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This paper aims to use a perspective informed by practice theory to examine the influence of change agents in enacting management control systems (MCS) in the process of shaping strategy.

The research uses a case study approach to examine the implementation of a business strategy in the utility sector. The authors seek a better understanding of practice theory and its role in influencing institutional change and stability.

The case study findings show that the change agents enacted MCS practices that aided the metamorphosis of a once state-owned company into a for-profit enterprise. The findings show how the organisation transformed from a long-established preoccupation with technical systems and engineering and shifted to a focus on customer satisfaction and shareholder interests.

In terms of policy implications, bureaucrats need to appreciate that inculcating business norms is not an easy path and can be met with resistance, which creates delays in strategy implementation. The current study, while reporting some of the influences of tribal loyalty, was nevertheless limited by not having the time and space to examine in-depth the intersections of MCS and strategy within a strongly tribal context. This can be an avenue for future research.

The study helps to understand embedded actors in the implementation of strategy by refocusing research on the actions and interactions of strategy implementation practitioners.

The authors contribute to the literature by seeking to use practice theory and offer a valuable understanding, from the actor level, of how practices are created and enacted. Often accounting studies have paid less attention to the change agents in the process of shaping business-oriented strategic activity. This study enabled us to gain a better understanding of the action and practice behaviour around the strategy-MCS nexus.

The purpose of the study was to ascertain the influence of innovation conviction, innovation mindset and innovation creed on the performance of women entrepreneurs in South African small and medium enterprises and their capacity for innovation. The study also examined how proactive personality and entrepreneurial education moderate the relationship between innovative capability and women entrepreneurs' performance.

The study used a quantitative research design and administered a questionnaire to collect data from participants. Since there was no sampling frame available, purposive sampling, a non-probability sampling technique, was used to select suitable respondents who were identified as entrepreneurial women. Data were collected from 304 women entrepreneurs in the Gauteng province of South Africa. The data were analyzed using smart partial least squares.

The findings demonstrated that innovation conviction, innovation mindset and innovation creed have a positive impact on innovation capability. It was also discovered that innovation capability, proactive personality and entrepreneurial education all positively and significantly impact women entrepreneurs' performance. Furthermore, the results showed that entrepreneurial education and proactive personality had a positive and significant moderating effect on the nexus between innovation capability and the performance of women entrepreneurs.

This study will add to the body of knowledge on women's small business management and entrepreneurship in Africa, two topics that are typically ignored by academics in developing nations.

The purpose of this paper is to study the effect of temperature on Zn–Ni alloys in ChCl–Urea.

Based on cyclic voltammetry experiments, the deposition behavior and kinetics of the Zn–Ni alloy are studied. The nucleation process of the Zn–Ni alloy is studied in detail via chronoamperometry experiments. The effects of the deposition temperature on the microstructure, Ni content and phase composition of Zn–Ni alloy coatings are investigated via scanning electron microscopy and X-ray diffraction (XRD) combined with classical thermodynamics.

The results show that with increasing temperature, the reduction peak shifts toward a more positive electric potential, which is beneficial for the co-electric deposition process, and the diffusion coefficient is estimated. With increasing temperature, the nucleation process of the Zn–Ni alloy becomes a three-dimensional instantaneous nucleation, the typical kinetic parameters are determined using the standard 3D growth proliferation control model and the Gibbs free energy is estimated. The Zn–Ni alloy coatings are prepared via normal co-deposition. With increasing temperature, the degree of crystallinity increases, the coating gradually becomes uniform and compact and the XRD peak intensity increases.

The nucleation process of the Zn–Ni alloy at different temperatures is analyzed. The diffusion coefficient D and Gibbs free energy are calculated. The contribution of the three processes at different temperatures is analyzed. The effect of temperature on the morphology of the Zn–Ni alloy coatings is studied.

Cracking, deformation and rutting are the most prevalent types of pavement distress, and these deformations and flow characteristics greatly distress the pavement features while also limiting its use. In India, on the other hand, more than 300 million scrap tyres are generated each year, and their disposal has become a severe environmental issue. Furthermore, the scrap generated by the used tyre must be disposed of properly. Hence, this study presents the experimental investigations of bitumen incorporating with Crumb rubber as main additive along with SBS polymer, to enhance the engineering property.

