Search results

The link between SME performance, growth and development is well established; however, the characteristics of SMEs that allow firms to be successful in the long run in an underdeveloped country context, i.e. Pakistan, are still unclear. This paper aims to bridge this gap by identifying the SMEs’ characteristics that set them apart from their rivals and become successful.

This study uses Storey’s development framework to identify the SMEs’ characteristics. Data is gathered using the case study method from SMEs with a metropolitan context in Pakistan. A narrative methodological framework was used during the data gathering and analysing stages.

Findings of this study indicate that the prosperity of SMEs in Pakistan is dependent on a combination of characteristics, including entrepreneurial characteristics of owner–managers, knowledge of business operating models, social networks and relationship building and innovation in business style. Additionally, other factors such as governance structure, strategic planning of market diversification and export characteristics also influence the prosperity of an SME. These findings may have several important implications for key stakeholders, including entrepreneurs, SMEs and policymakers in the government.

This research provides evidence about factors that can help an SME to become successful in uncertain situations surrounding a business environment. Theoretically, the contribution of this research is that it demonstrates that entrepreneurial characteristics and the effective leadership style of owner–managers can help SMEs achieve prosperity in external unforeseeable situations.

This study aims to analyze the effectiveness of online teaching and learning in the higher education sector during the COVID-19 pandemic and thereby design and formulate strategies to overcome the lacunas, if any, to enhance teaching effectiveness.

A survey was conducted to analyze how far students were able to adapt to online teaching and learning, access teaching platforms and afford it. It was also studied whether they were able to grasp and apply the concepts learned. A total of 600 questionnaires were given, and 372 complete responses were received. Structural equation modeling is employed to test the hypothesis. Confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) was conducted to test the model fit and measurement model.

This study is first of its kind in India which aims to analyze the effectiveness of online teaching and learning environments. This research model is designed to identify the determinants of effective online learning and to overcome the lacunas existing in the prevailing online teaching methods. It can be applied not just during crises like the pandemic but also during normal times to make teaching and learning more economical, innovative and impactful. The present study examined the impact of five major determinants—adaptability, affordability, bandwidth, grasping and interaction—on online learning and its effectiveness during COVID-19. It was observed that all the determinants positively influence online learning effectiveness.

The scope of the study was restricted to three centrally funded Indian Universities. Other institutions were not part of the study.

This study is the first of its kind done in the current COVID-19 scenario, and the outcome would help overcome the lacunas in the prevailing online teaching scenario across the globe and make it more effective.

The creative employees with innovative ideas tend to engage with the latest technologies and the needed organizational processes for the survival of the companies. The culture of workplace innovation (WIP) causes, strengthens, sustains and incentivizes employee performance to enhance employee innovativeness. This paper explores as to what employees perceive on and how to go about WPI; the study of the perception of knowledge professionals about nature, extent, the association and the outcomes of workplace innovation, therefore, assumes importance.

Knowledge professionals were surveyed to collect data regarding workplace innovation. And 481 collected responses were analyzed to infer the results and employed structural equation modeling (SEM) to validate the proposed research model. The results of the reliability and validity tests show that the proposed model has satisfactory psychometric properties.

The present study looked into how culture facilitates WPI and enhances employee innovativeness and performance. The level of trust between employees and organizations has to be very high, and the organization has to have a close-knit working environment to ensure that organizations remain in the market retaining their market standing. This is so particularly in the context of today's global scenario where organizations have access to technologies, and technologies have changed the way we live, consume and meet people. The success of an organization depends on the culture of the organization.

The study has certain constraints. Foremost, the sample collected comprises a good percentage of entry and middle managerial level employees while the proportion of senior managerial level employees is relatively less. In a way, it represents the actual population, as in general, the senior managers make a very less percentage in information technology (IT) organizations.

To accomplish the goal of marinating high performing and innovative organizational workforce, the policymakers and the management of organizations should adopt an employee-centric approach by employing nontechnical innovation at the workplace, namely WPI. The results of this study pronounce the same. The more favorable the culture of an organization, the more likely the employee thrives and continues in it. Hence, the major step from the employer side could be to develop and maintain a supportive and constructive organizational culture.

The value of this original research lies in the understanding of the literature reviewed that it is the first survey of its kind done in India, and it helps the Indian IT organizations and knowledge professionals to understand that the WPI enhances employee innovativeness and job performance.

This paper aims to assess the equilibrium house price in the city of Suva (Fiji) and to analyse the house price bubble in the Fiji housing market.

This paper adopts a time series approach to determine the presence of house price bubbles in Fiji over the period from 1988 to 2018.

The findings suggest that real income, land cost, building material price, inflation rate, volatility, household size and wealth have a positive impact on house prices, whereas user cost of capital and political disturbances have a negative impact. The findings further indicate that the Fijis’ housing market does not constitute any house price bubble.

This paper draws policy implications for a small developing state (Fiji) and other similar economies.

The price bubble in the Fiji housing market is analysed for the first time. This paper develops a comprehensive empirical approach to assess the equilibrium-housing price in Fiji.

This study aims to analyze the challenges in financing the healthcare system of Pakistan and develop a comprehensive health financing strategy aimed at achieving universal health coverage (UHC).

The paper utilizes World Health Organization (WHO) framework on health financing to build the argument. It uses qualitative research design involving focus group discussions and in-depth interviews with key stakeholders, including Federal Board of Revenue, Ministry of Finance, Planning Commission, development partners, academia and health ministries at federal and provincial levels, as well as social health insurance entities.

