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The purpose of this paper is to explore a large data set compiled by a UK charity loan scheme to identify trends and paint a practice-based picture of how young children use early years powered mobility (EYPM).

Statistical analysis was used to investigate a database of 90 children, ranging in age from 15 to 72 months who completed use of an EYPM device (the Wizzybug, or WB) between April 2011 and December 2015. Goals were set and reviewed, and thematic analysis was used to understand families’ insights into their children’s use of EYPM, using a free-text review form.

Children’s mean age when joining this free loan scheme was 39.6 months. The later the child started using a Wizzybug, the less likely they were to achieve their goals. A theme of happiness and enjoyment emerged as important for both child and family. The child’s independence translated to independence for the whole family.

The database was operational and incomplete. Lack of a standardised outcome measure was disadvantageous.

Challenges of translating research knowledge into practice are highlighted, supporting the need for more rigorous and standardised outcome measures. Earlier identification of children’s readiness for EYPM is required alongside research and recognition of the holistic benefits of EYPM for all the family.

This research profited from a large data set of young children with long-term access to powered mobility at home.

This paper aims to explore practices and technologies successfully servitised manufacturers employ in the delivery of advanced services.

A case study methodology is applied across four manufacturing organisations successful in servitization. Through interviews with personnel across host manufacturers, their partners, and key customers, extensive data are collected about service delivery systems. Analyses identify convergence in their practices and technologies.

Six distinct technologies and practices are revealed: facilities and their location, micro-vertical integration and supplier relationships, information and communication technologies (ICTs), performance measurement and value demonstration, people deployment and their skills, and business processes and customer relationships. These are then combined in an integrative framework that illustrates how operations are configured to successfully deliver advanced services.

The analyses are reductive and rationalising. Future studies could identify other technologies and practices. Case study as a method is inherently limited in the extent to which findings can be generalised.

Awareness and interest in servitization is growing, yet adoption of a servitization strategy requires particular organisational capabilities on the part of the manufacturer. This study identifies technologies and practices that underpin these capabilities.

This paper contributes to the understanding of the servitization process and, in particular, the implications to broader operations of the firm.

What academic and managerial elements are particularly influential regarding performance? This study aims to address these questions as part of a broader longitudinal study. The current paper focusses on the results relating to performance management and measurement, and how the sectorial developments impacted on individuals and institutions.

An interpretive research methodology was used, which illustrates the institutional performance management and measurement system. The first part of the interpretive study was a single case study, focussing on one “old” research-intensive university. The second part included five institutions, three UK top-tier universities, focussing on top-level research and education, and two “new” universities with a greater teaching than research portfolio.

The current paper focusses on the results relating to performance management and measurement, and how higher education (HE) developments impacted on individuals and institutions, reflected in the notion of performance habitus. The qualitative element of the study sought to gain insight into which factors influence performance management and measurement and what changing effect these have on academic members of staff. The findings illustrate how academic values and managerial control practices create an academia-specific performance management approach, measured by particular key performance indicators that are used for the institution as a whole and then applied to units and individuals within institutions. With regard to institutional performance, more established and institutionalised performance management and measurement practices are relied upon. Both elements are addressed in this study, and the authors conclude that the interplay of human capital and institutional structure creates the most successful performance-related outcome.

The current study adds additional insights on how the changing HE context affects academic members and how the future of the UK HE sector is perceived. Insights can be derived for other HE sectors, as the contextual factors of international competition, tightening of resources and nature of the academic sector transcend national borders. Thus, practices illustrated in the current study are useful for institutions and academic managers of other HE sectors as well.

The purpose of this article is to explore the integrated processes of action learning, entrepreneurial learning and new venture creation by students and graduates in the creative industries by addressing two questions: How do action learning and entrepreneurial learning connect with new venture creation in the context of the creative industries? How does learning influence the types of creative enterprises developed by students?

The article is based around the case of the Student Placements for Entrepreneurs in Education (SPEED) project which ran in 13 higher education institutes (HEIs) in the UK between 2006 and 2008. This provided an innovative, action‐learning based route, enabling students to create new business ventures as self‐started work experience. The article uses the case to develop theoretical perspectives on creative entrepreneurship and action learning.

The article draws lessons from the experience of the SPEED programme as an innovative multi‐HEI project, and develops a conceptual model of creative entrepreneurship with illustrative cases. Transferable insights and a model of entrepreneurial action learning illustrate connections between venture formation and “pull” learning.

It is increasingly clear that graduate self‐employment and entrepreneurship must make an essential contribution to educational and economic development in the post‐recessionary economic era, but this is problematic, especially in the creative industries. Recommendations for development based on these models and practices are proposed for educators and policy‐makers.

The article connects action learning with theories of new venture creation and entrepreneurial learning. It develops critical insights and proposes conceptual models of creative enterprise and “pull” learning in venture creation.

This study aims to investigate the feasibility of integrating the social, environmental and innovation processes within the four-perspective sustainability balanced scorecard (SBSC) model by determining the extent of linkages between and within the four SBSC perspectives.

