Yasir Mansoor Kundi, Kamal Badar, Muhammad Sarfraz and Naeem Ashraf
Drawing on the social exchange theory, this study aims to examine the association between interpersonal conflict and task performance as well as the mediating and moderating roles…
Abstract
Purpose
Drawing on the social exchange theory, this study aims to examine the association between interpersonal conflict and task performance as well as the mediating and moderating roles of workplace deviance and emotional intelligence, respectively, in this association.
Design/methodology/approach
Two studies were designed to test the authors’ hypotheses using multiwave and multisource data collected from 173 (187) subordinates and their immediate supervisors from Pakistan.
Findings
An important reason that interpersonal conflict diminishes employees’ task performance is that employees are engaged in workplace deviance. This indirect effect is less salient when employees are more emotionally intelligent.
Practical implications
One way to improve employees’ task performance could be to reduce and manage interpersonal conflicts, especially through interventions aimed at increasing employees’ emotional intelligence levels.
Originality/value
This research contributes to the literature by demonstrating that employees’ emotional intelligence is a boundary condition that alters the association between interpersonal conflict and employee task performance directly and indirectly via workplace deviance.
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Ali Raza, Rodoula Tsiotsou, Muhammad Sarfraz and Muhammad Ishtiaq Ishaq
Given the fierce competition in financial services, service failure management and trust restoration tactics are becoming strategic priorities. Studies investigating trust…
Abstract
Purpose
Given the fierce competition in financial services, service failure management and trust restoration tactics are becoming strategic priorities. Studies investigating trust restoration have increased over the years due to the significance of trust in services and the frequency of trust violations. Drawing on the sense-making and defensive approaches of attribution theory, this study aims to explore the effectiveness of various trust recovery tactics (e.g. apology, explanation, and investigation) in financial services considering the prevalence of service failure severity.
Design/methodology/approach
Based on a scenario-based survey, this study gathered data from 402 consumers of different banks in Pakistan. The study analyzed the data using ordinary least square regressions and structural equation modeling.
Findings
The study indicated that explanation is more effective in repairing character-competence and commitment-based trust, while investigation remained highly effective for inducing congruence-based trust. Interestingly, an apology was more effective for communication-based trust repairing, while context-based trust recovery was unaffected against all recovery tactics. Despite the prevalence of severe service failure, recovery actions proved fully effective for character-competence and commitment-based trust while partially effective for congruence-based trust recovery. This study also found that severe service failure undermines the effectiveness of recovery actions in repairing communication and context-based trust.
Originality/value
The study extends the literature on trust recovery by integrating sense-making and defensive attribution theory. The sense-making approach contributes to the existing knowledge on trust recovery by elucidating how consumers and service providers develop a shared understanding to facilitate the recovery mechanism of multidimensional trust in financial services.
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Muhammad Sarfraz, Qasim Ali Nisar and Ali Raza
Drawing upon the social exchange and psychological capital literature and applying a multilevel perspective, this paper examines how personal and organizational factors contribute…
Abstract
Purpose
Drawing upon the social exchange and psychological capital literature and applying a multilevel perspective, this paper examines how personal and organizational factors contribute to expatriates' adjustment and performance of international assignments in a terrorism-induced risky environment.
Design/methodology/approach
Data were collected using a non-probability sampling approach (e.g. purposive and subsequent snowball sampling). The authors tested the hypotheses using survey data of 138 expatriates with current international assignments in Pakistan.
Findings
Expatriates' perceived organizational and risk-taking propensity influences their performance through improved adjustment. Moderating effects suggest that an individual's satisfaction with the received organizational rewards strengthens the risk-taking propensity to adjustment relationship; resilience strengthens the adjustment to performance relationship.
Originality/value
This study extends existing expatriation literature by focusing on a specific type of risk factor pertinent to international assignments, i.e. terrorism. Integrating individual and organizational factors that influence adjustment and subsequent performance provides a clear picture rather if such factors are operationalized separately in the terrorism-induced risky environment context.
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– This study aims to analyze Saudi scientific output in the field of computer science in Web of Science database, covering the years 1978 through 2012.
Abstract
Purpose
This study aims to analyze Saudi scientific output in the field of computer science in Web of Science database, covering the years 1978 through 2012.
Design/methodology/approach
The study involved analyzing 998 publications in terms of the publication count and its growth, citation, share of international collaboration, research areas and researchers’ productivity.
Findings
The results show that the number of papers produced in computer science field has only increased after year 2007; this is because Saudi universities have applied a catch-up strategy to increase its research output. Also, our study reveals that the publication performance of Saudi scientists in computer science was domestic and suffers from low international visibility. Only two universities took the lead in the production of computer science research. Furthermore, computer science research trends in Saudi Arabia focused on engineering, followed by mathematics and telecommunications.
