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This study explored the experiences of Irish emergency medical services (EMS) first responders during the first nationwide restrictions to curb the spread of COVID-19.

A systematic literature review (SLR) of research into healthcare workers' and first responders' experiences during the COVID-19 and 2003 SARS pandemics was performed. The SLR informed the content of an online questionnaire distributed via the Irish Pre-Hospital Emergency Care Council to 2,092 first responders on its live register. Data analysis used both descriptive and content analysis.

EMS first responders faced many challenges including PPE quality, training on its use, issues with decontamination facilities, and organisational effectiveness. Emotional challenges included the anxiety experienced, the impact on families, and ethical dilemmas confronted related to patient care. Positive findings also emerged, such as first responders' dedication to working through the pandemic, collegiality, and the community goodwill displayed.

While investigations of the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on healthcare workers have been undertaken globally, studies focussing exclusively on the experiences of EMS first responders have been rare. This study addressed this knowledge gap, providing an insight into the challenges and successes experienced by first responders and identifying opportunities for learning that can be applied to future public health emergencies.

The purpose of this paper is to explore how gamification may be used for project stakeholder engagement.

The paper presents the results of a systematic literature review of extant research concerning the gamification of projects. Based on this, an agenda for future studies is outlined.

Extant research on the gamification of projects is scarce and scattered among various disciplines, but the engineering fields dominate. The research performed does indicate that gamification may be used for involving stakeholders in projects, primarily by promoting learning, but also by engaging them, motivating action and solving problems.

In several cases, extant research display poor quality in research design and a lack in cross-disciplinary perspectives, which means that more research is needed. The users’ perspective is often lacking. Furthermore, the ideas gamification might be “hidden” within other technologies.

The findings of this research may assist project management practitioners in the endeavor of adopting gamification principles to better involve stakeholders.

The study fills a gap in summarizing the research on how gamification may be used to promote project stakeholder engagement. Based on this, it proposes a research agenda for future research on the use of gamification to promote project stakeholder engagement.

The purpose of this study is to examine the potential of integrating material from the arts into postgraduate curricula to deepen students’ engagement with marketing phenomena. The authors assess the use of arts-based activities, within a broader critical pedagogy, for encouraging imaginative and analytical thinking.

The authors devised two learning activities and an interpretive method for studying their value. The activities were an individual essay connecting themes in song lyrics to marketing, and a group photography project. These were applied, within a broader, critical approach, in postgraduate modules on sustainability, ethics and critical marketing. Data collection comprised diaries kept by the teachers, open-ended feedback from students and students’ assignments.

Students showed high levels of engagement, reflexivity and depth of thought, in felt experiences of learning. Their ability to make connections not explicitly in the materials, and requiring imaginative jumps, was notable. Several reported lasting changes to their behaviour. Some found the tasks initially intimidating or, once they were more engaged, stressful or saddening.

This adds to scholarship on management education by showing the usefulness of an arts-based approach towards a transformative agenda.

It offers a template of how to draw from the arts to strengthen critical engagement upon which marketing teachers can build. It also contains practical advice on the challenges and benefits of doing so.

The authors provide evidence that this approach can enhance sensitivity and reflexivity in students, potentially producing more ethical and sustainable decisions in future.

The pedagogical interventions are novel and of value to lecturers seeking to enhance critical engagement with theory. An empirical study of an attempt to integrate arts into teaching marketing represents a promising direction, given the discipline’s creative nature.

The objective of this research is to analyze the microfoundations of dynamic capabilities used by microbreweries in Porto Alegre (Brazil) in their coopetition strategies.

A case study with a qualitative approach was developed. Data were collected during interviews with owners of 11 microbreweries, via analysis of documents and nonparticipatory observation. The authors used the content analysis technique to infer knowledge.

The authors identified the microfoundations of dynamic coopetition capabilities including collective purchases, shared distribution expenses, shared production, education of consumers and other beer producers, group interaction and a business roundtable with entrepreneurs from the food and drink sector in the hospitality industry.

The authors developed a framework that considers the relationship between the microfoundations of dynamic capabilities and coopetition regarding the paradox between competition and cooperation. It is relevant to identify different actors’ movements and the potential outcomes of coopetitive strategies, which yield a competitive advantage for the cluster.

Together, the microfoundations of dynamic capabilities contribute to the competitive advantage of the cluster.

The study highlights how small companies can jointly develop competitive advantage in a market dominated by a large company.

The purpose of this paper is to analyse international business (IB) scholarship and present current gaps and new realities to enhance scholarly discourse.

The paper divides the scholarship into three distinct sections. First, it interrogates the changing definitions of the field from the 1880s to date. Secondly, IB paradigms are cross-examined while highlighting the understudied emerging interaction paradigm. Lastly, literature gaps, methodological gaps and new realities in IB are presented.

