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This study rigorously examines the complex interplay between entrepreneurial risk-taking and the achievement of sustainable development goals 1 and 2, which focus on eradicating poverty and hunger, respectively. By conducting a comprehensive review of existing literature and empirical data, the research aims to unravel the direct impact of risk-oriented entrepreneurial activities on poverty and hunger alleviation. Moreover, it seeks to investigate the moderating role of democratic governance in shaping these effects within the context of African economies.

By employing a Panel Smooth Transition Regression (PSTR) model and using annual and balanced panel data for 20 African countries over 21 years, we examine a potential regime switching as an original framework in the analysis of the curvilinear relationship between risk-driven entrepreneurial actions and sustainable development goals 1 and 2.

Our empirical results confirm the presence of a specific threshold above which risk-oriented entrepreneurial actions proactively tackle poverty and hunger issues. The results also show that entrepreneurship associated with a good level of democracy is the fair tradeoff toward eradicating extreme poverty and hunger by the 2030th United Nations (UN) deadline.

This study offers novel insights into the role of entrepreneurial risk-taking at the country level in achieving sustainable development goals 1 and 2. It advances research on entrepreneurship and sustainable development by demonstrating how a strong risk culture among entrepreneurs might make regions more developed while building on suitable institutional quality.

CityStudio is an adaptable, plug and play model that helps global cities create a permanent partnership with local higher education institutions (HEIs) for collaboration, projects, and mutual benefit. Since launching, CityStudio has seen well over 906 city staff working with 16,861 students on 3,578 projects, contributing well over 300,000 student hours to local civic priorities in three countries. CityStudio assists cities to identify and distribute priority needs to local HEI’s universities, providing increased capacity for cities and work-integrated learning opportunities for students on real-world projects in areas such as sustainability, equity, livability, and social justice. While projects directly support local strategic planning goals, they also align with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (UNSDGs). The dream of CityStudio is that students take a seat at the table of civic power, joining and helping the city with their needs and challenges for a better planet. But we find ourselves asking, will tomorrow be worse? Worse for democracy, worse for the environment, and worse for equity and choice? In our unique facilitator and translator position between large public institutions, across a growing network, we explore daily how to meet this moment meaningfully.

The purpose of this paper is to provide a critical historical analysis of the business (mis)behaviors and influencing factors that discourage enduring cooperation between principals and agents, to introduce strategies that embrace the social values, economic motivation and institutional designs historically adopted to curtail dishonest acts in international business and to inform an improved principal–agent theory that reflects principal–agent reciprocity as shaped by social, political, cultural, economic, strategic and ideological forces

The critical historical research method is used to analyze Chinese compradors and the foreign companies they served in pre-1949 China.

Business practitioners can extend orthodox principal–agent theory by scrutinizing the complex interactions between local agents and foreign companies. Instead of agents pursuing their economic interests exclusively, as posited by principal–agent theory, they also may pursue principal-shared interests (as suggested by stewardship theory) because of social norms and cultural values that can affect business-related choices and the social bonds built between principals and agents.

The behaviors of compradors and foreign companies in pre-1949 China suggest international business practices for shaping social bonds between principals and agents and foreign principals’ creative efforts to enhance shared interests with local agents.

Understanding principal–agent theory’s limitations can help international management scholars and practitioners mitigate transaction partners’ dishonest acts.

A critical historical analysis of intermediary businesspeople’s (mis)behavior in pre-1949 (1840–1949) China can inform the generalizability of principal–agent theory and contemporary business strategies for minimizing agents’ dishonest acts.

Although prior research has shown the influence of the degree of simplicity (versus complexity) in packaging design on consumer’s product and brand perceptions, no research to date has analyzed the effect of minimalist packaging on perceived product naturalness. This research thus aims to investigate the underlying mechanisms explaining how a minimalist food packaging design may lead consumers to perceive a product as more natural.

The paper is based on two pre-tests and two experiments (N = 152 and N = 220) focusing on food products. Serial–parallel mediations are performed to test the effect of minimalist packaging design on perceived product naturalness.

