Editorial

A theme in this issue is responsiveness – to individuals,organisational needs, societal requirements and the global context.

John Allpress kicks off the edition with a piece on coaching footballers. His article “Managing mistakes to the players’ advantage” indicates some important lessons for all coaches. Coaching came into the organizational world from sport but many people misunderstand the real role of sports coaching. Having worked with John I can assure readers that he is a pioneer in taking sports coaching forward in a way that is more responsive both to the needs of players and of their teams.

David McCleary picks up the coaching theme in his article “Executive coach certification and selection”. He has some choice words to say about the downside of certification. His case warrants attention.

Rocky Dwyer’s piece on “Adventure education – a new way to confront reality!” makes important points about the need for active learning and for the role of peers. This is a dimension picked up in Anne Davies’article “Management development through self managed learning”. She presents a solid case of real responsiveness to individual and organisational needs.

The last authored article, by Tuomo Takala, shows the need to go beyond narrow competence-based approaches when considering leadership development. Responsiveness to moral and ethical issues becomes a real need when considering charismatic leadership, as the article demonstrates.

The four review articles can all be seen to discuss responsiveness in different modes. “New knowledge sources” shows how institutions such as universities need to change, whereas “Learning the A B C of brainpower”focuses more at the individual level. “Carry on caring” provides a case from the National Health Service in the UK and finally “Training’s radical agenda” discusses issues at a more global level.

Ian CunninghamUniversity of Sussex. e-mail:ian@stratdevint.com