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The Indian power sector is dominated by coal. Environmental awareness and advances in techno-economic front have led to a slow but steady shift towards greener alternatives. The distributions of both fossil fuel resources and renewable energy potential are not uniform across the states. Paper attempts to answer how the states are performing in the sector and how the renewable energy and conventional resources are affecting the dynamics.

The authors employ a two-stage data envelopment analysis (DEA) to rank the performance of Indian states in the power sector. Multi-stage analysis opens up the DEA black-box through disaggregating power sector in two logical sub-sectors. The performance is evaluated from the point-of-view of policy formulating and implementing agencies. Further, an econometric analysis using seemingly unrelated regression equations (SURE) is conducted to estimate the determinants of total and industrial per-capita electricity consumption.

Efficiency scores obtained from the first phase of analysis happens to be a significant explanatory variable for power consumption. The growth in electricity consumption, which is necessary for economic wellbeing, is positively affected by both renewable and non-renewable sources; but conventional sources have a larger impact on per-capita consumption. Yet, the share of renewables in the energy mix has positive elasticity. Hence, the findings are encouraging, because development in storage technologies, falling costs and policy interventions are poised to give further impetus to renewable sources.

The study is one of the very few where entire spectrum of the Indian power sector is evaluated from efficiency perspective. Further, the second phase analysis gives additional relevant insights on the sector.

Considering the swift adoption of innovative sustainability practices in businesses to accomplish sustainable development goals (SDGs), research on corporate sustainability has increased significantly over the years. This research intends to analyze the published literature, emphasizing the existing, emerging and future research directions on achieving the SDGs through corporate sustainability.

This research analyzed the growing trends in corporate sustainability by incorporating 2,038 Scopus articles published between 1999 and 2022 using latent Dirichlet allocation (LDA) topic modeling, bibliometrics and qualitative content analysis techniques. The bibliometric data were analyzed using performance and science mapping. Thereafter, topic modeling and content analysis uncovered the topics included under the corporate sustainability umbrella.

The findings indicate that investigation into corporate sustainability has considerably increased from 2015 to date. Additionally, the majority of studies on corporate sustainability are from the United States of America, the United Kingdom and Germany. Besides, the USA has the most collaboration in terms of co-authorship. S. Schaltegger was considered the most productive author. However, P. Bansal was ranked as the top author based on a co-citation analysis of authors. Further, bibliometric data were evaluated to analyze leading publications, journals and institutions. Besides, keyword co-occurrence analysis, topic modeling and content analysis highlighted the theoretical underpinnings and new patterns and provided directions for further research.

This study demonstrates various existing and emerging themes in corporate sustainability, which have various repercussions for academicians and organizations. This research also examines the lagging themes in the current domain.

This study attempts to identify and analyse the barriers to implementing a reverse logistics (RL) system in Indian Construction, Real estate, Infrastructure and Project (CRIP) sectors and present a structured model to identify interdependencies among them.

The barriers to implementing RL in CRIP sectors in India were identified using a Delphi study. The interdependencies were identified using Interpretive Structural Modeling (ISM). Further, using the Matriced' Impacts Croisés Multiplication Appliquée à un Classement (MICMAC) analysis, the barriers were classified on the basis of their driving power and interdependencies.

The study has identified ten barriers that can hamper the application of an RL system in CRIP sectors. The finding of the ISM model shows that macro level barriers such as lack of awareness of reverse logistics, insufficient government policies and unavailability of standard codes stimulate each other and also drive all other barriers. The organization-specific barriers operating at the strategic/tactical level, namely, company's rigid mechanism, lack of awareness of economic profits, inadequate company’s organizational policies and lack of training, reluctance from stakeholders, scarcity of resources and finance from company are found at the intermediate level of hierarchy and they can be influenced by the barriers at the lower level and influence the barriers on the and higher levels. The operational level barrier namely “Inadequate Information Technology system” is at the top of the hierarchy and can be driven by all the barriers at the lower level.

The present findings are based on the opinions of experts only from Indian CRIP sectors so the results may require to be validated in other contexts.

The structural model presenting the interdependencies will be a guide for the CRIP supply chain professionals in understanding and ranking the barriers they may face while implementing the RL system.

The study contributes to the existing literature by providing a set of barriers and their interdependencies faced during the implementation of an RL system implementation in CRIP sectors. It is one of the first studies which identifies barriers applicable to the CRIP firms in India and models their inter-dependencies. Additionally Consequently, these firms can make a move forward towards a circular economy by overcoming these interlinked barriers.

This paper aims to conceptualize perceived management consulting success, derive relevant success factors based on principal-agent theory and the resource-based view as well as investigate the particular factors’ influence. Management consulting has become important for improving the competitiveness of a variety of firms. Surprisingly, there is little empirical evidence clarifying what constitutes a successful management consulting project.

The authors conduct a survey to empirically investigate the hypotheses. They develop the survey instrument through a literature review, expert interviews, a pre-test and an item-sorting test. To analyze the data from 348 management consultants, the authors apply structural equation modeling. Additionally, they choose a triangulation approach by asking secondary informants about the originally surveyed consultants’ responses.