The research findings highlight several critical issues within Pakistan’s healthcare system: Firstly, health spending is inadequate to provide financial protection to 24 million people. Secondly, the available health funding is allocated in clusters and caters primarily to specific groups, which exacerbates inequities in healthcare provision. Thirdly, the existence of multiple purchasing agents who operate concurrently to buy health services results in duplication and wastage of resources. Fourthly, the public financial management system, intended to support the swift distribution of public funds to health facilities, is not aligned with the requirements of the health system. Lastly, the devolved health setup has led to governance issues in managing the health sector.

This study fills a significant gap in the literature on health financing within Pakistan and proposes a unique empirical approach using WHO’s framework in a decentralized healthcare context. It also provides actionable recommendations for policymakers to develop strategies that improve the effectiveness of public financial management and health service delivery.

Banks perform, in general, two functions; one is to collect deposits and the other is to issue loans. In the traditional banking system depositor would be guaranteed a predetermined return on the nominal value of the deposit by the bank; furthermore, in most cases the deposits, themselves, are insured (FDIC is an example). Loan users in return pay a predetermined return on the amount of fund used; besides, the user has to provide a safe collateral in order to guarantee the principal and the interest. Hence it can be safely said that these banks play a passive role in the economy in the sense that their operations are quite inflexible in the face of any economic fluctuations. As the result it has rightly been said that in these banks “…since the nominal value of deposits is guaranteed … shocks that can lead to banking crisis can cause divergence between real assets and real liabilities and it is not clear how this equilibrium would be corrected and how long the process of adjustment would take.” This is the real essence of fund intermediary function of a traditional (capitalistic) bank.

To fully comprehend the significance of Islam in Islamic Finance, it is imperative to delve deeper into the ontology, epistemology and axiology of Islamic principles. Ontology is concerned with the foundation of reality, whilst epistemology covers the learning process. Then, axiology talks about the subject's values, norms and principles. This chapter covers the ontology of the Knowledge from an Islamic perspective, which, epistemologically speaking, is believed to be eternal, unchanging and universal by the believer. Therefore, having a profound understanding of the ontology and epistemology of the source and the Knowledge, the discussion continues the axiology of Islamic finance principles, which is paramount to understanding the role of Islam in modern financial systems.

Ontology is concerned with the foundational building blocks that become the governing rules, i.e. the relationships between the Almighty and His creations. It is crucial to acknowledge the eternality of the Creator, as He is not in comparison to His creation. The epistemology of Islam placed Al-Qur'an as the Book and Muhammad (Peace Be Upon Him – PBUH) and the Messenger of Allah (swt) as the Archetypal model. The Book is the Meta framework that serves as the ultimate authority. Muhammad (PBUH) led and taught his generation how to run a state, organize public affairs and restore justice in law and rulings. It is his sayings and behaviours that Muslims refer to ethics and good behaviour (akhlaqul karimah) as the axiology of Islam. These are fundamentals before embarking to the adaptability of Islamic finance principles into policy.

Canada’s visible minority population is increasing rapidly, yet despite the demographic significance of this population, there is a surprising dearth of nationally representative health data on visible minorities. This is a major challenge to undertaking research on the health of this group, particularly in the context of investigating racial/ethnic disparities and health disadvantages that are rooted in racialization. The purpose of this paper is to summarize: mortality and morbidity patterns for visible minorities; determinants of visible minority health; health status and determinants of the health of visible minority older adults (VMOA); and promising data sources that may be used to examine visible minority health in future research.

A scoping review of 99 studies or publications published between 1978 and 2014 (abstracts of 72 and full articles of 27) was conducted to summarize data and research findings on visible minority health to answer four specific questions: what is known about the morbidity and mortality patterns of visible minorities relative to white Canadians? What is known about the determinants of visible minority health? What is known about the health status of VMOA, a growing segment of Canada’s aging population, and how does this compare with white older adults? And finally, what data sources have been used to study visible minority health?

There is indeed a major gap in health data and research on visible minorities in Canada. Further, many studies failed to distinguish between immigrants and Canadian-born visible minorities, thus conflating effects of racial status with those of immigrant status on health. The VMOA population is even more invisible in health data and research. The most promising data set appears to be the Canadian Community Health Survey (CCHS).

This paper makes an important contribution by providing a comprehensive overview of the nature, extent, and range of data and research available on the health of visible minorities in Canada. The authors make two key recommendations: first, over-sampling visible minorities in standard health surveys such as the CCHS, or conducting targeted health surveys of visible minorities. Surveys should collect information on key socio-demographic characteristics such as nativity, ethnic origin, socioeconomic status, and age-at-arrival for immigrants. Second, researchers should consider an intersectionality approach that takes into account the multiple factors that may affect a visible minority person’s health, including the role of discrimination based on racial status, immigrant characteristics for foreign-born visible minorities, age and the role of ageism for older adults, socioeconomic status, gender (for visible minority women), and geographic place or residence in their analyses.

Drawing on the activation theory, the purpose of this paper is to study the positive influence of moral leadership, workaholism and spousal support at home on employees’ performance at the workplace. It also captures the moderating role of organizational support in the relationship between constructive deviance and employee performance.

The data were collected using a survey approach, employing a questionnaire as the primary tool (n = 416) to gather responses from employees in the hotel industry. The hypotheses were tested through hierarchical regression analysis and structural equation modeling (SEM).

Results indicated that moral leadership and spousal support at home are positively related to employee performance and constructive deviance. Additionally, the association between positive deviance and worker performance was strengthened by organizational support.

This study contributes in two significant ways. First, it enhances the understanding of activation theory by applying it to employees in the hotel industry, offering a context-specific perspective that can guide future research. Second, it investigates constructive deviations among hotel workers, with a distinct focus on the Indian setting, adding depth to the existing literature.

The originality of this study lies in expanding the understanding of constructive deviance by introducing moral leadership and spousal support as its key antecedents.