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Companies seek to increase the percentage of acquisitions in different parts of the world by expanding operations. Many companies are adopting strategic mergers to expand their influence. However, most strategic change programs fail to achieve their objectives. This study aims to investigate employees’ reactions after strategic mergers through the mediating role of the employees’ psychological context. It was necessary to identify the most prominent postmerger employees’ behaviors. The study addressed this gap by investigating the outcomes of strategic mergers.

Data for this study were collected from 30 family businesses. Accordingly, 341 questionnaires were collected with an overall response rate of 64%. The structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) approach and the nonlinear relationships approach were adopted by implementing artificial neural network (ANN) analysis.

The results confirm that there is a clear impact of strategic mergers on employees’ postmerger behavior because of the change at the hierarchical level and the process of distributing roles. Employees’ psychological context (individual incentives, anxiety and individual mobbing) mediates the relationship between strategic mergers and postmerger employees’ behavior. In addition, individual incentives are considered the main contributor to retaining or not retaining employees in family businesses after strategic merger.

Policymakers in organizations must pay attention to employees’ possible reactions to the internal and external policies of the organization by increasing individual incentives and reducing individual mobbing toward strategic merger. This study has theoretical implications that are critical guidelines for academics in mitigating the negative consequences for employees’ postmerger behavior. This study captured linear and nonlinear relationships to discover the determinants and antecedents of a strategic merger in family businesses. However, future studies should focus on using more robust statistical methods by adopting decision-making methods to determine the best and worst companies in terms of adopting strategic mergers.

The scarcity of literature on the most important determinants of postmerger employees’ behavior is considered an encouragement to conduct the current study. To this end, this study enriches the ongoing and future literature by examining the most important factors influencing the strategic merger of family businesses. Family businesses have changed the economic landscape of many countries. The investigation of the strategic merger of these companies is considered a worthy matter of study to improve the nation’s economy.

This study investigates the reasons behind the very high net interest margins in the Greek banking industry compared to the euro-area, focussing on the association between bank competition and recapitalisations.

The author conducts a dynamic panel analysis covering the period from the early 2000s to 2021, that controls for possible endogeneity and treats for heterogeneity. The author also employs local projections impulse response functions that control for structural changes in Greek banking.

The author finds that low bank competition has contributed to high net interest margins in Greece. Interestingly, the impact of recapitalisations conditional to low bank competition has had a significant further impact on increasing net interest margins, which is a noteworthy case due to several Greek bank recapitalisations in the last ten years. The author’s findings are supported by local projections impulse response functions.

To mitigate distortions in bank competition, the author argues to accelerate steps toward the direction of the banking union and a common bank regulation framework in the euro-area.

This chapter explores how perceived product innovation influences brand loyalty among UK Apple users, extending the technology acceptance model. Using a quantitative approach, data were collected from 101 respondents via an online survey and analysed using SPSS. Objectives included examining the mediating role of perceived product usefulness and ease of use, exploring the relationship between product/brand attitudes and brand loyalty and assessing gender's impact on loyalty perceptions. Findings reveal a significant positive relationship among variables, with perceived product usefulness and ease of use jointly mediating the link between product innovation and attitude, affecting brand loyalty. Gender was found to have no moderating effect. The research contributes by highlighting these mediating effects and deepening understanding of product innovation's impact on loyalty. Managerially, prioritising innovation, usefulness and ease of use can enhance satisfaction and loyalty. Future research could explore additional variables to enrich understanding further.

This study is one of the premier ones that is written to highlight the significance of corporate governance for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). The purpose of writing this chapter is to increase knowledge and understanding of SMEs and their management. Thus, the scope of this study is much broader as compared to the previous studies. Other than scope, this chapter also bridges the research gaps and tries to relate literature with shortcomings and relatively unexplored areas associated with SMEs and their governance. For these reasons elements, claims, reasons and pieces of evidence were collected from diverse literature and presented in a scholarly way to address readers' interest and provide scope for further studies and research. Overall, this chapter is a form of descriptive study which his purposively conducted to induce more research work on corporate governance practices and their significance for SMEs.

The detrimental effects of increased workloads and high-stakes accountability that impact on teachers’ job satisfaction and wellbeing have been well documented in the international literature (Holloway et al., 2017; Perryman et al., 2011). This chapter will explore the factors which influence staff mental health and wellbeing in schools. The authors unpack issues of burnout, job satisfaction and teacher attrition. The authors consider the concept of teacher resilience by situating resilience within a socio-ecological framework. Specifically, the authors draw on Greenfield’s (2015) model of teacher resilience. The authors draw on our own research to explore the relationship between staff wellbeing and student wellbeing (Glazzard & Rose, 2020). In addition, the authors consider the specific issues related to the wellbeing of school leaders.

This paper aims to explore the psychological, emotional and equity implications of compulsory acquisition, evaluate the adequacy of compensation in mitigating those consequences and assess the sustainability of cash compensation for future generations.

A case study approach was operationalised to investigate the experiences of 40 project-affected persons (PAPs) four years after a compulsory acquisition project in Ghana’s New Akrade-Mpakadan region for the construction of a railway line. These perspectives were analysed through descriptive statistics and thematic analyses using the NVivo software. Figures and a holistic framework were adopted to report the identified issues.