Originality/value
Studies on international academic publication productivity in the Middle East, particularly in Arab countries such as Saudi Arabia, are rarely found. In fact, bibliometric studies on Saudi researchers in the field of computer science are not available. Therefore, the originality of this study resides in being the first study to measure publication productivity of Saudi researchers in the field of computer science.
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Muhammad Ibrahim Abdullah, Dechun Huang, Muddassar Sarfraz, Junaid Naseer and Muhammad Waqas Sadiq
Organizations are facing several challenges in the current challenging business environment. The current study explores how counterproductive work behavior (CWB) affects…
Abstract
Purpose
Organizations are facing several challenges in the current challenging business environment. The current study explores how counterproductive work behavior (CWB) affects bio-medical companies' firm performance in Pakistan. The study considers the mediating role of organizational culture and its impact on CWB and a firm's performance.
Design/methodology/approach
Data were collected through a self-administered questionnaire. For data collection, 300 questionnaires were distributed among employees working in biomedical companies. Statistical analysis such as descriptive statistics, Pearson moment correlation and structural equation modeling (SEM) techniques was used to analyze the study variable's relationship and its effect on the firm's performance.
Findings
The study results revealed that CWB and organizational culture significantly influence firm performance directly and indirectly. Moreover, organizational culture partially mediates the relationship between CWB and companies' performance.
Originality/value
The current study plays a significant role in the firm's policy directions. There are limited research and information accessible to biomedical firms in Pakistan. Counterproductive job habits wind up becoming something that significantly affects the firm performance. This research adds to human resource management, corporate management and the business strategy literature.
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Sarfraz Zaman, Hina Ahmed, Muhammad Haseeb Shakil, Muhammad Rafiq and Faiza Ali
This study is an attempt to explore the determinants of entrepreneurial intentions in the context of family business background. There is a dearth of studies on the relationship…
Abstract
Purpose
This study is an attempt to explore the determinants of entrepreneurial intentions in the context of family business background. There is a dearth of studies on the relationship between family business and entrepreneurial intentions. Three constructs of social cognitive theory (SCT) have been applied as mediators: self-efficacy, subjective norms and outcome expectations.
Design/methodology/approach
To measure entrepreneurial intentions, the data have been collected from the postgraduate students of three universities in Pakistan. The questionnaire was distributed among the respondents, and 416 complete responses were taken from the students. Simple random sampling has been applied, and measurement and hypothesized models are tested by using the structural equation modeling technique in WarpPLS.
Findings
The results of this research reveal that family business background significantly affects the three elements of SCT (self-efficacy, subjective norms and outcome expectations), which further develop the individuals’ entrepreneurial intentions (EIs). The results showed that social cognitive elements are the underpinning mechanism that explains the relationship between family business background and EIs.
Originality/value
The similarity of the study is less than 18%.
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Syed Muhammad Irfan, Faisal Qadeer, Muhammad Ibrahim Abdullah and Muddassar Sarfraz
The primary study purpose is to examine whether managerial support triggers job crafting and sustainable employability, and to what extent work uncertainty moderates the…
Abstract
Purpose
The primary study purpose is to examine whether managerial support triggers job crafting and sustainable employability, and to what extent work uncertainty moderates the managerial support and sustainable employability relationships mediated by job crafting using a moderated mediation approach. Thus, this study aims to uncover new antecedent and outcomes of job crafting using job demands and resources (JD–R) theory as no such research has yet examined these relationships.
Design/methodology/approach
The structural equation modeling (SEM) technique was employed to test the proposed relationships based on survey data that include a final 483 knowledge workers of the services sector. The authors tested the structural model using self-developed estimates for AMOS 24.0 to examine the moderated mediation process models (process models 7, 14 and 58) rather than using a conventional process macro through SPSS.
Findings
Consistent with the formulated hypothesis, the results of this study indicate that managerial support directly stimulates job crafting and sustainable employability. Further, job crafting mediates the relationships between managerial support and sustainable employability. This validates the JD–R theory assumption that managerial support as job resources initiates a motivational process through job crafting, leading to sustainable employability as the outcome of the motivational process. Additionally, the moderated mediation results show that in the presence of high work uncertainty, employees are more engaged in job crafting to boost their sustainable employability.
Practical implications
Organizations may incorporate these findings while developing human resources (HR) management policies and practices to align top-down and bottom-up job re(design) approaches. For example, by designing line managers’ role in implementation of supportive HR practices, their supportive leadership behavior towards employees will successfully trigger job crafting and nurture their sustainable employability.
