Sattar Khan, Naimat Ullah Khan and Yasir Kamal
This paper aims to examine the role of corporate governance (CG) in the earnings management (EM) of affiliated companies in family business groups (FBGs) listed on the Pakistan…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to examine the role of corporate governance (CG) in the earnings management (EM) of affiliated companies in family business groups (FBGs) listed on the Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX), using principal–principal agency theory.
Design/methodology/approach
The sample of 327 nonfinancial firms of the PSX, consisting of 187 group-affiliated firms and 140 nonaffiliated firms has been used in this study for the period of 2010 to 2019. The study uses different regression models for analysis, with robustness tests of various alternative measures of EM and FBG affiliation. In addition, endogeneity is controlled with the propensity score matching method.
Findings
The findings show that EM is less prevalent in affiliated firms compared to nonaffiliated companies. The results show a negative and significant relationship between FBGs affiliated firms and EM. Moreover, the results also show a positive relationship between EM and the interaction term of the CG index and group affiliation. It refers to the fact that effective governance cannot reduce EM in affiliated companies of FBGs as well as in the nonfinancial companies of the PSX. In addition, the quality of CG is higher in affiliated companies compared to its counterpart in nonaffiliated firms. The findings support the principal–principal agency theory that CG cannot mitigate the expropriating behavior of controlling shareholders against minority shareholders by reducing EM in emerging markets due to the ownership concentration phenomenon.
Research limitations/implications
This research study has implications for small investors, government agencies and regulators. The findings of the study show that CG code should make it mandatory for companies to reveal information about their complex ownership structure and ownership information about affiliated companies and directors. Furthermore, it is suggested to revisit the code of CG in the Pakistani context of principal–principal conflict instead of the agent–principal explanation of agency theory based on Anglo–Saxon countries.
Originality/value
This research study has contributed to the CG and FBG literature in relation to EM in idiosyncratic settings of Pakistan. One of the prime contributions of the paper is the development of a comprehensive CG index. This research study used detailed, manually collected novel data on affiliated firms of FBGs in Pakistan.
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This paper aims to investigate the impact of the revised Code of Corporate Governance 2017 (CCG-2017) clauses pertaining to board independence, mandatory inclusion of female…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to investigate the impact of the revised Code of Corporate Governance 2017 (CCG-2017) clauses pertaining to board independence, mandatory inclusion of female directors, audit committee (AC) chair independence and directors’ expertise on earnings manipulation.
Design/methodology/approach
Using an unbalanced panel of 323 listed companies from 2015 to 2019, this study uses panel data regression models with a robust methodology called difference-in-differences to tackle the potential endogeneity.
Findings
This study’s findings show that, as compared to the pre-CCG-2017 period, board- and AC-related variables increased significantly in the post-CCG-2017 period. Furthermore, financial experts on the board and board independence have a negative effect on discretionary accruals (DAs), whereas female directors and DAs are positively related, as is real activity manipulation. The AC-related variables, such as AC independence, expertise in AC, and AC chair independence, are significantly different from the preperiod to the postperiod, whereas their relationship is not according to the hypotheses of the study. Moreover, these results are robust to additional analysis of the alternative proxies for female directorship and the endogeneity problem.
Practical implications
The findings of this study have implications for regulators and practitioners who are concerned with the functions of the board of directors (BOD). The findings of this research study show that earnings management (EM) may be reduced by independent and expert directors. However, board gender diversity is not reducing the EM. Therefore, the decision to appoint female directors to the board should be based on their business and professional attributes rather than simply filling quotas or blindly adhering to regulations. Moreover, the findings of this research may assist the regulator in encouraging listed firms to enhance board governance via independence, diversity and competency, which are useful for effective monitoring.
Originality/value
This study fills a gap in the literature by providing the first evidence of country-specific regulation (CCG-2017), concerning the BOD and AC-related clauses on EM in Pakistan, which is missing in the relevant literature general and in Pakistan in particular.