Crumb rubber (CR) was used as an additive along with styrene–butadiene–styrene (SBS) polymer to enrich the engineering qualities of the bitumen to reduce the disposal problem of scrap tyres and reduce the risk of environmental pollution. Because SBS polymer is expensive, response surface methodology modelling's central composite design (CCD) was used to optimise the number of tests. CCD modelling's input factors (process variables) were the inclusion rates of SBS and CR, which ranged from 2% to 5% and 4% to 10%, respectively, by total weight. Furthermore, the influence of SBS polymer and CR on the characteristics of modified bitumen was prioritised.

The addition of SBS and CR enhanced the bitumen's penetration resistance at service temperatures. Furthermore, increasing the SBS and CR concentration affected the flow characteristics of the modified bitumen and enhanced its viscosity. The addition of SBS and CR as bitumen modifiers increased penetration resistance by 24.06%. The Dynamic Shear Rheometer test demonstrated that the complex modulus of virgin bitumen increases with increasing SBS and CR content, which is consistent with the shifting softening point trend. The dosing rate of up to 3.5% SBS and 11% CR considerably contributed to the creation of polymer link networks, which increased the complex modulus of the bitumen by 16.5%. The CCD model's analysis of variance and Pareto bar chart demonstrated that the dose of CR is significant in improving the engineering features of the virgin bitumen rather than the SBS.

The utilisation of CR as a bitumen modifier may solve the problem of waste tyre disposal while also lowering the risk of environmental damage. Furthermore, because the presence of CR increased the engineering properties, particularly the complex modulus of virgin bitumen, the use of CR in combination with SBS polymer can be an efficient and cost-effective strategy to improving bitumen qualities.

The purpose of this paper is to examine whether board characteristics moderate the relationship between capital adequacy regulation and bank risk-taking of universal banks in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA).

The paper uses 700 bank-year observations of universal banks in SSA between 2009 and 2019. The paper further uses the two-step generalized method of moments as the baseline estimator.

The paper finds that capital adequacy regulation is positively related to overall bank and liquidity risks. Nonetheless, capital adequacy regulation increases credit risk in the sampled banks. The paper further reports that board characteristics individually and significantly moderate the relationship between capital adequacy regulation and risk-taking.

The findings have implications for regulators of universal banks that board characteristics matter for capital adequacy regulation to impact risk-taking behavior.

The paper extends the existing literature on the effect of board characteristics on the capital adequacy regulations and risk-taking behavior nexus of universal banks.

This paper aims to address the following issues: (1) most existing methods are based on recurrent network, which is time-consuming to train long sequences due to not allowing for full parallelism; (2) personalized preference generally are not considered reasonably; (3) existing methods rarely systematically studied how to efficiently utilize various auxiliary information (e.g. user ID and time stamp) in trajectory data and the spatiotemporal relations among nonconsecutive locations.

The authors propose a novel self-attention network–based model named SanMove to predict the next location via capturing the long- and short-term mobility patterns of users. Specifically, SanMove uses a self-attention module to capture each user's long-term preference, which can represent her personalized location preference. Meanwhile, the authors use a spatial-temporal guided noninvasive self-attention (STNOVA) module to exploit auxiliary information in the trajectory data to learn the user's short-term preference.

The authors evaluate SanMove on two real-world datasets. The experimental results demonstrate that SanMove is not only faster than the state-of-the-art recurrent neural network (RNN) based predict model but also outperforms the baselines for next location prediction.

The authors propose a self-attention-based sequential model named SanMove to predict the user's trajectory, which comprised long-term and short-term preference learning modules. SanMove allows full parallel processing of trajectories to improve processing efficiency. They propose an STNOVA module to capture the sequential transitions of current trajectories. Moreover, the self-attention module is used to process historical trajectory sequences in order to capture the personalized location preference of each user. The authors conduct extensive experiments on two check-in datasets. The experimental results demonstrate that the model has a fast training speed and excellent performance compared with the existing RNN-based methods for next location prediction.

This paper aims to examine the relationship between employees’ perception of corporate social responsibility (CSR) practices in Indian business organizations and psychological capital (PsyCap) during the COVID-19 pandemic.

This research design is conclusive, descriptive and cross-sectional. An online survey was conducted during COVID-19-related lockdowns in India in 2020–2021, using two standardized research instruments. Data was collected from 154 respondents; correlation and regression techniques were applied using SPSS version 25.

Results indicate that employees’ perception of CSR practices was positively correlated with the components of PsyCap, namely, employee self-efficacy, hope, resilience and optimism. Findings indicate that 57.4% of the variance in PsyCap is explained by employees’ perception of CSR.

