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This paper aims to examine the impact of humble leadership on project success. The authors propose that such an effect is mediated by team-building, and top management support moderates the direct relationship (humble leadership and project success) as well as an indirect relationship through team-building.

Data were collected from 337 individuals employed in the information technology sector of Pakistan. A two-step approach consisting confirmatory factor analysis and structural equation modeling was used for analysis. To examine conditional direct and indirect effects, the authors utilized model 8 in PROCESS.

The results showed that humble leadership is positively related to project success. Furthermore, team-building partially mediates the relationship between humble leadership and project success. Moreover, top management support was anticipated to have a moderating effect on the direct and indirect link (via team-building) between humble leadership and project success.

Drawing on the conservation of resources theory, this study found that how humble leadership is vital for project success, and thus, extends the utility of the concept of humble leadership to the project literature.

This study examines whether financial development affects entrepreneurship, and how financial openness moderate this relationship.

The study employs panel data consisting of 781 country-year observations of 48 countries of Asia for the period 2001–2018.

The study provides empirical support for the eclectic theory of entrepreneurship in Asian countries. The findings of the study indicate that effective allocation of resources and ease of transactions increases the entrepreneurial activities in the country. Additionally, the less stringent regulations, allowing for the cross border transactions, increase the funds availability to the entrepreneurs which in turn increase innovation and establishment of new businesses.

The study only considered the moderating influence of financial openness on the nexus. Other indicators such as governance quality and political stability could also have significant impact on entrepreneurship. Further, our study was based on countries belonging to Asian continent. Since Asian continent has culture distinguished from other regions, therefore, the results cannot be generalized to the other continents.

The study’s results provide insight to policymakers and regulators that in order to increase the entrepreneurial activities, the financial sector improvement is of paramount importance. The regulators should focus on well-functioning financial system and availability of capital to improve the investor's confidence and boost economic activities.

The study provides novel evidence on the effects of financial development on entrepreneurship and moderating influence of financial openness in the context of the entire Asian region, which is yet an unexplored area. This paper offers a fresh contribution in this area.

The authors examine the impact of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic on the stock market, forex market and gold market of Pakistan.

By using the daily data of COVID-19 confirmed cases, stock index, foreign currency rates and gold prices for the period 10 March 2020 to 16 October 2020, the authors explore that the stock index negatively responds to the corona pandemic.

Additionally, the authors observe the price hikes in gold and foreign currency corresponding to the number of COVID-19 positive cases.

The study analysis unveils that the stock market adversely responds to a pandemic, whereas, forex and gold markets serve as a safe haven for investors at the time of financial distress.

This study complements the literature and provides empirical evidence of the stock market, the gold market and foreign currency market, in the perspective of Pakistan.

The aim of this research is to understand how government incentives (financial and non-financial) influence the relationship between green innovation and Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in SMEs.

To contribute to the literature, this research uses empirical evidence of 204 Pakistani small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and tests the moderating role of government support between green innovation and SDGs.

The findings indicate that green innovation has a significant influence on SDGs, community development and environmental activities. The government support significantly strengthens the relationship between green innovation and environmental practices, while it does not moderate the path between green innovation and community development.

The research recommends SMEs focus on the adoption of green innovation and green technology to protect the environment and facilitate the community. Moreover, the research advises the government to assist SMEs financially and nonfinancially, so they will in turn help in the attainment of SDGs.

This research is the first attempt to assess the importance of green innovation in SDGs with a moderating role of government incentives in emerging SMEs. It provides several useful implications for policymaking.

With a foundation in the conservation of resource theory, this paper aims to examine the validity of a conceptual model that explains the mechanism connecting perceived threat of terrorism to production deviance. The link between perceived threat of terrorism and production deviance was examined via emotional exhaustion. Notably, the study evaluated whether the relationship between perceived threat of terrorism and production deviance is mediated by emotional exhaustion and moderated by levels of emotional intelligence.

The study is cross-sectional in nature and data were collected from 432 pharmaceutical sales representatives who operate outdoors in the high-risk region. Two-step approach consisting confirmatory factor analysis and structural equation modeling was used for analysis. To examine conditional direct and indirect effects, the authors used model 8 in PROCESS.

Results were consistent with prediction made from the conceptual model in that emotional exhaustion partially mediated the relationship between perceived threat of terrorism and production deviance. This was particularly the case when emotional intelligence was low, but not when high. Likewise, perceived threat of terrorism exerted a direct effect on production deviance when emotional intelligence was low, but not when high.

The study is the first to examine the relationship between perceived threat of terrorism and production deviance. Moreover, no study to date has examined the mediating role of emotional exhaustion between perceived threat of terrorism and production deviance. Finally, up till now, it is unknown that emotional intelligence moderates the relationship of perceived threat of terrorism with emotional exhaustion and production deviance.

Road and transportation has a significant role in the prosperity, economic growth and development of a region. The main purpose of this study is to conduct an in-depth analysis of local residents’ attitude towards road and transport infrastructure (China–Pakistan economic corridor, CPEC) and the wider economic, social, cultural and environmental impact on local people.

Data were collected using a questionnaire survey from the local people. Factor analysis and structural equation modelling approach were used to test the relation between the observed and latent variables.