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Lorna de Witt, Kathryn A. Pfaff, Roger Reka and Noeman Ahmad Mirza
Current and predicted continued dramatic increases in international migration and ethnocultural diversity of older adult cohorts pose challenges for health care services. Review…
Abstract
Purpose
Current and predicted continued dramatic increases in international migration and ethnocultural diversity of older adult cohorts pose challenges for health care services. Review studies on ethnoculturally diverse older adults and health care show a lack of focus on their service use experiences. This study aims to report a meta-ethnography that addresses this knowledge gap through answering the review question: How do ethnoculturally diverse older adults who are immigrants experience health careservices?
Design/methodology/approach
The authors applied a seven-phase method of meta-ethnography to guide the review. The authors conducted two literature searches (April 2018 and June 2020) in MEDLINE, CINAHL, Embase, Sociological Abstracts and Abstracts in Social Gerontology that yielded 17 papers eligible for review.
Findings
“There’s always something positive and something negative” is the overarching metaphor for answering the review question. Findings highlight positive and negative tensions within ethnoculturally diverse older adults’ health care use experiences of understanding and being understood, having trust in providers and the health care system, having needs, preferences and resources met and desire for self-care over dependency. The majority of experiences were negative. Tipping points towards negative experiences included language, fear, provider attitudes and behaviours, service flexibility, attitudes towards Western and traditional health care and having knowledge and resources.
Originality/value
The authors propose concrete actions to mitigate the tipping points. The authors discuss policy recommendations for health care system changes at the micro, meso and macro service levels to promote positive experiences and address mainstream service policy inequities.
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Shazia Aman Jatoi, Sobia Shafaq Shah, Abdul Sattar Shah and Sajjad Hyder Channar
The purpose of this research is to examine the relationship between high- performance work systems (HPWS) and organisational innovation in hospital settings, examining the role of…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this research is to examine the relationship between high- performance work systems (HPWS) and organisational innovation in hospital settings, examining the role of employee engagement as a mediator in this relationship. Additionally, the study aims to investigate the moderating role of perspective-taking between HPWS and employee engagement as well as the moderating effect of trust in leader on the connection between employee engagement and organisational innovation.
Design/methodology/approach
A quantitative-deductive causal method, along with a cross-sectional approach, was utilized. Structural equation modelling was applied to analyse data from a sample of 530 doctors employed in hospitals, practicing human resources management in the public and private sectors of Sindh province, Pakistan.
Findings
The findings show positive effects of HPWS on employee engagement and organisational innovation. Additionally, employee’s engagement partially mediates the relationship between HPWS and organisational innovation, while the moderating role of perspective-taking significantly influences the link between HPWS and employee engagement.
Originality/value
While HPWS are recognized for enhancing organisational innovation, this study confirms their positive effects on individual and organisational outcomes, particularly within the healthcare sector in Pakistan. This study suggests that when HPWS are effectively perceived and implemented, these integrated practices can be beneficial for both employees and organizations, even in challenging situations.
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Nabeel Nisar, Ali Raza, Pashmina Nisar Pathan, Muhammad Muzamil Sattar and Ubedullah Memon
This investigation is based on the rich experiences of alumni from a reputable public higher education institution (HEI) in Pakistan. Its primary goal is to assess and investigate…
Abstract
Purpose
This investigation is based on the rich experiences of alumni from a reputable public higher education institution (HEI) in Pakistan. Its primary goal is to assess and investigate the relationship between the institution’s long-term sustainability strategies and alumni impressions. The inquiry aligns with the global changing landscape of HEIs, which demands more robust and marketing-driven strategies to achieve long-term sustainability through engaging various stakeholders.
Design/methodology/approach
The study employs a phenomenological research design to offer fresh insights into the effectiveness of alumni engagement practices. This research uses semi-structured interviews with nine alumni to contribute an interesting and important narrative regarding alumni’s experiences with engagement strategies.
