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Characterized by declining goodwill and exemplified sharp drop in gross premium, the Nigerian insurance industry, in recent times, has experienced turbulent economic challenges that necessitated re‐engineering of its core activities. However, advertising and sales are core activities, which are important predictors of stability and growth in the insurance industry. Consequently, the purpose of this paper is to examine the impact of advertising on sales of insurance products.

An empirical investigation is carried out using a survey that utilizes questionnaires, interviews, and field observation as major research instruments. A total of 71 insurance companies in Nigeria, which represent the total operating insurance companies in Nigeria at the time of study, were surveyed. With 100 scientifically selected subjects sampled, descriptive analysis was employed to understand the relationship and the strength of such relationships.

It was found that advertising had effects on sales volume and improved public image. However, the choice of advertising medium, the message, and the format are critical ingredients of a successful advertising program in the insurance industry.

The insurance industry in Nigeria was studied from a holistic viewpoint due to the need to present reliable and detailed information for decision makers. However, limitation in achieving this relates to the reluctance of respondents to release information for the study.

The implication of this research is that proper control of advertisement budget vis‐à‐vis the expected sales volume could be made. Thus, organizations could spend budgets more effectively on growth enhancing projects instead of excessive wastage of funds on advertisement.

This paper seems to be the first original work that concerns the impact of advertising on sales in the Nigerian insurance industry. As such, it bridges a gap that is opened for investigations. It may be of great value to decision making seeking for control tools.

Recapitalization, mergers, and acquisitions are the most crucial issues confronting the Nigerian Insurance Industry (NII) in recent times. Yet information relating to these issues is rarely reported in print. The purpose of this paper is to present the results of a survey aimed at understanding the challenges faced within the NII and the reactions of the insurance underwriters towards the recapitalization exercise in Nigeria.

Stratified sampling was applied in segregating listed insurance companies on the Nigeria Stock Exchange into top‐, middle‐, and lower‐management cadres. Random sampling was then used in selecting samples of the insurance company's staff. A questionnaire containing both open‐ended and closed‐form questions was used as the instrument to collect the primary data. Questionnaire administration was combined with personal interviews and record viewing in gathering relevant facts for use. Fifty‐four questionnaires were properly filled and returned from members of staff of the selected insurance companies. Chi‐square statistical procedures revealed the true position of the issues raised in the hypotheses.

Recapitalization has been enhancing the development of the insurance industry and mergers and acquisitions have remained viable options for companies to remain in business.

Limited financial and non‐financial resources, as well as a reluctance to release information by insurance companies and other operators in the industry, prevented further investigation.

The study serves as an information source for investors in the insurance industry.

The purpose of this paper is to present a theoretical and empirical relationship between corporate social responsibility (CSR) and some dimensions of organizational effectiveness (OE) of insurance companies in Nigeria.

Data were obtained from a field survey in insurance companies in Lagos using structured questionnaires. Responses from the survey were statistically analyzed using descriptive statistics and Pearson product moment correlation.

Results of the study indicated that insurance companies are involved in all four forms of CSR activities (business ethics, urban affairs, consumer affairs and environmental affairs) with consumer affairs receiving the most active involvement. The study indicated that OE of the participating insurance companies is to a large extent satisfactory. However, involvement in CSR was found to correlate positively with OE.

The study also indicated that insurance companies still suffer from the lack of awareness, unavailability of information to identify the needs of a developing society, lack of qualified workforce and adverse economic factors that prevent them from performing CSR activities.

From a practical perspective, the study is needed to assess if investments in CSR is worthwhile or not.

Errors or negligence are inherent parts of professional services, thus necessitating the adoption of professional indemnity insurance (PII) as a risk management tool to protect professional interest. This paper sought to examine the adoption of PII among Estate Surveying and Valuation firms in Oyo State, Nigeria.

The quantitative research methodology was adopted, and primary data were collected via questionnaires distributed to 84 purposively selected Estate Surveyors and Valuers (ESVs) who are mostly principal partners or branch managers in the study area. Sixty-three questionnaires representing 75.0% were returned and found useable. Data collected were analysed with the aid of descriptive statistics of percentages and relative importance index (RII).

The study found that the influence of foreign investors as well as the requirements of PII by the professional body as a basis for annual license renewal were responsible for higher level of awareness among the practitioners. However, about average of the firms had adopted PII with few taking professional insurance policy of as low as ₦500,000 per annum. The study recommends that NIESV/ESVARBON should sensitize, monitor and enforce the adoption of PII by ESVs as a means to increase public confidence and credibility of valuers while rendering professional services to clients.