The result discovered that road infrastructure has significant socio-economic and cultural impacts that significantly affect the local people support for CPEC development. It also revealed that more promotion and awareness regarding benefits of the project for dwellers lead to more support of the local residents in the study area.

Information provided by this study will help policymakers to gain local resident support for the project and make policies accordingly for the future projects.

This study investigated the attitude and support of the local people based on the road infrastructure’s social, economic, cultural and environmental impact, which has never been examined in the existing literature.

Islamic label of an organization attracts Muslims for investment. There is a rising concern with a huge profile of corporate governance related to the Islamic rules (principles). In this context, this study aims to examine the effect of Islamic labelling on corporate governance in the Pakistani setting.

This study used a panel data set comprising 120 non-financial Shariah-compliant and non-Shariah-compliant Islamic firms listed on the Pakistan Stock Exchange over the period 2013–2020. For analysis, this study used static panel data estimation techniques. Moreover, for robustness check, this study also applied the system generalized method of movements procedure.

The findings deduced from empirical estimations reveal that Islamic labelling is positively associated with corporate governance. Overall, results indicate that Islamic labelling promotes corporate governance practices in Pakistan.

It is of utmost importance in terms of both theoretical and empirical context that Pakistan is a Muslim country having a 96.5% Muslim population, and it is evident that Muslims are allowed to execute their business under the guidance of Shariah principles. This study is unique because most of the previous literature provides empirical support related to the impact of corporate governance on capital structure, profitability and firm performance in conventional and Islamic firms. Practically, there is scarce literature on this issue.

This paper investigates the legitimacy tactics used in the annual reports of UK listed companies in the aftermath of major corporate scandals.

We carried out a content analysis of annual reports of 19 companies that have been involved in corporate scandals with a view to understand how firms communicate negative scandals affecting them.

The findings reveal that firms use a wide range of legitimisation strategies in the manner that contribute to shape disclosure communications concerning negative incidents. For instance, some firms may offset the negativity linked to an incident by rendering such explanations amidst positive information.

Contrary to earlier studies conducted on accounting scandals, the authors incorporated extensive corporate scandals such as human rights violations, controversies concerning child labour, environmental scandals, corruption, financial embezzlement and tax evasion.

One of the main obstacles to the flourishment of African entrepreneurship is financial constraint. Existing studies on the nexus between entrepreneurship and financial development are inconclusive, while the position of African economies remains unknown. The purpose of this paper is to empirically study the impact of financial development on entrepreneurship in Africa.

This study utilizes data of 20 selected countries in Africa over a period of 2006–2017. International Monetary Fund (IMF) data on broad-based financial development were combined with World Bank Entrepreneurship database. This study uses system generalized methods of moments (system GMM) technique and the recently developed dynamic panel threshold based on dynamic panel GMM.

The following findings emerged: financial development does not spur entrepreneurship in Africa; there is a threshold at which financial development improves the level of African entrepreneurship; and the tendency of financial development to improve the level of entrepreneurship is conditioned on conducive business regulation and strong institutional quality at a specific threshold value.

This is one of the few studies that examines the impact of financial development on entrepreneurship in Africa. This study shows that the financial development relies on the effectiveness of regulatory environment to extend loan and other financial services to new firm entrants. In addition, the results of this study reveal that the assumption of linearity in the nexus between finance and entrepreneurship is not tenable for the case of Africa. Therefore, policymakers should keep on developing African financial system to accelerate the pace of entrepreneurship development.

This study aims to examine how corporate financial flexibility, financial sector development and the regulatory environment influence corporate investment decisions in an emerging economy after controlling for several macroeconomic factors.

The authors estimated random-effects models to empirically examine the impacts of corporate financial flexibility, banking sector development, equity market development, regulatory quality and corruption on corporate investment decisions. The empirical analysis is based on an unbalanced annual panel data set of a sample of 198 non-financial firms listed on the Pakistan Stock Exchange for the period 1992–2018.

The results show that financially flexible firms tend to invest more. The increased banking sector development, stock market development and better regulatory quality play a pivotal role for enabling firms to increase their investment ability. However, the results reveal that corruption acts as a barrier and reduces corporate investments during the examined period. The results suggest that unused borrowing capacity is a good source of financial flexibility. These results strongly support the pecking order theory, which explains why firms incline toward internal sources for financing their investments and why they prefer debt to equity when go for external financing.

The empirical findings of the study enable corporate managers to make better financing and investment decisions by understanding the significance of the attainment and maintenance of the corporate financial flexibility to enhance firm value. Furthermore, the findings enable corporate managers to examine and understand the role of banking sector development (BSD), equity market development (EMD), regulatory quality and the role of corruption in affecting corporate firms' investment ability, allowing them to make appropriate investment decisions, especially from an emerging economy perspective. The findings also help investors in making appropriate investment decisions while they are purchasing financial assets. Finally, the findings of the study have some implications for regulators as well. Specifically, the findings suggest that the authorities should implement economic and financial policies favoring banking sector as well as equity market development to enhance corporate investment.

The study significantly adds to the literature by examining the impact of financial flexibility, financial sector development and regulatory environment on corporate investment decisions. According to the authors' knowledge, the empirical evidence examining the impact of all of these factors on corporate investment is very scarce. Therefore, this study is an effort to fill the gap left in the literature.