Findings
The findings show that alumni strongly desire to maintain contact with their institution and support in various ways, thus signifying the importance of alumni engagement. In the broader context, alumni engagement can support HEIs to avoid the risks of losing education standards in financially strict times and achieve sustainable development.
Practical implications
By actively involving alumni, HEIs in Pakistan can support their sustainable development, strengthen their financial position, raise educational standards, access resources and more. This research provides a way for Public HEIs to attract external support to address the growing institution’s sustainability concerns and avoid the risk of deteriorating education.
Originality/value
The present research extends to the existing body of knowledge regarding Pakistan’s developing economy, while earlier studies have primarily concentrated on alumni studies from developed nations. The study has theoretically expanded the use of the stimulus-organism-response framework and introduced several new constructs not examined or utilized in earlier alumni studies.
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Muhammad Bilal Zafar and Mohd Fauzi Abu-Hussin
This study aims to dissect and understand the latent themes of Islamic work ethic (IWE) and explore the driving factors of IWE research.
Abstract
Purpose
This study aims to dissect and understand the latent themes of Islamic work ethic (IWE) and explore the driving factors of IWE research.
Design/methodology/approach
Structural topic modeling (STM), a sophisticated machine learning technique, was used to analyze a corpus of 205 articles sourced from the Scopus database. These articles cover the 36 years of research on IWE, from 1988 to 2024. Moreover, negative binomial regression was applied to examine the driving factors of IWE research.
Findings
The STM analysis unfolds ten topics in conjunction with IWE including individual success, workplace dynamics, organizational work ethics, knowledge management, employee citizenship behavior, financial ethics, job satisfaction, organizational commitment, performance enhancement and leadership. The further STM outputs included word clouds, prevalence proportions, correlation matrix, heatmap, relationship of topics with metadata, topic prominence in the publishing journals and, finally, illustrating trends and future prospects of research on IWE. The results of negative binomial regression reveal that number of authors, article age, journal indexing, authors from multiple countries and number of references are strong drivers of fostering research in IWE, by having significant positive impacts on total citations.
Social implications
The insights from this study provide valuable guidance for businesses and organizations looking to integrate IWE principles into their operations. By promoting values such as fairness, hard work and ethical behavior, organizations can foster a more inclusive and morally grounded workplace culture. This, in turn, may lead to enhanced employee satisfaction, greater organizational commitment and improved overall performance. Additionally, the emphasis on ethical practices can contribute to broader societal benefits, such as increased trust in business practices and a stronger alignment with social responsibility initiatives.
Originality/value
This is a unique study that explores the latent themes and characteristics of the IWE literature through STM and provides insights on the future research directions. In addition, this study also examines the driving factors of IWE research.
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This study aims to empirically test the influence of board member gender on insolvency risk in a two-tier system.
Abstract
Purpose
This study aims to empirically test the influence of board member gender on insolvency risk in a two-tier system.
Design/methodology/approach
This study considers 91 banks operating in Indonesia from 2009 to 2021. It uses a two-step system generalized moment method to analyze the data.
Findings
This study reports that appointing women to the board of commissioners and as directors reduces the insolvency risk. Women’s role in reducing risk is more effective in listed and private-owned banks (POB) than in others.
Practical implications
The presence of women in boardrooms is crucial for improving financial performance and reducing financial distress in banks, particularly listed and POB. The findings of this study are expected to provide insights into board selection and appointment.
Originality/value
The extant literature on the impact of appointing women to boards on bank risk lacks a consensus because of differences in proxies in measuring gender diversity (GD). This paper conducts scenarios using four GD proxies, namely, dummy, percentage of women, Blau index and Shannon index, and two insolvency risk proxies.
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Muhammad Imran, Abdul Sattar and Md Shabbir Alam
Economic ties and formation of trade blocks escalates the movement of goods among the participants and bring different economic and structural changes. Therefore, the current…
Abstract
Purpose
Economic ties and formation of trade blocks escalates the movement of goods among the participants and bring different economic and structural changes. Therefore, the current research emphasises on the distribution of market structure and industrial value added among the participant countries of China–Pakistan economic corridor project while focussing on pre and post FTA status.
