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In addition to business stresses, small business owners (SBOs) face moral conflict and moral identity challenges when providing services during a crisis, such as a natural disaster, war or global health issues. This netnography study explores SBOs as they leverage online service communities to modify practices, sustain services and manage the resulting moral conflict.

We employ a netnographic approach, including engagement with a global forum, online surveys and interviews. Data were collected from virtual reality photographers working in residential real estate at the height of the pandemic crisis.

The netnographic data reveal that the crisis threatened their businesses and caused these SBOs to question whether their services were essential or merely capitalizing on the crisis, creating moral tension and role conflict. We find that online service communities offer a social alliance and verification that can promote a co-creative process, leading to creative business practices. Additionally, the community interactions inspire SBOs to adopt a moral identity, which assists in bringing normalcy to the delivery of their service while keeping others safe.

This study utilized netnography innovatively, including incorporating open-ended surveys and broad-reaching member checks. This yielded insights during a time-bound crisis context within an online service community. Additionally, using social identity and organizational identity theories, we introduce the concept of SBO identity and investigate the owners’ journey through early crisis management.

Conceptual and empirical research over the past 20 years has moved the social media (SM) literature beyond the embryotic stage to a well-developed academic discipline. As the lead article in the special issue in the Journal of Research in Interactive Marketing on Cutting-Edge Research in Social Media and Interactive Marketing, this review and agenda article has two key goals: (1) to review key SM and interactive marketing research over the past three years and (2) to identify the next wave of high priority challenges and research opportunities.

Given the “cutting-edge” research focus of the special issue, this review and research agenda paper focused on articles published in 25 key marketing journals between January 2021 and March 2024. Initially, the search request was for articles with “social media, social selling, social commerce” located in the article title, author-selected key words and journal-selected keywords. Later, we conducted searches based on terminology from articles presented in the final review. In total, over 1,000 articles were reviewed across the 25 journals, plus additional ones that were cited in those journals that were not on the initial list.

Our review uncovered eight key content areas: (1) data sources, methodology and scale development; (2) emergent SM technologies; (3) artificial intelligence; (4) virtual reality; (5) sales and sales management; (6) consumer welfare; (7) influencer marketing; and (8) social commerce. Table I provides a summer of key articles and research findings for each of the content areas.

As a literature review and research agenda article, this paper is one of the most extensive to date on SM marketing, and particularly with regard to emergent research over the past three years. Recommendations for future research are integrated through the paper and summarized in Figure 2.

Consumer welfare is one of the eight emergent content areas uncovered in the literature review. Specific focus is on SM privacy, misinformation, mental health and misbehavior.

Drawing on experiential learning theory, this study seeks to understand how the perceived cultural difference in a foreign country and learning flexibility, which enables more integrated experiential learning from international experience, influence expatriates’ cultural intelligence (CQ) and consequently their adjustment and job performance.

Survey data were collected from 169 expatriates in China. Polynomial regression analyses were employed to test curvilinear relationships between cultural difference and CQ and between learning flexibility and CQ. Mediation hypotheses were tested either by the MEDCURVE procedure if a curvilinear relationship was confirmed or by the Haye’s Process procedure if a curvilinear relationship was not confirmed and instead a linear relationship was confirmed.

The results demonstrated a positive relationship between cultural difference and CQ and an inverted U-shape relationship between learning flexibility and CQ. CQ mediated the relationship between cultural difference and expatriate adjustment and partially mediated the relationship between learning flexibility and expatriate adjustment. CQ positively influenced expatriates’ job performance via expatriate adjustment.

Our findings suggest that companies should not hesitate to send expatriates on assignments to culturally very different countries and focus more attention on the selection of expatriates. The findings of this study suggest firms should choose candidates who are moderate or high in learning flexibility and could engage in integrated learning and specialized learning in a more balanced manner.

This research is the first study that examines the influence of learning flexibility on CQ and expatriate effectiveness. It examines cultural difference through the lens of experiential learning theory and argues that cultural difference constitutes “stimuli” in the experiential learning environment for individual learning in an international context. The results advance our knowledge of the role of experiential learning in developing capable global managers.

There is evidence of country-level contextual variations regarding the benefits of practical experience acquired by students during higher education. This paper, therefore, analyses the benefits of student internships in the Ghanaian context.

In Study 1, two structured but distinct surveys were distributed to senior members and students of six specialised technical education institutions (TIs). Study 2 involved in-depth interviews with the heads of organisations in the tertiary education sector, including trade groups, industries and government agencies.

Internship provides soft skills, confidence, career development, sense of responsibility, employability, income, knowledge sharing and networking for students/interns. For TIs, it contributes to the professional development of faculty supervisors and helps them to update the content they teach. For employers, it unveils talented and promising students who can be employed immediately after graduation at a relatively cheaper cost.