The current study was limited in coverage to Ibadan thus necessitating a study with wider area of coverage of national status.

The study has major implications on real estate education and practice in Nigeria. There is an urgent need for the professional body to devise means of enforcing compliance with the adoption of PII so as to be able to get the confidence of their teeming clients for subsequent patronage.

The paper is one among the scanty studies that provides a useful guide to real estate practitioners in developing countries towards adopting PII to shield the company from unnecessary negative exposure and financial loss.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the relationship between competency-based performance management and organizational effectiveness (OE). It signifies the importance of developing competency-based performance concept in organizations. Since conventional performance management systems (PMSs) are diminishing and as organizations are looking for breakthrough PMSs, this research attempted to fill the gap from stakeholder’s perspective – employee, manager and organization in devising new approach in PMS.

The research design involved developing scale for “competency-based superior performance” and validating scale for “organizational effectiveness,” The data for this survey are collected from 292 respondents through structured questionnaire. Hypotheses depicting aforementioned relationships were empirically tested in the context of competency-based performance practices in organizations based in India. Structural equation modeling (SEM) technique was used for data analysis.

The empirical results provide methods to accelerate the performance management initiatives based on a leadership competency model (LCM), which are necessary for building performance culture in the organization. The paper contributes by developing a new scale for measuring competency-based performance practices. The scale for OE is revisited. A positive relationship between competency-based superior performance and OE with productivity, adaptability and flexibility has been empirically confirmed using SEM.

The paper limits the performance measurement concept using leadership competencies.

The developed model will act as a building block for performance measurement in organizations. This paper promotes LCM to be applied in creating a performance-based culture.

This is a unique attempt to test the relationship between competency-based performance management and OE.

This paper aims to investigate corporate social responsibility (CSR) practices in Iran from the perspective of employees.

To achieve the objectives of this research, the perceptions of 142 Iranian employees were examined regarding the CSR practices of their respective organizations. The required data were collected using a questionnaire. Exploratory factor analysis was conducted to refine scale items and confirm the factorial structure of the scale applied. Descriptive statistics and a t‐test were used to analyze the data.

The paper unveils information about the current status of CSR in Iran from the perspective of employees, and shows that on average Iranian employees perceive their organizations to be committed to CSR, although the mean CSR scores were relatively low in all dimensions. Also, this research shows that while the four‐factorial structure of Truker's CSR scale was confirmed in the Iranian context, some of the items had to be removed from the original scale when measuring CSR.

The relatively low mean on the categories of CSR among Iranian organizations from the perspective of employees indicates the infancy level of CSR among Iranian organizations and calls for further awareness among Iranian organizations and managers about the issue of CSR. This research also shows that researchers need to be cautious when using CSR scales that have been developed in Western or European contexts to measure social responsibility activities of organizations in culturally different contexts such as the Middle East. A major limitation of this research pertains to sample size, which limits the generalizability of the findings to the whole country.

This research indicates the infancy level of CSR among Iranian organizations and calls for further engagement of Iranian organizations in social initiatives and community outreach endeavors.

Being among the first research studies of its kind to examine the CSR status in Iran, this study provides invaluable understanding and insights about the status of CSR in Iran, an important country in the Middle East. Furthermore, it validates and supports a recently proposed CSR scale by providing empirical findings from a culturally different context.

The purpose of this study is to empirically examine the association between corporate governance and the extent of corporate social responsibility (CSR) disclosures in insurance companies, using archival data.

The data set comprises 277 listed insurance company-years in Bangladesh for the period of 2008 to 2014. The authors have used a checklist to measure the extent of CSR disclosures. The checklist was developed based on the previous CSR literature. The study uses a multiple regression analysis technique to investigate the association between different governance variables, particularly managerial ownership, institutional ownership, board independence and the proportion of female directors, and the extent of CSR disclosures in Bangladeshi insurance companies.

The authors find that board independence and the proportion of female directors have positive associations with the extent of CSR disclosures. However, the results indicate that managerial ownership is negatively associated with the extent of CSR disclosures.

Unlike most of the prior research that explored CSR disclosures in non-financial companies, the authors focus on financial companies, namely, insurance businesses. The authors provide empirical evidence using archival data that suggests that some governance mechanisms are important determinants of CSR disclosures in the insurance industry.