In a food consumption context, we demonstrate and replicate the positive impact of minimalism on perceived product uniqueness, which then positively influences both production mode and perceived taste, which, in turn, increases perceived product naturalness.

The findings provide new insights into the influence of food packaging design on consumers’ product perception. This paper offers a deeper understanding of the relationship between minimalist food packaging design and product naturalness by highlighting the mediating roles of perceived uniqueness, production mode and perceived taste.

In marketing and consumer research, the study of Indigenous ideas and rituals remains limited. The authors present an Indigenous-informed study of consumption rituals co-produced with members of the Shipibo–Konibo Indigenous group of the Peruvian Amazon. Specifically, the authors worked with the Comando Matico, a group of Shipibos from Pucallpa, Peru. This study aims to investigate how Indigenous spiritual beliefs shape health-related consumption rituals by focusing on the experience of the Shipibos and their response to COVID-19.

Drawing upon the principles of Indigenous research, the authors co-produced this study with the Comando Matico. The authors collaboratively discussed the research project’s design, analysed and interpreted data and co-authored this study with members of the Comando Matico. This study uses discourse analyses. The corpus of discourse is speech and text produced by the Comando Matico in webinars and online interviews during the COVID-19 pandemic. The full and active participation of the Comando Matico informed the discourse analysis by ensuring Indigenous knowledge, and worldviews were infused throughout the process.

The authors foreground how Indigenous spiritual beliefs act as a force that imbues the knowledge and practice of health, wellbeing and illness, and this process shapes the performance of rituals. In Indigenous contexts, multiple spirits coexist with consumers, who adhere to specific rituals to respond to and relate to these spirits. Indigenous consumption rituals involve the participation of non-human beings (called rao, ibo, yoshin and chaikoni by the Shipibos) and this aspect challenges the traditional notion of rituals and ritual elements in marketing.

The authors demonstrate how Indigenous spiritual beliefs shape consumption rituals in the context of health and draw attention to how the acknowledgement of alternative ontologies and epistemologies can help address dominant hierarchies of knowledge in marketing theory.

While some hydrogen (H₂) products are available in the industrial market, new clean H₂ applications are considered critical alternatives in decarbonization efforts. As suppliers need to understand how business customers conceive the value of hydrogen, this paper aims to investigate how the value of hydrogen is described in the published evidence and to identify or propose specific tools to assess its value.

An integrative literature review is developed to synthesize studies on the value of hydrogen to identify the main value categories. Then, the authors create a novel guideline by linking three value dimensions: 1) the product-oriented value (including sustainability), 2) the elements of B2B value and 3) the concept of goal-oriented value.

This paper categorizes the aspects of value discussed so far in the literature, suggesting conceptualizing the value of H₂ value-in-use based on economic, environmental, social and technological categories. The missing value categories from the marketing perspective are related to perceived value. A comprehensive guideline for assessing the value of H₂ for business customers was developed to address that gap. The guideline can evaluate hydrogen from a multicategory perspective and compare new hydrogen products with alternatives.

First, the authors present the value of hydrogen in the B2B marketing discussion. Second, the authors propose four hydrogen value categories based on the current state-of-the-art. Third, the authors developed the multicategory guideline for assessing the value of hydrogen products for business customers (VH₂-BC).

This study aims to explore the impact of engaging in serious leisure (SL) on the well-being (WB) and self-perceived employability (PE) of university students while also considering the role of career adaptability (CA) as a mediator.

A total of 905 domestic undergraduate students from China completed an online survey.

The findings reveal that participation in SL positively influences WB and PE. Additionally, the results indicate that CA mediates the SL-WB relationship but not the SL-PE relationship.

The theoretical contribution of this research comes from advancing our understanding of sustainable career theory through empirical testing of SL, PE, and CA on WB outcomes within a higher education setting. The practical implications of this study involve providing universities with strategies to support domestic Chinese undergraduate students in enhancing their WB and PE through active engagement in SL pursuits and the development of CA. Moreover, our findings serve as a foundation for future research investigating whether insights gained from domestic Chinese undergraduate students can provide solutions on a global scale to address the persistent challenges of improving student WB and PE.

