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This paper aims to review the latest management developments across the globe and pinpoint practical implications from cutting-edge research and case studies.

This briefing is prepared by an independent writer who adds their own impartial comments and places the articles in context.

Researchers from India have constructed a scale to measure organizational stress among women workers in the garment industry. The scale was found to be reliable and valid for the purpose. The analysis identified the main causes of stress as job-related stress, organization-related, social and personal.

The briefing saves busy executives, strategists and researchers hours of reading time by selecting only the very best, most pertinent information and presenting it in a condensed and easy-to-digest format.

The Singapore construction sector is promoting performance improvement by implementing collaborative contracting (CC). For CC's successful implementation, there is a need to sieve out the critical success factors (CSFs). Hence, this paper aims to explore factors influencing the adoption of CC and investigate the potential performance improvement by implementing CC.

Based on the literature review, 23 CSFs were identified and packaged to a questionnaire to evaluate the CSF's priority as well as CC's potential impact on the project performance. After prior validation, 165 potential respondents were drawn from survey list by using simple random sampling. Finally, 31 valid responses were received.

The survey result showed that the top five CSFs are mutual trust, all parties to commit fully, openness between parties, commitment to a win–win attitude and resource availability. The majority of respondents hold that CC implementation would improve overall project performance, decision effectiveness, cost, time, quality and risk performance.

Directors, project managers, contractor managers and site engineers have different perceptions of CSFs. Also rather than meeting the same requirements in the implementation of CC, there are differences among projects with different values.

This study provides an in-depth understanding of the CSFs for industry practitioners adopting CC and CC's potential impact on project performance. This study is also helpful for authorities to formulate effective policies to push the implementation of CC.

This study intends to review studies on the success criteria and critical success factors (CSFs) for mega infrastructure construction projects (MICPs) from journal articles between 2000 and 2018 to (1) identify the publication trend of success criteria and CSFs for MICPs; (2) explore distributions of selected papers, including the distribution of journals, authors’ origin/country and publications by country or region focus; and (3) summarize the findings of success criteria and CSFs studies of MICPs.

A methodical and systematic analysis of 38 selected journal articles was conducted using descriptive analysis to obtain the annual trend of publications, distributions of publication sources, contributors’ origin/country, regions/countries of research focus, methods involved in publications and thematic analysis to identify and categorize success criteria and CSFs for MICPs.

Australia, the USA, UK, China and Hong Kong had been the leading contributors for publications on success criteria and CSFs for MICPs; meanwhile, China, Australia and the UK have been the countries of focus for most studies on this specific topic. This review identified 20 success criteria grouped into 5 constructs and 36 CSFs grouped into 5 categories and, respectively, integrated them into two conceptual frameworks. The top five CSFs were adequate resource availability, partnering/relationships with key stakeholders, adequate communication and coordination among related parties, public support or acceptance and clear strategic vision. Three implications, namely, evaluation indicators, relationships between CSFs and the success of MICPs and human-related factors, are highlighted in future research.

The identified success criteria and CSFs provide a basis for evaluating the success possibility of MICPs and serve to identify areas for further improvement. Additionally, the CSFs checklist and framework have been established, which could help to conduct further empirical studies. Finally, the holistic analysis identifies gaps in the body of knowledge, revealing avenues for future research.

Purpose: Post COVID-19 disruptions, a new era of online education has begun in India providing new opportunities for imparting quality education. This study aims to explore, identify and understand the factors motivating students to enrol in online courses and facilitate decision-making for students, EdTech firms and policymakers at government level.

Methodology: The study used predominantly a qualitative research design drawing data from students pursuing graduation/post-graduation from universities in the Delhi NCR region. In the first phase, 10 groups with 8–10 members were formulated, and focus group discussions were held. The deliberations were analyzed to identify and screen factors influencing their choice to enrol in online courses. In the second phase, identified factors were presented to the students for giving their rankings to identified factors.