There is still the need for additional research in different contexts: both developed and developing economies to clear doubts on the controversies surrounding the relevance of internship in the 21st century.

TIs should continue to champion student internship programmes. This study highlights the need for employers to place internship students in areas that relate to their fields of study. It also underscores the need for students to embrace internship since it is the cornerstone to their employability in the labour market.

Undeniably, student internships provide a critical platform for career beginners.

This paper contributes to knowledge by offering contextual literature in Ghana on the benefits of student internship programme for interns/students, TIs and employers, all together.

We used a complementary mixed methods approach, grounded in situated expectancy-value theory, to explore the relationship between completing an internship and engineering undergraduate students’ preparedness and expectancy of success in obtaining their preferred first position after graduation. We disseminated a survey to institutions in the United States and received 1,583 responses; from this sample, we interviewed 62 students.

Internship experiences are considered among “high impact practices” in higher education. Despite calls to increase the quality and quantity of internships, little is known about relationships between internship participation and how prepared students feel for future work, specifically their first position after graduation.

Our findings showed that the students who participated in internships had positive perceptions of preparedness and expectancy of success compared to their peers. We found that participating in multiple internships was beneficial to these outcomes until a student participated in five internships. After five internships, our data did not show a correlation between increasing numbers of internship experiences and increased preparedness or expectancy of success.

While there are benefits to internship participation, after six experiences, additional internships are unlikely to increase confidence in job success and preparation. If that still is lacking, a different approach or conversation on career choice may be warranted.

Our findings are unique in identifying (1) the aspects of internships that increase perceptions of success, including tying theoretical concepts learned in the classroom to engineering practice and (2) the point at which further internships do not seem to offer further benefits.

This study is the maiden attempt to understand the influence of four specific sources of employee support (SES), on the life insurance agents’ retention (AR) with the mediation of felt obligation (FO) in the context of the life insurance industry.

This study adopted a quantitative methodology and used the partial least squares-structural equation modelling to test the hypotheses of the study. Using convenience sampling method and a web-based questionnaire, this study gathered data from agents (n 265) of life insurance companies located in the central region of Malaysia.

The results reveal a positive relationship between all SES and AR. This means when agents perceive higher levels of support from their supervisors, peers, technology and mentors, they are more likely to remain in the industry. Contrary to the expectations, FO does not mediate the relationship between SES and AR, indicating that SES directly influences AR without the involvement of FO.

This study is the first to explore how an integrated model of SES influences AR within the Malaysian life insurance industry. The model takes a comprehensive approach, incorporating various SES including the less studied perceived technological support in influencing AR through the framework of social exchange theory.

In line with the theory of planned behavior, this study aims to examine the mediating effect of cultural identity and role identity between relational capital and adaptive behavior, and the moderating effect of willingness to learn.

Data were collected from 241 Chinese expatriates in Latin America through a two-wave survey.

The findings indicate that expatriates’ perceived relational capital can promote adaptive behaviors by enhancing their cultural identity and role identity. Willingness to learn positively moderates the indirect effects of relational capital on adaptive behaviors through cultural identity and role identity. For expatriates with a high willingness to learn, the impact of relational capital on their adaptive behaviors through cultural identity and role identity is stronger.

This study extends empirical research on expatriate adaptation. Organizations should promote the accumulation of expatriates’ relational capital while they are working abroad. Meanwhile, willingness to learn should be considered as a criterion when selecting expatriates.

This paper aims to examine whether information technology (IT) managers’ virtual listening, as rated by their high-tech employees, affected turnover behaviour beyond a new constellation of variables, some of which have never been researched as antecedents of turnover behaviour, particularly during a pandemic or crisis. Namely, the main aim, among others, is to answer the research question: does IT employees’ perception of the quality of their supervisors’ virtual listening in the pandemic and crisis era, when employees and managers work remotely, will negatively affect turnover behaviour? If yes, in which constellation of antecedents the virtual listening effecting on turnover behaviour?

Logistic regression analysis was conducted to test the hypotheses via SPSS 26 and PROCESS (Model 6). The variance inflation factor was calculated to test multicollinearity. Interaction was tested using the Hayes and Preacher PROCESS macro model. The researchers also used the J-N technique test (Johnson–Neyman via process). The supplemental analysis used also PROCESS MACRO (IBM Corp., Armonk, NY, USA, 2023) Model 4 and Bootstrap test.