This paper aims to ascertain the effects of stress in sales positions and the intention of employees to quit their jobs. The paper also places a distinct focus on unraveling the intricate mechanisms of organizational disidentification that underlie the connection between job stress and the intention to quit.

To secure results of high precision and reliability, this study employed a convenient sampling approach to gather data from sales personnel in the Delhi National Capital Region (NCR). A total of 329 samples were meticulously gathered and subjected to analysis through partial structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) using SMART PLS 4.0. This method enabled the relationships between the variables, yielding invaluable insights for our research.

The study's findings emphasize a clear connection between job stress and the inclination to quit. The data indicates that heightened job stress increases the likelihood of employees contemplating job departure. Notably, the study unveils organizational disidentification as a crucial factor in this association. Essentially, when employees feel disconnected from their organization, they are more prone to job stress and consider leaving. The takeaway is evident: employers must prioritize employee well-being, foster a positive work environment and thereby diminish job stress to retain their valuable workforce.

The research makes it evident that job stress is leading employees to withdraw from social interactions and, in some cases, quit their jobs. To address this issue, organizations can lower dissatisfaction by supporting stress management initiatives and promoting a healthy environment. The study underscores the significance of adopting strategies and practices that instill a sense of pride in employees for being part of the organization. This approach not only helps in retaining top talent but also cultivates a more positive work environment.

Uncovering the nuanced relationship between job stress and the intention to quit is the primary goal of this study. What sets this research apart is its capability to illuminate the existence of organizational disidentification arising from stress in sales jobs.

Construction education rarely addressed the importance of disseminating knowledge on infrastructure equity, thus impeding progress toward creating equitable and sustainable developments. This study aims to investigate the existing sustainability courses under the American Council for Construction Education (ACCE) accredited construction management (CM) programs to examine the integration of infrastructure equity topics and assess improvement in CM students’ knowledge and awareness to address this issue through an intervention.

To achieve these objectives, this research reviewed the sustainability course descriptions of the ACCE-accredited undergraduate and graduate CM curricula. Furthermore, the study implemented a workshop within a CM sustainability course that taught the students about the key concepts of infrastructure equity as well as how to address this issue by leveraging the Envision infrastructure rating system.

The course review results showed that most sustainability courses lack topics such as infrastructure equity and social sustainability. Moreover, the analysis of pre- and postworkshop surveys indicated that guided training could improve the students’ understanding as well as boost their confidence to address and mitigate infrastructure inequity issues.

The findings of the study are valuable for increasing awareness of infrastructure equity and facilitating the future construction workforce with the required expertise to develop equitable infrastructure systems.

This research was initiated by motivation from a real business problem that delves into lean management practices in dairy farm operations. It investigates how lean management practices can be applied as an improvement strategy in the dairy business to evaluate its impact on performance, where profitability is a decisive factor.

Based on the qualitative design, a 5-phase action research methodology was used in this study, where multiple data collection sources were used, including focus group discussions, on-site observation or Gemba walks and process mapping. The impact is evaluated by comparing the key performance measures with the same period before and after research.

The research revealed that lean management practices can significantly improve dairy business performance. It explained vital aspects of lean management practices and their sequence with examples of first-hand applications. It explained, how lean management practices were applied in dairy farm operations. Furthermore, the research resulted in significant benefits, in terms of quality, cost and profitability.

This research was conducted in a real business setting in the field environment, to improve dairy business performance. It was a distinctive application of lean management practices to solve a national problem. This could be used as a road map to bring continuous improvement at the national level to improve the performance of food value chains.

This research is unique because it addresses the methodological, population and empirical gaps in dairy farm operations. It adds value to the existing knowledge base by sharing best practices, developed and implemented for the first time to the best of our knowledge, like high-level process mapping and performance measures at different levels. Furthermore, the solutions can be simulated in related farm operations to bring breakthrough improvements in dairy business performance.