Overall, only 25% of PAPs received formal communication prior to the acquisition, and only 10.3% have been fully compensated four years later. Despite the acquiring body initiating the marking of properties and compensation assessment in 2019, no payments were made until 2021. This induced emotional responses of distress, loss, uncertainty, stress and sadness, which was further exacerbated by feelings of hopelessness because there was no platform to voice concerns or pursue arbitration. Although PAPs were only offered compensation in the form of single monetary payments, a third would have preferred re-settlement.

By exploring the emotional and psychological effects of compulsory land acquisition, the study adds a new dimension to understanding its consequences. This may spark more interest, debate and discourse amongst researchers and policymakers and lead to the creation or enhancement of existing policy and legal measures to address the needs of PAPs in compulsory acquisition projects in developing countries.

The financial consequences of eminent domain are well documented, but this study explored the psychological, emotional and equity implications of the practice under conditions of weak regulatory frameworks. The adequacy of single lump-sum compensations was also explored to highlight preferred alternatives to ensure fairness for generations unborn.

This paper aims to determine the impact of perceived virtuality on team dynamics and outcomes by adopting the Input-Mediators-Outcome (IMO) framework. Further, it also investigates the mediating role of team processes and emergent states.

The authors collected survey data from 315 individuals working in virtual teams (VTs) in the information technology sector in India using both offline and online questionnaires. They performed the analysis using Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modelling (PLS-SEM).

The authors investigated two sets of hypotheses – both direct and indirect (or mediation interactions). Results show that psychological empowerment and conflict management are significant in managing VTs. Also, perceived virtuality impacts team outcomes, i.e. perceived team performance, team satisfaction and subjective well-being.

The interplay between the behavioural team process (conflict management) and the emergent state (psychological empowerment) was examined. The study also helps broaden our understanding of the various psychological variables associated with teamwork in the context of VTs.

Findings from this study will aid in assessing the consequences of virtual teamwork at both individual and organisational levels, such as guiding the design and sustainability of VT arrangements, achieving higher productivity in VTs, and designing effective and interactive solutions in the virtual space.

The study examined the interplay between behavioural team processes (such as conflict management) and emergent states (such as psychological empowerment). The study also theorises and empirically tests the relationships between perceived virtuality and team outcomes (i.e. both affective and effectiveness). It may serve as a guide to understanding team dynamics in VTs better.

This exploratory study attempts to enhance the current understanding of the research and practice of VTs within a developing economy.

A significant increase in the number of private sector banks has intensified the level of competition in the Indian banking industry (IBI). This increase in the number of banks has a considerable impact on the existing players, which calls for prioritizing customer satisfaction (CS) and enhancing bank reputation (BR). Our study seeks to investigate the enablers of CS and BR in the IBI.

The study adopted a cross-sectional design for gathering responses from retail bank customers across the selected banks through a structured questionnaire. Structural equation modeling (SEM) was utilized to evaluate direct and indirect linkages among the identified constructs by examining mediating and moderating effects.

The study puts forward crucial antecedents of CS and BR. The findings exhibit that perceived trust (PT) and relationship commitment (RC) magnify CS and BR, respectively, while CS amplifies repurchase intention (RI). The study advances that BR and CS partially mediate between the underlying constructs. In addition, fairness and risk exhibit moderating effects between CS and customer repurchase intention (CRI) and BR and CRI.

The study illustrates the crucial enablers of BR, CS and CRI that may assist banking professionals in enriching customer experience and holding on to their customers.

There is a shortage of research on RC, service innovation (SI) and BR in the IBI. Accordingly, our study builds on the prior studies by considering these constructs using a comprehensive conceptual framework by extending the application of signaling theory (ST) in the banking domain and scrutinizing the dual moderating effects of fairness and risk.

The proliferation of lean principles in the construction industry is offset by the enduring uncertainty among industry stakeholders regarding their respective roles in lean implementation. This uncertainty is further compounded by the scarcity of empirical investigations in this area. Consequently, this study undertakes the task of bridging this knowledge gap by identifying the critical roles of lean learners and their indispensable contributions to achieving successful lean implementation.

A qualitative exploratory approach informed by an interpretivism perspective was adopted. The case study strategy was employed to gather data from three contracting organisations that had implemented lean practices. Empirical data was collected through in-depth semi-structured interviews with fifteen industry experts and complemented by document reviews. To analyse the data, a code-based content analysis approach was employed using NVivo software, while Power BI software was utilised to develop a comprehensive force-directed graph visualisation.

The research findings substantiated nine lean learners and unveiled a set of seventy-three roles associated with them. The force-directed graph facilitated the identification of lean learners and their connections to the emerged roles. Notably, the graph highlighted the pivotal role played by project managers and internal lean trainers in ensuring the success of lean implementation, surpassing the contributions of other lean learners.

The implications of findings extend to industry professionals seeking to establish a robust lean learning framework to expedite lean implementation within the construction sector. This study not only provides a comprehensive definition of lean learners’ roles but also transcends specific construction types, making it a significant catalyst for global impact.