States that highly structured methods and tools for bringing about organizational change are frequent features in both the management literature and the practice of management consultants. Reports that, in order to understand the nature and popularity of these methods and tools, a study of the availability and use of methods in business process re‐engineering (BPR) projects was carried out in five large consulting companies. Identifies six functions of methods on the basis of this study. Finds that methods play important roles both in the consulting organization and in the consultant’s interaction with the client in the specific change project. Also reveals that common to the identified functions is an ability to store and transfer knowledge, which contributes to the change process interface for clients and consultants. Shows also that consulting companies with very different professional backgrounds have very similar approaches to BPR projects. Identifies and comments on the similarities between these companies’ methods in respect of managing change.

We present the complete family of space-times with a non-expanding, shear-free, twist-free, geodesic principal null congruence (Kundt waves) that are of algebraic type III and for which the cosmological constant (Λ c ) is non-zero. The possible presence of an aligned pure radiation field is also assumed. These space-times generalise the known vacuum solutions of type N with arbitrary Λ c and type III with Λ c = 0. It is shown that there are two, one and three distinct classes of solutions when Λ c is respectively zero, positive and negative. The wave surfaces are plane, spherical or hyperboloidal in Minkowski, de Sitter or antide Sitter backgrounds respectively, and the structure of the family of wave surfaces in the background space-time is described. The weak singularities which occur in these space-times are interpreted in terms of envelopes of the wave surfaces. *

The Robinson-Trautman type N solutions, which describe expanding gravitational waves, are investigated for all possible values of the cosmological constant Λ and the curvature parameter ǫ. The wave surfaces are always (hemi-)spherical, with successive surfaces displaced in a way which depends on ǫ. Explicit sandwich waves of this class are studied in Minkowski, de Sitter or anti-de Sitter backgrounds. A particular family of such solutions which can be used to represent snapping or decaying cosmic strings is considered in detail, and its singularity and global structure is presented.

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Current developments in the sociotechnical framework address a number of vital issues that failed to occupy the high ground in its formative years. These include: (i) the purpose of the systems, to create customer value under social and resource constraints, (ii) the context or external business environment, and (iii) the dynamics of the sociotechnical system. Due attention to the dominant issues of purpose, context, and their dynamics make it more meaningful to speak of sociotechnical business systems (STBS) and organizational learning instead of sociotechnical systems (STS) and individual learning. In STBS each unit in an organization has business responsibilities and goal-based couplings with its environment and focuses on the creation of customer value. The implications of this shift from STS to STBS are discussed and illustrated with current research and two summary case studies.