A survey collected responses from senior management and middle management of large Australian companies.

The findings support several positive significant associations. Direct associations are found between value-creating processes within the internal process perspective. These results support the feasibility of integrating environmental, social and innovation-orientated value-creating process into the internal process of the four-perspective SBSC model. The results also provide evidence about the extent to which direct or indirect associations exist between the four SBSC perspectives: first, direct association of human capital (learning and growth perspective) with value-creating processes (internal processes perspective); second, direct association of value-creating (internal processes perspective) with customer value (customer perspective); and third, direct and indirect associations of value-creating (internal processes perspective) with financial performance (FP; financial perspective).

Several limitations are acknowledged related to cross-sectional data, senior and middle managers’ perceptions and assumptions underpinning structural equation modelling.

The implications for practice from this study concern how organisational management should relate to their stakeholders while providing value in their FP.

These associations reflect the influence of stakeholders’ recognised needs on process and product innovation. These needs highlight the benefits of focusing on future-orientated environmental budgets and ongoing employee training that lead to customer value and FP.

This is an initial in-depth study of a four-perspective SBSC model that provides an effective means of integrating social, environmental and innovation processes within the traditional four SBSC perspectives.

The servitization of manufacturing is a diverse and complex field of research interest. The purpose of this paper is to provide an integrative and organising lens for viewing the various contributions to knowledge production from those research communities addressing servitization. To achieve this, the paper aims to set out to address two principal questions, namely where are the knowledge stocks and flows amongst the research communities? And what are generic research concerns being addressed by these communities?

Using an evidenced-based approach, the authors have performed a systematic review of the research literature associated with the servitization of manufacturing. This investigation incorporates a descriptive and thematic analysis of 148 academic and scholarly papers from 103 different lead authors in 68 international peer-reviewed journals.

The work proposes support for the existence of distinct researcher communities, namely services marketing, service management, operations management, product-service systems and service science management and engineering, which are contributing to knowledge production in the servitization of manufacturing. Knowledge stocks within all communities associated with research in the servitization of manufacturing have dramatically increased since the mid-1990s. The trends clearly reveal that the operations community is in receipt of the majority of citations relating to the servitization of manufacturing. In terms of knowledge flows, it is apparent that the more mature communities are drawing on more locally produced knowledge stocks, whereas the emergent communities are drawing on a knowledge base more evenly distributed across all the communities. The results are indicative of varying degrees of interdependency amongst the communities. The generic research concerns being addressed within the communities are associated with the concepts of product-service differentiation, competitive strategy, customer value, customer relationships and product-service configuration.

This research has further developed and articulated the identities of distinct researcher communities actively contributing to knowledge production in the servitization of manufacturing, and to what extent they are pursuing common research agendas. This study provides an improved descriptive and thematic awareness of the resulting body of knowledge, allowing the field of servitization to progress in a more informed and multidisciplinary fashion.

Explores how entrepreneurial capability and identity are learned in the creative and media industries. This sector is of growing social and economic importance, and the majority of its employment and commercial activity takes place within small businesses. However, entrepreneurship in the creative industries and the related development of entrepreneurial skills are not well understood, and “mainstream” approaches cannot be assumed to be effective, therefore the development of a learning model is potentially valuable. Proposes a conceptual framework of entrepreneurial learning in the creative and media sector, based on a social learning perspective. This highlights the processes of entrepreneurial learning and identity formation, and features a triadic model with three major themes. Proposes a group of related sub‐themes and provides a set of reflective questions to assist in practical application of the model by educationalists, students and emerging entrepreneurs. Outlines the potential applications of the model in education and entrepreneurship development within and beyond the creative industries.

Perceptions drawn from the construction management research (CMR) community regarding research impact (RI) and its relationship to theory generation (TG) are examined. Investigative emphasis is on RI and TG enablers and challenges (within an academic context). The paper aims to discuss these issues.

Qualitative narrative data accrued from open-ended questions within a structured questionnaire survey are analysed using frequency, quantitative content analysis, and graphical methods. A model of the RI/TG interface is presented and discussed.

Principal RI enablers are “facilitation” (industry engagement, time); while principal constraints include “internal factors” (the academic, the university) and “external factors” (collaboration, funding). Respective TG enablers are “resources” (competence, time, funding) and corresponding challenges include “external factors” (market forces, compliance). RI is considered a minor challenge to TG.

The study adds empirical evidence to the ongoing RI debate within the UK generally and with regard to the CMR discipline more specifically.

RI research is relatively sparse, while the findings in regard to CMR are entirely novel.

Family businesses do not perpetuate themselves. Entrepreneurs must nurture and propagate the values that led to the creation of the very thing most precious to them‐their business.This of course depends on stability. Nor do these cherished values propagate themselves. To be made meaningful for others, and for future generations, family experiences, values, and achievements must be communicated to others via language, narrative and storytelling, or other forms embedded in the narrative such as symbols. Often a variety of different socially constructed stories may be necessary contingent upon situation, purpose, or need.