Studies may be carried out to examine the difference in PsyCap between organizations having strong CSR vis-à-vis weak CSR. The impact of PsyCap on organizations’ performance during states of disruption and chaos is unexamined so far; studies on the said linkage are thus required. Researchers may also examine whether there is a significant difference in organizations’ PsyCap during crisis and non-crisis conditions. Studies on the linkages between EPCSR and organizational resilience, employee performance and employee engagement during crises, with PsyCap in the moderating role will provide further insights into this area of research.

The findings imply that having effective CSR policies can help with the conservation and recovery of psychological resources. Employees’ enhanced self-efficacy, hope, resilience and optimism are the benefits of being a CSR-oriented organization as indicated by the study findings. Investing in CSR would therefore be a win–win situation for organizations, as besides giving back to society and building a great public image for themselves, it would also improve organizations’ PsyCap, which in turn would make businesses resilient and better able to navigate through crises.

This study makes a case for a macro- and micro-level focus on PsyCap. Increasing organizational psychological resources makes it possible to lessen the pandemic’s negative psychological toll and enhance workers’ coping abilities. As evidenced in this study, the CSR practice of organizations is one such way toward it. It is thus in the interest of society, organizations and employees that organizations strengthen their CSR and more so during times of widespread crises.

Extant literature has mostly examined CSR from the macro-level lens during noncrises conditions, with a focus on external stakeholders and in the context of developed Western economies. This research has a micro-level perspective and focuses on the PsyCap of internal stakeholders, i.e. corporate employees in an emerging market, namely, India. It has been conducted in the background of an unprecedented global economic and mental crisis caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, thus making this study very unique and relevant.

The purpose of this paper is to update a previous review work (Abu-khader, 2006, Heat & Mass Transfer, Vol. 43 No. 2, pp. 123-134) and highlight the new research methods on the use of twisted tapes and the application of different configurations of these tape inserts. Also, based on a vast collection of experimental data in open literature, generalized Nusselt number (Nu) and friction factor (f) correlations as the function of twist ratio were developed with maximum error around ± 15 per cent. The present paper examines several case studies which apply complex configurations of twisted inserts.

Using the developed correlations, an equivalent Nusselt number and friction factor of typical type twist insert were generated which achieved the same performance of each complex configuration.

The open literature contains large number of wired and complex configurations of twisted tape inserts. Their applicability to real industrial use is questionable.

This paper presents an up-to-date review on the use of twisted tape in research, highlights the different tape configurations and proposes general correlations for traditional twisted tape inserts.

Many authors describe police culture as a relevant determinant of officers' health, policing behavior and reaction to change. Investigation of such relationships requires an appropriate instrument for measuring police culture.

This paper proposes a questionnaire containing 20 values that are characteristic of police culture (e.g. masculinity, loyalty, solidarity). In an online survey, 153 German police officers described their last workgroups in terms of how typical these values are. Besides conducting item and factor analyses, multiple regression models were tested to explore the effect of group characteristics on police culture.

A four-factor solution, comprising (1) conservative-male culture, (2) institutional pride culture, (3) team culture and (4) diligence culture, seems to fit the data best. Significant predictors of the police culture total score are percentage of male officers, average age of the group and service in a problematic district.

Overall, the results indicate that police culture is a measurable multidimensional construct, which substantially depends on the composition and the operational area of the workgroup. A limitation of the study is the retrospective and subjective assessment of cultural values.

The questionnaire presented in this paper depicts the culture of police workgroups in a differentiated way and is able to detect cultural variation within the police. Future research could draw on the questionnaire to investigate determinants and consequences of police culture.

This paper aims to determine possible differences in causes or characteristics between men and women in attaining the CEO position in large publicly listed companies in the USA.

T-test statistic, correlation analyses and logit model were used to determine the role individual factors (tenure in management roles, age of CEOs, number of children, years of education) and the firm-level factor (number of employees, net income) play in determining the likelihood of having a female CEO.

The research results show that years of education, the number of children and the number of employees in the business play significant roles in determining the likelihood of having a female CEO. An increase in the number of children and years spent in education lower the probability of the CEO being a woman, while having greater number of employees raises the likelihood of having a woman CEO.

The findings are applicable to only the largest publicly traded firms in the USA and are not applicable to mid to small publicly listed, private or non-for-profit companies or institutions. This research is a starting point for future research of women and men CEOs of small and mid-size publicly traded and non-publicly traded firms in the USA.

Prior research has shown that having children is detrimental for women in management positions; this research specifically identifies this problem for the CEO position. It also reveals that having more of education does not translate to getting to the CEO position for women.