COVID-19 and business renewal: Lessons and insights from the global airline industry

The emergence of the COVID-19 pandemic has adversely affected the fortunes of multiple companies around the globe. Accordingly, questions are increasingly being asked about how organizations can revitalize during and after a crisis. Yet, we have limited understanding of how organizations renew themselves during crises over time. We explore this question through the lens and examination of two South-Asian airlines: Pakistan International Airlines and Sri Lankan Airlines. The cases offer important insights into the reasons behind underperformance of state-controlled enterprises and renewal activities. We shed light on strategic renewal (SR) in the wake of increasing liberalization and deregulations in the global airline industry. To this end, we propose a four-stage approach towards renewing such underperforming organizations to respond effectively to black swan events and external shocks.     

External pressure or internal culture? An innovation diffusion theory account of small retail businesses’ social media use

COVID-19 put unprecedented external pressure on small businesses to adopt or increase use of social media while not all small businesses are internally ready for this rapid change. This study investigated the roles of external pressures and organizational culture of openness and learning in driving small retail business owners'/managers' social media use decisions by impacting their perceived usefulness and barriers, based on the innovation-decision process model from the diffusion of innovations theory and the theory of reasoned action. An online survey with structured measurements was administered to 411 U.S. small retail business owners/managers. Results from structural equation modeling revealed that external pressures positively influenced small business owners'/managers’ perceived usefulness and barriers and social media use intention. In addition, the culture of openness and learning positively influenced the perceived usefulness while mitigating the perceived barriers, thereby directly and indirectly influencing the social media use intention. Theoretical and managerial implications are discussed.     

Merit versus maleness: How strategic positioning can mitigate external gender bias

Despite the proactive efforts of many firms to combat gender bias within their organizations, societal prejudices still disadvantage women leaders and the firms who employ them. This external gender bias shapes outside stakeholder evaluations of women leaders’ efforts in various ways, and firms need strategies to cope with this external gender bias. We examine the conditions that might alleviate this burden of external bias and what women leaders and top executives can do to leverage these conditions—from a strategic positioning perspective—that will effectively allow female leaders to differentiate their work. To do this, we synthesize and build upon evidence that the external gender bias against women leaders diminishes when they lead in areas that are unconventional rather than mainstream. We then propose a two-step process based on (1) identifying the likely threat of external gender bias, which is stronger in some industry contexts than others, and (2) leveraging unconventionality to circumvent male prototypical comparisons, thereby reducing the hazards of external gender bias.     

Foreign inflows and economic growth: An emiprical study of the SAARC region

The study examines and highlights the impact of selected foreign inflows (aid, trade, FDI, debt and remittances) on the economic growth of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) countries. The existent literature lacks a comprehensive analysis of the SAARC countries as countries like Afghanistan, Bhutan and the Maldives have largely been ignored due to the shorter time periods of available data. The study is empirical in nature and utilizes panel data techniques on macroeconomic data for the period 2008–2015. Foreign aid and foreign direct investment are found to impact economic growth positively. Foreign debt and trade flows are found to adversely affect economic growth. No relationship is established between the flow of remittances and the economic growth of these countries. The obtained results are robust to different proxy variables and the addition of macroeconomic variables. For the first time, the study provides policy implications based on the data of all SAARC countries. The study recommends focusing on increasing the inflows of resources in the form of aid and foreign direct investment (FDI) from the developed world to achieve higher economic growth.     

PEDAKSI: Methodology for Collecting Data about Survey Non-Respondents

The effects of unit non-response on survey errors are of great concern to researchers.However, direct assessment of non-response bias in survey estimates is rarely possible.Attempts are often made to adjust for the effects of non-response by weighting, but thisusually relies on the use of frame data or external population data, which are at bestmodestly correlated with the survey variables. This paper reports the development ofa method to collect limited survey data from non-respondents to personal interviewsurveys and a large-scale field test of the method on the British Crime Survey (BCS).The method is shown to be acceptable and low cost, to provide valid data, and to haveno detrimental effect on the main survey. The use of the resultant data to estimatenon-response bias is illustrated and some substantive conclusions are drawn for the BCS.     

两合计划:从政府需要角度透视其职能转变

立足政府需要,从侧面对当前政府职能转变过程进行分析和探讨,希望以政府本身作为理性实体的运作为基础,对该问题进行解释。     

关于教育测量的要素分析

教育测量是指对教育现象的测量。教育测量的基本手段是存在失真范围的数量化分析。其数量化的语言是效度、信度等。效度分为效标效度与内容效度等,信度是表明测量可靠性的数量指标。     

The Importance of Professional Training for Test Writers

The importance of language testing is noticed by more and more people.But the quality of testing,or say,the level of test writers,has been ignored for a long time.This article intends to talk about the importance of professional training for test writ- ers,in order to arouse people＇s attention to the quality of test designers.     

西方货币政策有效性理论综述

本文从西方经济学家对市场是否出清和要素价格变化是否完全弹性观点得出的货币政策是否有效结合的角度，来论述货币政策有效性理论。     

Social Scientific Explanations?

Generally valid scientific explanations of observable social phenomena are still hardly available. By applying philosophical insights generated by Quine and derived from semiotics to social research methodology three kinds of context dependencies accompanying theory formation within social science are identified. The third context dependency is mostly not attended in theory formation about social phenomena thereby producing a ``connotation fallacy', which leaves almost all social theories undetermined and fallible. These context dependencies should be taken into account in the research design and be tested for using statistical criteria comprising a new methodology presented in this article.