Design/methodology/approach
This study utilises the footloose capital model for analysing whether China or Pakistan is more suitable for attracting factors of production to increase their share of industrial value added. For econometric analyses the current research utilises data from 1995 to 2018 and maximum likelihood effect method to assess factors that affect regional value-added distribution.
Findings
Results show that both countries owe different level of economic developments. Effect of capital is, comparatively, similar for both countries while Pakistan supports trade openness which points towards the fact of positive utilisation of abundant labour resources in Pakistan by establishing industrial structure either through domestic capital formation or foreign investment. Whereas, share of labour and trade openness of China positively affect value added production of China.
Originality/value
This is one of the unique studies that studies the regional economic treaties usefulness for any developing country across Asia. Where this study uses the footloose capital model and maximum likelihood method for its analysis which is not previously done, while for detailed analyses the study further divides the timeframe into two parts as pre-FTA ranges from 1995 to 2006, post-FTA from 2007 to 2018 while overall results consist of whole-time frame.
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The purpose of this study is to investigate the impact of e-service quality and e-trust on customer e-satisfaction and, subsequently, on customer e-loyalty towards a website in…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this study is to investigate the impact of e-service quality and e-trust on customer e-satisfaction and, subsequently, on customer e-loyalty towards a website in the online shopping environment of Pakistan.
Design/methodology/approach
The research employed a quantitative approach and utilised structural equation modelling to investigate the relationship between e-service quality and e-trust on consumers’ e-satisfaction and e-loyalty. The data were collected from 250 individuals who actively use online shopping websites to purchase products in Pakistan.
Findings
The findings revealed that e-service quality and e-trust offered on e-commerce websites significantly impacted customer e-loyalty. However, it was found that both e-service quality and e-trust do not have a significant impact on customer e-satisfaction. In addition, the findings showed that customer e-satisfaction positively impacts e-loyalty.
Research limitations/implications
Overall, these findings emphasise the importance of e-service quality, e-trust and customer e-satisfaction and their role in cultivating customer loyalty within the context of the online shopping environment in Pakistan.
Originality/value
This study contributes to the existing literature on online shopping in Pakistan by exploring the factors influencing consumer behaviour in this context. The findings add to the academic understanding of consumer behaviour and provide valuable insights for e-commerce businesses in Pakistan.
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Mukaram Ali Khan, Rimsha Ashfaq Butt, Saba Nawab and Syed Sohaib Zubair
This study intends to explore the influence of emotional intelligence on employee self-efficacy in Pakistan's telecom industry. Besides, it explores the mediating effect of…
Abstract
Purpose
This study intends to explore the influence of emotional intelligence on employee self-efficacy in Pakistan's telecom industry. Besides, it explores the mediating effect of emotional labor (surface acting and deep acting) between them. This study also tests the relationship between emotional labor (surface acting and deep acting) and self-efficacy in the customer care of Pakistan's telecom division.
Design/methodology/approach
The study leads forward with a positivist approach to obtain data in two different waves as a time lag study from the big five telecom companies operating in Pakistan. The data was collected from 270 employees working in Customer Services in the Telecom sector.
Findings
The results reveal that there exists a positive relationship between emotional intelligence and self-efficacy in customer care employees in Pakistan's telecommunication division sector. Moreover, emotional labor (deep acting) partially mediates the relationship between emotional intelligence and self-efficacy, and surface acting could not mediate the relationship among the employees of customer care in Pakistan's telecom division.
Originality/value
Management of emotions at the workplace has been an immensely vital area in managing the performance of employees, especially in customer-centric jobs, where dealing with customers is the prime focus and achieving customer satisfaction is the utmost outcome. There is limited evidence of the relationship between emotional intelligence and self-efficacy specifically in the customer care of the Telecom sector.