Search results

The growth of mental disorders and their costs represents a public health challenge. This study aims to explore how a social club can help mitigate its impact through arts and sports workshops.

Using the social return on investment (SROI) methodology, the impact of the social club is evaluated by identifying stakeholders and quantifying their contributions. In addition, the relationship between patients’ attendance and the reduction of relapses and medication consumption is explored.

The SROI showed a positive return on investment, €12.12 per euro invested. This ratio indicates that the social club generates social value well above its initial costs. On the other hand, two stakeholders were identified as higher impact generators, and it was confirmed that sports activities generate more social and economic impact than art activities – however, the positive effects of art activities last longer over time. The study revealed a positive relationship between social club attendance and relapse reduction. Almost 90% of the participating users reported no relapses or emergency hospitalizations during the past year of attendance. In addition, a substantial decrease in medication dosage was observed. These results suggest that social clubs help stabilize mental health and reduce the burden on health-care systems.

The case study highlights the vital role of social clubs in supporting people facing mental health issues. Policymakers and health-care providers can use this knowledge to invest in more effective and sustainable mental health support activities.

The purpose of the paper is to analyse the entry mode choice of the Spanish companies in China, the factors that influence it and the barriers that they found.

A qualitative approach is used by interviewing the partners of management consulting firms (MCFs) specialised in internationalisation processes in China.

The decision on the entry mode choice depends on whether the firm has incentives for investment with a partner rather than the size or the international experience of the board and the top managers. The barriers faced by Spanish companies in China are related to legal issues, bureaucracy, culture, language, trust and human resources.

Companies must have a differential factor to succeed in China and use a legal form that lets them to protect this advantage regardless of the entry form chosen. MCFs pointed out the need to collaborate with local people and to rely on a management team capable of overcoming the barriers.

One of the major contributions of this study is the methodology, as the view of the consultants in the internationalisation process of companies had not been studied before.

Cash flow deficit situations and working capital control are major challenges for many companies, especially those whose suppliers and clients have strong bargaining power. This study aims to describe the application of the Six Sigma methodology for solving these problems in a large German food can manufacturing company.

This paper follows the qualitative methodology of case study research. During different define, measure, analyse, improve and control process phases, the problem and critical aspects are identified to improve the quality of the payment process and improvements are suggested and implemented.

The results provide evidence of how Six Sigma can be useful in administrative–financial processes that are carried out within a company. This result is particularly interesting because it is about processes that have not applied Six Sigma methodology. For the company studied, this methodology has balanced its cash flow and this meant large amounts of savings, especially in bank interest to avoid having to ask for bank credits.

This case can be extrapolated to other companies, regardless of the company size, that present similar symptoms of cash deficit, especially if their bargaining power with suppliers and customers is low.

This study introduces a comprehensive bibliometric analysis of the foreign direct investment (FDI) literature by multinational corporations (MNCs) focusing on emerging economies to identify the most influential authors, journals and articles in FDI research and reveals the fields' conceptual and intellectual structures. The purpose of this paper is to address these issues.

The study analyzed 533 articles published between 1974 and 2020 in 226 academic journals indexed in the Web of Science (WoS) and Scopus databases. We used the R language for statistical computing to map author collaboration, co-word and develop a conceptual and intellectual map of the field.

The results show that, although the FDI literature has many authors, few dominate the field. The International Business Review (IBR) and International Journal of Emerging Markets (IJoEM) are the main sources of the publications. Moreover, bibliometric laws show that our dataset follows the Lotka law of scientific productivity and Bradford law of scattering, identifying the core journals. Finally, FDI by MNCs in emerging economies research is divided into four sub-research themes related to (1) FDI determinants, (2) entry mode, (3) MNCs and FDI performance and (4) the internationalization process.

The current article provides several starting points for practitioners and researchers investigating FDI. It contributes to broadening the vision of the field and offers recommendations for future studies.

An important sector that presents continuous growth year after year and one of the most notable economic sectors worldwide is hospitality and tourism (H&T). For this reason, many enterprises have been created and developed. Each journey could face several challenges, such as economic, social, political, environmental, and technological. This study examines research and case studies about H&T entrepreneurship and provides new insights into the current industry about all aspects that affect entrepreneurship development. Additionally, the impacts of the spread of COVID-19 in the current industry and the changes in the awareness of tourists to enjoy more sustainable tourism that protects the planet during their daily operations are addressed; this being a new opportunity for business so that entrepreneurs can compete in a hypercompetitive market.