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The purpose of this study is to investigate the perceptions of practitioners working within the UK design organisations on the perceived benefits of health and safety management (HSM). It further explores whether these perceptions could be influenced by the external factors such as the length of service in employment, organisation size, and the professional disciplines and educational backgrounds of the respondents. The study proposes the HSM index, an indicator reflecting the level of benefits from HSM approaches within the construction sector.

Using a data triangulation approach involving quantitative and qualitative methods and a KAP (knowledge, attitudes and perceptions) approach, a total of 110 questionnaires were distributed to the practitioners drawn from the small and medium sized design organisations within the UK, of which only 30 were deemed usable, giving a response rate of 27.3 per cent.

The ranking analysis suggest that “safer workplace”, “enhanced company reputation”, and “decrease in accidents” as the most important benefits arising from deployment of HSM programmes among the practitioners whereas “improved work performance”, “increased organisational performance “, and “reduced sickness and absence from work” though least ranked, still attained medium level of benefits. The findings further identified organisational skills as the most desirable for the effective implementation of safety management by project managers. The overall weighted HSM Index of 3.68 implies that the small and medium sized UK constructional related organisations perceive the benefits that arise from the deployment of HSM systems as medium.

The findings may help construction practitioners in reviewing decisions factors when they consider implementing HSM during the various stages of the construction process, from feasibility, design, tender and actual construction stage, also for improving their HSM approaches through considerations of the cognitive impacts.

A Casebook of Indigenous Business Practices in Africa is a collection of business case studies that expand understanding of how indigenous enterprises apply entrepreneurial practices embedded in culture to achieve success. Indigenous methods are part of Africa's social and economic fabric, and these cases identify concepts and models that can accelerate growth in Africa. The value of these practices across regions of Africa cannot be overemphasised despite the dominance of Western business methods, which, though beneficial, are yet to drive the continent's developmental agenda. By exploring indigenous business practices in Africa, students, educators, practitioners, entrepreneurs and government decision-makers will be introduced to unique and sustainable practices that can foster inclusive growth and social and economic empowerment when contextualised within the business landscape. Identification of relevant orientations in indigenous practices that will benefit contemporary business frameworks and actors is a significant contribution of the authors of this book. Incorporation of these indigenous methods into management teachings and business practices is essential to the continent's economic growth and socio-cultural progress.

Broom production and marketing is a local business industry operated by women in Nigeria. This activity serves not only as a source of livelihood to women but also has created job opportunities for the teeming unemployed persons in the rural areas. This paper aims to examine socioeconomic effects of small-scale women businesses in broom production and marketing industry in Nigeria with a view to analyze small-scale women businesses in Igbo Eze North District of Nigeria.

New economic theory was used to guide the study. The study adopted a quantitative research design comprising of semi-structured interviews, field observations, reference to relevant literature and a questionnaire survey of 340 female households engaged in broom production and marketing from fifteen villages. This sample size was selected using purposive sampling technique and Yamane formula. Frequencies and Spearman rank correlation were used to analyze the data.

The study found that broom production and marketing have an effect on the socioeconomic development of the people. The study found a positive relationship between broom production and marketing and income generated, education and occupation in the study area. This study concluded by suggesting that broom production in the study area should be mechanized to improve the quality and quantity of broom produced in the area.

This study has shown that Nigerian women have good potentials for entrepreneurship. Both the society and the government authorities should work together in supporting female ventures in Nigeria.

The paper empirically has shown the socioeconomic effects of small-scale women businesses in broom production and marketing on local household of Igbo Eze North District of Nigeria. This study stands as the first in Nigeria to consider the effects of broom production and marketing and how women in this part of Nigeria have used it to create job opportunities and opportunities of income for themselves and their families.

This paper aims to study the impediments and difficulties that prevent Indian women from becoming entrepreneurs.

Data were obtained through a survey involving 15 experts. Based on the feedback provided by the experts, ten relevant barriers in the context of Indian micro small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) were chosen. A structured questionnaire was used to gather data. These ten barriers create obstruction for Indian women as entrepreneurs. These barriers were ranked, and causal relationships among them established using interpretive structural modeling and Matrice d’Impacts croises-multiplication appliqúean classment (cross-impact matrix multiplication applied to classification) (ISM–MICMAC) approach.

