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The purpose of this paper is to examine a case of sham compliance performance reporting through the lens of Goffman’s dramaturgy to reveal its dramaturgical structure. It makes a methodological contribution to comprehending “lived experience” accounts of project work, and adds knowledge concerning the behind-the-scenes motivators to sham behaviour in project work.

Using an ethnographic lived experience account, an aspect of project work is reconceptualised as a collection of dramaturgical scenes. These scenes disclose issues beyond the bounds of the traditional project management discourse, and increase knowledge and appreciation of sham and performative behaviour in project work.

Sham progress reporting can emerge in an environment where senior management’s ignorance of project work creates unworkable binds for project staff. Moreover, the sham behaviour succeeds at its objective because senior management are vulnerable to false impressions. This situation raises ethical issues for those involved, and creates an overhead in dealing with the reality of project work.

Limitations to this study are due to the inherent nature of the ethnographic method, where it is difficult to recruit willing participants, particularly in terms of sham behaviour cases. This study has implications for research on sham and performativity behaviour in project work, as studies can benefit from the dramaturgical analysis and Goffmanesque scene illustration techniques that help give focus to particular aspects of social performance, and remove complexity from the narrative.

The research provides practitioners with a way of discussing superfluous compliance process using additional lived experience vocabulary. This could reduce the undue pressure to behave unethically, and reduce the burden to create the extra impression management work.

This study brings a voice to sham behaviour in project work. Continued ignorance of sham behaviour results in unnecessary work and unprofitable projects. Individuals could pay a price in terms of stress and well-being, not discussed.

The recent development of legal rules that can invalidate sham clauses or bogus contracts in employment have proven beneficial to workers, in particular those workers that want to be treated as employees. This paper aims to investigate this issue.

This article considers relevant legal decisions from all areas of employment law that have a bearing on this topic.

As will be seen when a court or tribunal has a reasonable suspicion that the clause (or the contract itself) is a sham that is designed, for example, to exclude employee status (to those persons working under a contract with an employer) they may decide to ignore it and treat the contract as a contract of service. The affected worker will then have entitlement to the full range of employment rights available to an employee.

As a consequence of recent legal decisions particularly, those over the last three years an employer that introduces a clause into his contracts (or enters in contractual relations with his workers) needs to ensure that the clause or contract is genuine and operates in practice as it states that it intends to.

If a clause or contract is not genuine and does not operate in practice as it states that it intends to, as the title of this article suggests, there might be serious legal implications for an employer. The clause (usually a substitution clause) or the type of contract entered into must not simply be a device to circumvent the correct application of the law in other words perpetrate a sham.

The legal impact of clauses or type of contract entered into is analysed fully for the first time in this paper.

The purpose of this paper is to study the steady laminar flow of a pressure driven third‐grade fluid with heat transfer in a horizontal channel. The study serves two purposes: to correct the inaccurate results presented in Siddiqui et al., where the homotopy perturbation method was used, and to demonstrate the computational efficiency and accuracy of the spectral‐homotopy analysis methods (SHAM and MSHAM) in solving problems that arise in fluid mechanics.

Exact and approximate analytical series solutions of the non‐linear equations that govern the flow of a steady laminar flow of a third grade fluid through a horizontal channel are constructed using the homotopy analysis method and two new modifications of this method. These solutions are compared to the full numerical results. A new method for calculating the optimum value of the embedded auxiliary parameter ∼ is proposed.

The “standard” HAM and the two modifications of the HAM (the SHAM and the MSHAM) lead to faster convergence when compared to the homotopy perturbation method. The paper shows that when the same initial approximation is used, the HAM and the SHAM give identical results. Nonetheless, the advantage of the SHAM is that it eliminates the restriction of searching for solutions to the nonlinear equations in terms of prescribed solution forms that conform to the rule of solution expression and the rule of coefficient ergodicity. In addition, an alternative and more efficient implementation of the SHAM (referred to as the MSHAM) converges much faster, and for all parameter values.

The spectral modification of the homotopy analysis method is a new procedure that has been shown to work efficiently for fluid flow problems in bounded domains. It however remains to be generalized and verified for more complicated nonlinear problems.

The spectral‐HAM has already been proposed and implemented by the authors in a recent paper. This paper serves the purpose of verifying and demonstrating the utility of the new spectral modification of the HAM in solving problems that arise in fluid mechanics. The MSHAM is a further modification of the SHAM to speed up converge and to allow for convergence for a much wider range of system parameter values. The utility of these methods has not been tested and verified for systems of nonlinear equations. For this reason as much emphasis has been placed on proving the reliability and validity of the solution techniques as on the physics of the problem.

The purpose of this article is to classify and study the features of the types of non-standard marriages existing in Russia (de facto, sham, same-sex marriages), in order to adjust their legal regulation by the state.

The authors of the article examined the theoretical and practical problems of state recognition and regulation of non-standard marriages not recognized by the state, and justified a new strategy of support (in the case of de facto marriages) or counteraction (in the case of sham marriages) of these social phenomena by the state and law. In the light of the negative attitude of Russian citizens to same-sex marriages, the possibility of their support in the future is justified.