Originality/value
This research adds to the work design and employability literature. No such study has yet examined whether managerial support triggers job crafting and sustainable employability. Prior studies examine personality traits, some individual difference variable, job characteristics, or leadership influence as antecedents of job crafting. Utilizing the JD–R theory, we empirically validate that job crafting plays a vital role in the motivational process initiated by the job resources (managerial support), leading to sustainable employability as an outcome of the motivational process. The authors further show that in the presence of high job demands (work uncertainty), employees are more engaged in job crafting and more conscious to boost their sustainable employability.
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Sarfraz Zaman, Muhammad Arshad, Naheed Sultana and Sharjeel Saleem
The purpose of this study is to examine the effect of family business exposure on individuals' entrepreneurial intentions (EIs). By applying the institutional framework at the…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this study is to examine the effect of family business exposure on individuals' entrepreneurial intentions (EIs). By applying the institutional framework at the micro level, this study proposed the mediation of three types of institutional forces (coercive, normative and mimetic) between the relationship of family business exposure and EIs.
Design/methodology/approach
Data were collected from 367 university students in Pakistan. The survey design was used for the data collection. The measurement and hypothesized models were tested using the structural equation modeling technique in Mplus 7.0.
Findings
The findings of this study revealed that family business exposure positively influenced the institutional forces (coercive, normative and mimetic) which further developed the individuals' EIs. However, family business exposure did not affect the EIs directly that showed the full mediation of institutional forces between the relationship of family business exposure and EIs.
Originality/value
This is the first study in its nature which applied institutional theory from the macro level to the micro level within the context of family business. The results revealed the institutional forces as the underpinning mechanism which explains the relationship between family business exposure and EIs.
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Syed Muhammad Irfan, Faisal Qadeer, Muddassar Sarfraz and Mohammed Khurrum Bhutta
This paper explores critical job resources (CRJRs) as predictors of job crafting and sustainable employability. Using job demands-resources (JD-R) theory as a theoretical lens…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper explores critical job resources (CRJRs) as predictors of job crafting and sustainable employability. Using job demands-resources (JD-R) theory as a theoretical lens, the authors examine how job crafting mediates CRJR and sustainable employability and whether work uncertainty as a boundary condition further strengthened these associations using moderated mediation approach.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors used a cross-sectional time-lagged research design by collecting data from 483 knowledge workers in Pakistan's healthcare and universities, both public and private. The authors used structural equation modeling using AMOS 25.0 software to examine the proposed relationships’ mediation, moderation and moderated-mediation processes, such as Hayes (2018) process models 1,7,14 and 58. In addition, the authors tested a structural model with self-developed estimands instead of using process macros available in SPSS by computing variables.
Findings
The results of this study confirmed that CRJR predicts job crafting and employees' sustainable employability. Furthermore, comprehensive testing suggested that mediation of job crafting between CRJR and sustainable employability further strengthened in the presence of a boundary condition of work uncertainty.
Originality/value
The study uncovers CRJR (job, organizational, social and relational) as a predictor of job crafting. The authors suggest that job design integrating CRJR helps organizations and managers promote job crafting and make employees responsible for their sustainable employability. The proposed CRJR has not been used as a predictor of job crafting, and no such study tested CRJR as a predictor of sustainable employability. The authors made comprehensive testing to examine the boundary condition of work uncertainty while examining the CRJR and sustainable employability relations via job crafting.
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Jahanzeb Marwat, Suresh Kumar Oad Rajput, Sarfraz Ahmed Dakhan, Sonia Kumari and Muhammad Ilyas
The current study aims to achieve two targets. First, examine empirically that whether corporate managers use tax avoidance to influence short-term profitability? Second…
Abstract
Purpose
The current study aims to achieve two targets. First, examine empirically that whether corporate managers use tax avoidance to influence short-term profitability? Second, investigate the impact of tax avoidance on the value of firms. The tax accounts provide the opportunity to influence temporary/permanent profitability but empirical studies overlooking this matter, particularly in emerging economies.
Design/methodology/approach
First, the authors identified unexpected fluctuations of tax avoidance and then examine whether it impacts the profitability signal and firms' value? The unbalanced panel data of 189 non-financial firms for the period 2000–2018 are used for empirical analysis. The estimation biases and results consistency are verified by using two different econometric models including generalized least square and two-stage least square
Findings
The study identifies that managers manipulate the profitability signal through tax avoidance. Tax avoidance practices help in earning management and earning smoothing to avoid negative signals in the stock market. In line with the behavioral finance view, tax avoidance has a positive impact on current stock returns because investors focus on profitability without a detailed screening of cash flows.
Originality/value
A limited number of studies investigate the use of tax avoidance for manipulation of the short-term earning signal. Identifying gaps and limitations in the literature, this study provides invaluable insights into tax avoidance and its association with the profitability and value of firms. The findings are important for investors, managers and policymakers in making portfolio decisions and corporate policies.