This research shows that IB inquiry has concentrated on firm-level paradigms, leaving the emerging interaction paradigm understudied. As a result, there is a deficit of novel ideas and limited research on critical emerging issues affecting IB. Further, simplistic methodologies are prevalent, making IB scholarship weak. Additionally, a majority of studies concentrate on the Americas, Europe and Asia, leaving Africa understudied.

This research augments the need for scholars to cross-examine the best approach to apply in IB discourse and presents gaps calling for new insights and future research directions.

This research aims to determine the factors that affected Bitcoin price return in the period before and during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The independent variables used in this study are hashrate, transaction volume, social media and some macroeconomics variables. The data are processed using the vector error correction model (VECM) to determine the short-term and long-term relationships between variables.

The research shows that (1) Twitter and Gold significantly affected Bitcoin in the short term before the COVID-19 pandemic; (2) hashrate, transaction volume, Twitter and the financial stress index had a significant effect on Bitcoin in the long term before the COVID-19 pandemic; (3) the volatility index had a significant effect on Bitcoin in the short term during the COVID-19 pandemic; and (4) hashrate, transaction volume, Twitter and CHF/USD had a significant effect on Bitcoin in the long term during the COVID-19 pandemic.

This research provides explanation about factors affecting Bitcoin so investors and regulators can pay more attention and prepare for the potential risks as well as to get a good understanding of market conditions for greater crypto adoption in the future.

The novelty in this study is the various factors driving the Bitcoin price were analyzed before and during the COVID-19 pandemic including the social media, as sentiment, interestingly, is being a predictive power for Bitcoin price return.

This research examines the growth of intellectual assets in Islamic banking (IB) in Indonesia and intellectual capital (IC) growth to predict Islamic commercial banks' (ICBs) current and future profitability.

This research is a quantitative descriptive research, a study that emphasizes theory testing by measuring research variables with numbers that aim to test the hypothesis. The object of this research is sharia banking companies listed on the Indonesia Stock Exchange during 2014–2019. This study takes IB companies as an object because IB has its types of relatively different transactions from conventional banking or commercial banks.

The results show that the rate of growth of IC (ROGIC) for ICBs in Indonesia can predict the current year's financial performance but has not been able to predict the profitability of the future year.

This study examines the predictive value rate of IC return in predicting current and next three years’ earnings, which previous researchers have never done.

The adoption of digitalization and sustainability is key phenomenon that has changed perception and behaviors of people recently. As there is a rising power of digital communication by social media platforms, there is higher interaction between people globally. In addition, consumers can influence each other to adopt new consumption pattern. At this point, this paper aims to examine the role of green women influencers on promoting sustainable consumption patterns via social media platforms.

This study employed qualitative research method. The study included four top-lists for green/sustainable social media influencers as a sample case. Then, the data were analyzed by descriptive content analysis. To determine the role of green women influencers in sustainable consumption, this study used classification and categorization technique through descriptive content analysis.

The study indicates that green women are seen as a primary social media influencer because of promoting sustainable consumption patterns in general. Especially, green women have more power to change consumption patterns via digital platforms. Green women social media influencers, who are micro-celebrities, share primary contents such as sustainable fashion, green foods, sustainable travel, sustainable lifestyle, conscious choices, green cosmetics and zero waste life to promote sustainable consumption patterns. Women social media influencers are much more effective than men influencers to transform society's consumption behaviors into sustainable consumption patterns.

The study provides some qualitative findings based on the selected four top-listed green social media influencers by different social media platforms. Future studies can find out different results based on different sample cases and employ quantitative research methodology.

The study suggests policymakers to cooperate with green women social media influencers to achieve sub-targets of 2030 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Especially, it is suggested to cooperate with micro-celebrities or Internet celebrities to promote sustainable consumption patterns.

The study proves that women social media influencers have the essential role in promoting green/sustainable consumption patterns via digital platforms. In addition, green women influencers can guide their followers to adopt sustainable consumption patterns.

This paper examines how board structure influences real earnings management and the interaction effect of CEO narcissism on board structure-real earnings management relationship.

The authors used panel data derived from secondary sources from publicly listed firms in Kenya during 2002–2017. Hierarchical regression analysis was used to test the hypotheses.

The results indicate that board independence, board tenure and size have significant negative effect on real earnings management, while CEO duality positively affects real earnings management. Further, the interaction results show that CEO narcissism moderates the relationship between CEO duality and real earnings management.

The results suggest that real earnings management reduces when boards are independent, large and comprising of long-tenured members. However, when the CEO plays dual role of a chairman, real earnings management increases. The authors also find that when CEOs are narcissists, the monitoring role of the board is compromised.

The study adds value to the understanding of how board structure and CEO narcissism influence the monitoring role of the board among firms listed at Nairobi Securities Exchange.