Initially, the authors develop the second-order construct perceived management consulting success, consisting of the factors compliance with budget and schedule, degree of target achievement, profitability as well as expansion and extension. Additionally, they develop an understanding of management consulting’s success factors. In this regard, five of six factors show a significant impact on perceived management consulting success.

According to the results, the factor intensity of collaboration is of highest importance for perceived management consulting success. Further, the factors common vision, consultant expertise and top management support show comparably strong significant influences. Yet, the authors have to reject the hypothesis about trust. This result conveys the complicacy of the consultant–client relationship and shows that building a trustful relationship between both parties is hard to accomplish.

Multisided platforms (MSPs) have become omnipresent. Millennial consumers have taken well to MSPs. It has become imperative to explicate the process of adoption of MSPs by millennials. The purpose of this study is to comprehend the factors that lead to the adoption of MSPs by millennials beyond the factors identified in the technology acceptance model (TAM).

Data was collected from 252 respondents through a structured survey questionnaire to comprehend MSP adoption. Partial least squares structured equation modelling was applied for analysis.

The theoretical lens of TAM was applied for the study. Results indicated that over and above TAM, millennials’ intention to use of MSPs was moderated by ethical expectations, as well as ethnocentric thinking. The study, thus, extended TAM theoretical conversation by including factors of consumer ethnocentric behaviour and customer ethical considerations.

This study modifies the TAM factors theoretically by including two new factors, namely, customers’ ethical expectations and ethnocentric thinking.

This study results would help MSP firm managers comprehend the importance of consideration of consumer ethnocentric behaviour and customer ethical considerations. Thus, managers have to include in their MSPs’ aspects of customers’ ethical expectations and ethnocentric thinking while marketing their MSPs’ while doing business with millennials.

This was one of the first studies that extended TAM by adding the factors of ethical expectations and ethnocentric thinking in the context of MSP adoption for millennial customers.

As various different and even contradictory concepts are proposed to depict a firm's capabilities related to big data, and extant relevant research is fragmented and scattered in several disciplines, there is currently a lack of holistic and comprehensive understanding of how big data alters value creation by facilitating firm capabilities. To narrow this gap, this study aims to synthesize current knowledge on the firm capabilities and transformation of value creation facilitated by big data.

The authors adopt an inductive and rigorous approach to conduct a systematic review of 185 works, following the “Grounded Theory Literature-Review Method”.

The authors introduce and develop the concept of big data competency, present an inductive framework to open the black box of big data competency following the logic of virtual value chain, provide a structure of big data competency that consists of two dimensions, namely, big data capitalization and big data exploitation, and further explain the evolution of value creation structure from value chain to value network by connecting the attributes of big data competency (i.e. connectivity and complementarity) with the transformation of value creation (i.e. optimizing and pioneering).

The big data competency, an inclusive concept of firm capabilities to deal with big data, is proposed. Based on this concept, the authors highlight the significant contributions that extant research has made toward our understanding of how big data alters value creation by facilitating firm capabilities. Besides, the authors provide a future research agenda that academics can rely on to study the strategic management of big data.

Friction stir processing (FSP) is overviewed with the process variables, along with the thermal aspect of different metals.

With its inbuilt advantages, FSP is used to reduce the failure in the structural integrity of the body panels of automobiles, airplanes and lashing rails. FSP has excellent process ability and surface treatability with good corrosion resistance and high strength at elevated temperatures. Process parameters such as rotation speed of the tool, traverse speed, tool tilt angle, groove design, volume fraction and increase in number of tool passes should be considered for generating a processed and defect-free surface of the workpiece.

FSP process is used for modifying the surface by reinforcement of composites to improve the mechanical properties and results in the ultrafine grain refinement of microstructure. FSP uses the frictional heat and mechanical deformation for achieving the maximum performance using the low-cost tool; the production time is also very less.

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The purpose of this study is to explore the role of accountants as advisors in professional services firms (PSFs), and it examines the impact of digital transformation on the work, knowledge and skills of accountants in their role as advisors in PSFs.

Data were collected using semi-structured interviews predominantly with partners in Australian PSFs, including the Big4 and directors of professional accounting bodies.

The findings show that accountants as advisors fill a critical role in PSFs as they represent substantial human capital for such firms. Accountants as advisors are a valuable strategic resource because of their unique capabilities in combining generic human capital with digital human capital and social capital resources. Some differences between the Big4 and non-Big4 were found in terms of services offered that were attributable to the respective industry foci and resource availability.

The findings have broader implications for both the accounting profession and the education sector in terms of providing a better, and more overt, understanding of what the future holds for the accounting profession and the relevant knowledge and skills required. Also, recruiters and managers at PSFs are likely to benefit from the findings.

Evidence from PSFs provides insights into an evolutionary path for the accounting profession, and the knowledge and skills accountants need to work in that increasingly competitive domain, due to digital transformation.