Findings: The student inputs in focus group discussions led to identification of factors, namely low cost, convenience, accessibility, quality education, personalized attention, availability of expert faculty, scholarship opportunities, attractive course design, availability of internet technologies like Google Meet, credibility of degree, usefulness of knowledge and skills learnt and value of online courses towards employability.

Research Limitations/Implications: The study is limited to students from the Delhi NCR region. Thus, findings cannot be generalized for other regions.

Originality/Value: Existing literature suggests that no study has been conducted in India to explore factors influencing student choice of online education. The growth of EdTech companies and government inclination towards online education necessitates research on student perceptions of online courses.

Organisational strategy becomes reality by connecting organisation’s resources and capabilities in daily operations, and physical workspace is one of the environments in which this takes place. This study aims to explore to what extent factors required for successful strategy implementation are considered when designing, using and managing workspaces of knowledge-intensive organisations.

For the study, managers in 25 large and medium-sized knowledge-intensive organisations were interviewed. The semi-structured interviews focused on organisation’s strategy, strategy implementation practices and workspace design and management. To form a comprehensive framework of strategy implementation success factors for the study, the factors of 11 frameworks were analysed, grouped and renamed.

Current workspace design, usage and management mainly support human-related strategy implementation factors. However, both organisation- and human-related factors are needed for the strategy implementation to be successful. Therefore, the organisations studied may have unused potential in their workspaces to ensure strategy-aligned operations and behaviour.

Due to the potential imbalance between organisation- and human-related strategy implementation factors, a more holistic, organisational-level approach to workspace design, usage and management is recommended to ensure the success of strategy implementation.

Workspaces have extensively been studied from individual strategy implementation factors’ as well as employees’ perspectives. Prior to this work, there are only few studies exploring workspace in the holistic, strategy implementation context.

This study focuses on the key success factors (KSFs) for strategy implementation in the fisheries industry in Iceland identified by chief executive officers within the industry. The purpose is to provide a comprehensive categorization of KSFs that influence how strategy is mobilized. The secondary aim is to uncover the level of priority that companies place on the dimensions of the United Nations (UN) Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

The methodology involves qualitative case studies based on in-depth elite interviews with nine chief executive officers of Icelandic fishing companies.

The research indicates strategy implementation can be improved in four main areas. First, by engaging and involving all employees in the implementation process. Second, by enhancing bottom-up innovation and communication. Third, through alignment of the corporate strategy and the UN SDGs, and fourth, by following rigorous action plans with clear, measurable and prioritized objectives and timeframes for the managers to follow. These improvements have both theoretical and practical implications for the fishing industry. Consequently, a conceptual framework for integrated strategy implementation in the fisheries industry is proposed.

A limited number of in-depth elite interviews were conducted since access to the chief executive officers of the country’s largest fishing companies proved challenging. However, the nine companies collectively hold nearly 50% of the country’s total quota, thereby proving a deep understanding of the topic relevant to the industry. The research uncovered a substantial cross-section of viewpoints, and as such, the results are relevant for both academia and practitioners alike.

This study contributes to the debate on KSFs relevant to strategy implementation within a specific industry but also aligns with the UN SDGs by proposing a dedicated framework for implementing strategies in the fisheries industry. Overall, this study can help managers achieve strategy implementation.

The work-from-home scheme (WFH) is increasingly being adopted in service firms. However, the blurred border between employees’ work and life can create work–life conflict (WLC) that negatively affects their well-being. Therefore, identifying factors that help employees overcome WLC and nurture their well-being is imperative. From a transformative service research (TSR) and personal psychology perspective, this study aims to explore the roles of service employee state of mindfulness and resilience in reducing WLC, alleviating its negative effects and ultimately nurturing their happiness.

A structural model was proposed. Data were collected from 339 WFH employees in various knowledge-based services such as professional services, information, education and training, financial consulting and marketing. Direct, indirect, mediating and moderating effects were estimated using the CB-SEM method.