This study identifies, on the basis of extant literature and experts’ opinion, ten barriers to female entrepreneurship. These barriers were ranked, and causal relationships among them established using the ISM–MICMAC approach. On the basis of ranking, women can move forward in MSMEs after removing these obstacles and it will have good results.

In this research, with literature reviews and experts opinion, ten barriers have been identified for women’s entrepreneurship and have been used to build the model.

To bring Indian women forward in the field of entrepreneurship, both the society and the government should work together, and efforts should be made to overcome the obstacles coming in the way of entrepreneurs.

Female entrepreneurship in India faces many problems including negative attitude of authorities and society toward women. The society and authorities have no format or model for Indian women to move forward in the entrepreneurship sector.

This study seeks to identify, on the basis of a thorough review of literature and expert opinion, major barriers to female entrepreneurship in the context of Indian MSMEs.

The purpose of this study is to understand the strategy adopted by family firms in using social media for their business. Based on the social media usage, this paper attempts to segment family firms. To do so, a reactive – proactive – innovative (RPI) scale was developed for the study. Then, the family firms were categorised as reactive, proactive or innovative social media users. Further, based on the scale developed, clusters were created. Family firms were placed into different clusters based on the strategy that they had for using social media platforms for their business.

A pilot sample of 50 family firms and a main study of 256 Indian family firm entrepreneurs were surveyed through self-administered questionnaires. Factor analysis reduced the 12 scale-based questions to three distinct factors. Confirmatory factor analysis was then conducted on the main sample to confirm the constructs identified using exploratory factor analysis. Cluster analysis was used to build clusters of entrepreneurs who use social media as part of their digital marketing strategy.

Findings reveal that the Indian family firm market is largely divided into four main segments. These segments represent distinct behaviours with respect to the use of social media. The four segments of family firm entrepreneurs were named as high rollers, ignorant inhabitants, trend-setters, combative crowd based on their social media usage behaviour. These clusters give deep insights into the strategic usage of social media by family firms.

The limitation of this study is that entrepreneurs from all Indian states were not considered in the sample because of cost implications. This research study has only created the segmentation of the family firms as reactive, proactive or innovative social media users and also has created the clusters as high rollers, ignorant inhabitants, trend-setters and combative crowd. Also, the reasons for their behaviour and root cause for the strategic usage have not been studied.

This study reflects on current practices of family firms with respect to usage of social media and groups them into large identifiable clusters. Equipped with the findings from this study, the RPI scale developed for the study and the clusters created, entrepreneurs can now move towards better use of social media for innovation.

Although past studies have advocated the use of social media to spur innovation in firms, this study segments the current market based on their practices. It allows readers to gauge the proportion of family firms using social media for innovation and paves the way for a change in behaviour amongst these firms.

Students' career choices and programmes of study are perceived to influence student understanding of many courses. Yet, research attention is limited on entrepreneurship education that is a panacea for unemployment. Thus, this paper aims to assess the influence of students' career interests on students' comprehension of the entrepreneurship curriculum from a developing economy perspective.

The study adopts a mixed-method approach and explanatory sequential design is used to collect the data from 575 student studying entrepreneurship course in Ghana.

The results show that there is no statistically significant relationship between students' career interests and students' comprehension levels in concepts taught in the entrepreneurship curriculum but a statistically significant relationship between students' programme of study and students' comprehension levels in concepts taught in the entrepreneurship curriculum in Ghanaian universities.

The findings imply that the entrepreneurship course should be taught practically. This can be accomplished by creating a virtual enterprise modelled after a successful enterprise. This will help students understand the concepts being taught. Second, students who study different programmes should be taught using different methods. Lastly, students who study non-business-related programmes should be taught using methods that emphasise the basic ideas to aid students' understanding.

This study has made significant contribution by successful adopting the Piaget's cognitive constructivism to the learning of entrepreneurship from a developing country perspective and establish that no statistical relationship exist between students' career interests and students' comprehension levels in entrepreneurship education.