This paper aims to examine the implications of high performance work system (HPWS) strength from a managerial perspective and the impact of economic, cultural, political, legal and technological factors on the operationalization of HPWSs in the banking industry in Sri Lanka.

The data for this study were collected from three licensed commercial banks in Sri Lanka. This research used a case study approach for data collection with archival analysis of records and semi-structured interviews with the CEO, head of HR, two board members and three focus groups (top, middle and lower level managers across various functional areas) in each bank which altogether covers 66 key informants.

The findings supported the research proposition that to gain positive outcomes on organizational effectiveness, there should be a strong HPWS, resulting in a positive attitudinal climate among employees. Further, the findings provide evidence of the global applicability of HPWSs, although more research is needed to clearly specify the contextual boundaries of HPWS effectiveness.

Contemporary research provides ample evidence to endorse the contribution of high performance work systems toward organizational effectiveness. However, there is a dearth of literature on how high performance work systems are operationalized across the management hierarchy and support the achievement of organizational effectiveness. Few studies have been conducted on high performance work system strength and organizational effectiveness in emerging economies.

The national and global digital transformation makes investments in information and communications technology (ICT) by financial institutions a necessity, not only for gaining a competitive advantage but also for expanding their knowledge and learning about their customers. This study assesses the business value of ICT investments by financial institutions using a mixed-method approach.

This study adopted a mixed-method approach. First, financial data were gathered from Omani banks' annual financial reports and through a longitudinal quantitative analysis in order to assess the value of ICT in financial institutions' profitability performances. Second, a Delphi qualitative approach was utilized in order to further assess how top managers view the impact of ICT investments in different aspects of business. We used an extended balanced scorecard (finance, customer, internal process and learning and growth) and a sector perspective to address how future ICT investments can offer value that goes beyond traditional metrics of profitability.

The results of the longitudinal study demonstrated significant evidence of the impact of ICT investment on finance performance indicators; ICT value is significantly positive. Furthermore, the results indicated that there is an acceptable consensus among business and ICT managers that ICT is linked to performance indicators beyond financial; ICT value is linked also to customer indicators, internal process indicators and learning and growth indicators in addition to sector indicators.

ICT is vital for a diversified and knowledge-based economy, especially for developing countries, because modern banking and financial institutions are relatively new in economies such as those that had previously relied on cash and informal financing institutions. Therefore, continued ICT investments face challenges and may not succeed. Most of the existing literature on ICT value has focused on tangible financial performance indicators. The financial evaluation of intangible performance indicators of ICT investments still remains a problematic area of high relevance to decision-makers. The present study provides an integrated assessment that enables financial institutions to develop their strategies and assessments in terms of ICT investments and to go beyond typical, tangible financial profitability indicators. Furthermore, it integrates assessment indicators that are beyond organizations themselves and reaches sectors and countries. This type of investigation is limited in the literature yet important for the financial sector as it is highly integrated by nature and critical to the development of a nation's economy.

This paper explores the link between employee stress and the high-power distance (HPD) culture in Nigeria. The study context is the banking and manufacturing sectors in Nigeria, which have a history of exploitation, unconducive work environments to productivity, work-life imbalance, work overload, burnout and employee stress.

Using a qualitative, interpretive methodology, this article adopts a thematic analysis of data drawn from semi-structured interviews with 24 managerial and non-managerial workers to explore the process by which Nigerian manufacturing and banking sectors' work (mal)practices go unchallenged, thereby triggering and exacerbating employees' stress levels.

The study found that the high power distance culture promotes a servant-master relationship type, making it impossible for employees to challenge employers on issues relating to stressors such as work overload, unconducive work environments, work-life imbalance and burnout, thereby exacerbating their stress levels in a country in which stress has become a way of life.

Research on the relationship between employee stress and HPD culture is relatively underdeveloped. This article sheds light on issues associated with stressors in Nigeria's human resource management (HRM) and employment relations practices. The link between the inability of employees to challenge these stressors (which are consequences of an HPD culture) and increased employee stress has substantial implications for employment and work-related policies and practices in general. The study is constrained by the limited sample size, which inhibits the generalisation of its findings.

The article adds to the scarcity of studies underscoring the relationship between high-power distance and the inability of employees to challenge work-related stressors as a predictor of employee stress and a mediator between workplace practices and employee stress, particularly in the emerging economies.