The findings show that perceptions of supervisors’ virtual listening quality as rated by their employees moderated the relationship between organisational deviance as a type of organisational misbehaviour (OMB) and turnover behaviour and had the strongest effect on turnover behaviour beyond other key predictors (organisational deviance as a type of misbehaviour, turnover intention, job satisfaction, embeddedness and alternatives in the labour market). Alternatives to current work moderated the association between the perception of managers’ virtual listening behaviour as rated by their employees and turnover behaviour. Specifically, when alternatives in the labour market were high or medium, the perceived quality of managers’ virtual listening reduced turnover behaviour. Finally, the perception of the IT employees supervisors’ virtual listening moderated the relationship between organisational deviance and turnover intention among high-tech employees.

Evaluating supervisor listening in the high-tech firm may have value in terms of its relationship to outcomes such as retaining employees, turnover intention and especially turnover behaviour. The effect on turnover behaviour and of that new constellation of antecedents on turnover behaviour when people work remotely was not researched yet and important for the post COVID-19 era. Additionally, in contrast to most studies of turnover, this study also focus on the positive aspects of turnover and especially turnover behaviour to organisations in general and especially to high-tech firm and not just the negative aspect as was researched until now. Another contribution is the finding that when employees perceived their managers’ virtual listening quality as high, the effect of deviance as a type of OMB on turnover behaviour was positive. Namely, the listening as a moderator and turnover assisted in making the organisation cleaner from inappropriate behaviour. Additionally, when alternatives in the labour market are high or medium, perceived quality of virtual listening of managers as rated by their employees can reduce turnover behaviour. This virtual listening–turnover relationship and the moderator of alternatives to current work had not previously been found in the turnover literature and this is also significant a contribution to the turnover and withdrawal literature.

The research paper aims to analyse the scholarly literature on advancing HR analytics as an intervention for attrition, a problem that lingers on organisational performance. This study aspires to provide an in-depth literature review and critically assess the knowledge gaps in HR analytics and attritions within organisational performance.

The review analyses the corpus of 196 research articles published in ostensible journals between 2011 and 2023. To identify research gaps and provide valuable insights, this study synthesises relevant studies using School of thought (S), Context (C), Methodology (M), Triggers (T), Barriers (B), Facilitators (F) and Outcomes (O) (SCM-TBFO framework). This study employs the R programming language to conduct a systematic literature review in accordance with the “preferred reporting items for systematic reviews and meta-analysis” (PRISMA) guidelines.

The emerging discipline of HR analytics encompasses the potential to manage attrition and drive organisational performance enhancements effectively. The study of SCM-TBFO encompasses a multidimensional approach, incorporating diverse perspectives and analysing its complex aspects compared to various approaches. The School of thought includes the human capital theory, expectancy theory and resource-based view. The varied research contexts entail the USA, United Kingdom, China, France, Italy and India. Further, the methodologies adopted in the studies are artificial neural networking (ANN), regression, structure equation modelling (SEM) case studies and other theoretical studies. HR analytics and attrition triggers are data mining decision systems, forecasting for firm performance and employee satisfaction. The barriers include leadership styles, cultural adaptability and lack of analytic skills, data security and organisational orientation. The facilitators were categorised into data and technology-related facilitators, human resource policies and organisational growth and performance-related facilitators. The study's primary outcomes are technology adoption, effective HR policies, HR strategies, employee satisfaction, career and organisational expansion and growth.

The primary goal of the literature review is to provide a comprehensive overview of the current state of HR analytics and its impact on organisational performance, particularly in relation to attrition. Further, the study suggests that attrition, a critical organisational concern, can be effectively managed by strategically utilising HR analytics and empowering data-driven interventions that optimise performance and enhance overall organisational outcomes.

This study explores the concept of “workplace survivor syndrome” (WSS) using bibliometric analysis and literature review, thereby identifying the avenues for future research in business management.

The study adopted a methodological combination of bibliometric analysis and literature review. The methodological order is as follows: using the Scopus database and identifying 118 articles from ABDC listed journals, performance analysis by VOS viewer (citation analysis), science mapping analysis by Biblioshiny (visualisation and graphical presentation), and finally, the content analysis of the best 40 articles with a minimum of 50 citations and without any year restriction.

The bibliometric analysis reveals the most influential authors, articles, journals, countries, publication trends, impactful articles, and impactful authors of workplace survivor syndrome research, along with popular keywords used in this area. The content analysis identified three themes: emotional, cognitive, and behavioural syndrome. The content analysis reported the central mechanism adopted in 40 articles, including theories, methodologies, variables, sample size, etc. Additionally, the study explored the positive reviews on WSS.

The study considered only the articles from the ABDC journal quality list for the review.

The article is persuasively the first research to provide the intellectual structure and comprehensive bibliometric analysis of workplace survivor syndrome.