Mindfulness is the overarching capability that helps reduce WLC and raise resilience. It nurtures WFH employee happiness not only directly but also via the mediation of resilience and WLC. Resilience, on the other hand, mediates the effect of mindfulness on happiness and moderates the negative impact of WLC on happiness.

Firms are recommended to organize mindfulness and resilience training programs, and encourage organizational- and job-related facilitators. WFH employees should actively participate in such programs and add them to their to-do-list practices.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study is among the first empirical studies of employee mindfulness and resilience in the WFH context. It contributes to the TSR research stream and enriches the concepts of mindfulness and resilience by elucidating different mechanisms in which each of these personal qualities operates to help employees nurture happiness in this specific working condition.

Although change is a necessary part of organisational life, achieving a successful change is complex. Change readiness is a critical element in successful change implementation, yet studies assessing change readiness as an underlying mechanism in the link between organisational-level factors and successful change implementation are scarce, particularly in the African context. Accordingly, the present study examined the extent to which change readiness mediates the link between learning organisation and successful change implementation in the Ghanaian context.

The study utilized a standardized questionnaire to collect data from 364 participants, working in public and private universities in Ghana. The participants were selected via the convenience sampling strategy to complete the survey on the main variables at a single point in time. The study was purely quantitative, as path analysis – a form of structural equation modelling was employed to test the hypothesized relationships in the study.

The results show that both learning organisation and change readiness facilitated successful change implementation. Finally, it was observed that change readiness served as an important mediating mechanism in the link between learning organisation and successful change implementation.

Change readiness was found to explain the link between learning organisation and successful change implementation. Thus, it is important that managers and leaders of public and private sector educational institutions in Ghana invest resources into preparing and getting employees to accept, be committed to and ready for change.

The present study contributes to the scarce knowledge of the mediating role of change readiness in the link between learning organisation and successful change implementation in the African context.

The purpose of this study is to examine how employees’ deference to leader authority may induce their unethical pro-organizational behavior (UPB) and whether this translation is more likely to materialize in the presence of two personal factors (dispositional greed and proactive personality) and two organizational factors (workplace status and job rotation).

The empirical assessment of the research hypotheses relies on quantitative survey data collected among 350 Canadian-based employees who work in the healthcare sector. The statistical analyses include hierarchical moderated regression.

The role of deference to leader authority in stimulating UPB is greater when employees (1) have a natural disposition to always want more, (2) enjoy initiative taking, (3) believe that they have a great deal of prestige in the organization and (4) operate in an organizational environment in which job rotation across different departments is encouraged.

The results inform managers about the risk that employees’ willingness to obey organizational authorities unconditionally might escalate into negative behaviors that can cause harm to both the organization and employees in the long run, as well as the personal and organizational circumstances in which this escalation is more likely to occur.

This study extends extant research by investigating the conditional effects of an unexplored determinant of UPB, namely, a personal desire to defer to organizational leaders.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate employees’ perception of their organization and to examine the impact of such perception on overall employee satisfaction using qualitative and quantitative employee reviews in an online platform.

The employee online reviews were classified into positive and negative sentiments using sentiment analysis. Further, multiple regression was employed to examine the impact of sentiments (positive and negative) and employee ratings on pre-defined job attributes in explaining overall employee satisfaction with the organization.

The findings of the sentiment analysis shows that employee online reviews exhibit more positive sentiments than negative sentiments. Positive sentiments show a significant positive effect, and negative sentiments show a significant inverse relationship with overall employee satisfaction. Further, pre-defined job attributes are differently related to overall employee satisfaction with the organization, skill development being the strongest predictor.

Practitioners may customize the organization's policies and practices based on the sentiments associated with employee reviews. Organizations emphasizing employee engagement and satisfaction are suggested to include skill development as their priority.

Most existing work on overall employee satisfaction is primarily based on the survey questionnaire method; only recently, online employee reviews (OERs) are gaining attention. The current research uses employee online reviews to study overall employee satisfaction.