. Considers the threats to existing cultures, structures and systems.

This chapter focuses on the largely unexplored within- and cross-category spillovers between category kings and commoners within the field of the sharing economy. Going beyond the reputational spill-overs that are the main focus of extant literature, the authors also consider spill-overs in awareness, regulation, and customer usage between category kings and commoners, providing a holistic view of what it means to be a commoner in the same or adjacent category as a king. On the basis of a mixed-method study based on semi-structured interviews with UK sharing platforms and a consumer survey, the authors show that category commoners are affected by kings differently depending whether they are in the exact same sub-category or in an adjacent one within the same larger category. This chapter expands extant work on within and cross-category dynamics by taking the less popular perspective of the less visible category members. Studying these dynamics in the setting of the sharing economy also contributes to the authors’ knowledge of what enables/hinders the growth of a new field as a whole. Finally, the findings have important policy implications.