Having studied three types of non-standard marriages, the authors substantiate the need for a different approach of the state to further legal regulation of these social phenomena. It is proved, that in relation to same-sex marriages, the existing non-recognition and negative attitude of the legislator and society in Russia to their legalization will last until the attitude towards sexual minorities in general, changes in Russian society. De facto marriages should be introduced into the legal field, they should be given a normative definition and outline the general legal framework of the rights of de facto spouses and their children. As for sham marriages, it is proposed to consider the lack of intention to create a family and the selfish interest to be their main features pursued by one or both spouses entering into a sham marriage.

The originality and value of the research is stipulated by the consideration of the legal regulation of marriage and family issues in the historical context of the development of the Russian state, as well as the evolution of ideas about morality in Russian society. The changing attitude of society towards de facto marriages, the increase in the number of unregistered married couples indicates the transformation of the moral values of young people and the need for the state to promote the legal protection of such married couples without trying to prohibit or restrict them. Existing approaches to the legal regulation of sham marriages require adjustments, including incorporating the notion of “fictitious divorce” in family legislation.

International students, who have a non-English speaking background (NESB), encounter many difficulties, in comparison to their local fellows of an English-speaking country. Literature demonstrates that leveraging various relational perspectives in a multicultural teaching environment has favourable implications to manage the NESB international students’ academic experience. Based on the observation and introspection approaches and a relevant literature review in relationship management, an ethnographic analysis is conducted to realise how such relational perspectives can be nurtured, in a way that the NESB international students expect and accept in a foreign country.

A literature review in relationship management and an ethnographic analysis based on observation and introspection methods was conducted.

Findings show that universities could assist the NESB international students by designing, delivering and monitoring innovative teaching and learning approaches and taking care of the associated academic and non-academic issues of the students, while leveraging the social, psychological and academic relational perspective(s).

Leveraging relational perspectives offers global implications. The implications of relational perspectives can be used from any setting. However, the relational appeal should be focused on the presented circumstances of a targeted setting only (e.g. the issues of a particular multicultural classroom).

The purpose of this paper is to investigate a benchmarking project carried out by the Dubai Electricity and Water Authority (DEWA) as part of a structured benchmarking initiative. The project was based on the TRADE benchmarking methodology and this paper examines the tools, activities and outcomes that relate to each stage of the adopted methodology.

This study is based on case study methodology. Data were collected from various sources including analysis of project reports written by DEWA’s benchmarking team reporting on their activities during the project. Data were also collected from four project presentations given at different stages of the project. In addition, the research team held three meetings with the DEWA benchmarking team at different stages of the benchmarking project.

The results show the key challenges and successes faced during each stage of the benchmarking project. It indicates the actions taken to overcome the challenges and the role played by internal and external stakeholders in facilitating the success of the benchmarking project.

The study presents information that would guide organisations that wish to carry out a benchmarking project – and particularly those implementing benchmarking for the first time. The study provides a summary of the key lessons learnt by DEWA’s benchmarking team as a guide for other organisations.

Academic research has not adequately examined and analysed the stage-by-stage elements of a benchmarking project from the perspective of the implementing organisation. This study addresses this gap by detailing and analysing the experiences of a benchmarking project by tracking the stage-by-stage activities of the benchmarking team.

The handicraft industry has been contracting in recent times because of external competition and a preference for foreign-made crafts by consumers. Kiliim, ¹ an Egyptian social enterprise and lifestyle brand, has initiated the process of revival needed in the industry with modern designs of the traditional crafts (local bed covers, curtains, bedding, rugs, bathmats, cushion, throw pillows dining and living cloths). This case provides an analysis of the company, beginning with how the idea of the kilim product was conceived and the dilemma they are currently facing. Although Kiliim, with various kilim product offerings, has made significant inroads in the consumer market, it must continue to adopt innovative strategies to sustain its survival in the market. With globalisation rapidly changing the dynamics of market entry and penetration, indigenous organisations must be innovative with their product and service offerings. Suggestions are made for the sustainability of the indigenous craft industry in Egypt and Africa.

Previous research has indicated that trusts are used to commit various economic crimes, but limited studies examine the exact method of how trusts are abused. This paper aims to determine how trusts are abused to conceal assets in insolvency and divorce proceedings. Apart from discussing how fraudulent trusts are evaluated by South African courts, two court cases will also be analysed to determine how trusts have been abused in the past to conceal assets in insolvency and divorce proceedings.

The methodology used is a literature study, predominantly using court cases and relevant statutes as the primary sources of information. The difference between a sham and alter ego trust is discussed, whereafter two court cases are dissected to identify how trusts have been abused to conceal assets.

The study found that trusts can be abused in different ways to conceal assets in insolvency and divorce proceedings. This can vary from the way the trust is established to the way the trust is used. But trusts are particularly susceptible to abuse when there is no separation between the ownership and enjoyment of trust assets, and the trust lacks independent trustees.

The research finding can be used to better understand how trusts are abused in divorce and insolvency proceedings.

This paper aims to address the problem of double-diffusive magnetohydrodynamics (MHD) non-Darcy convective flow of heat and mass transfer over a stretching sheet embedded in a thermally-stratified porous medium. The controlling parameters such as chemical reaction parameter, permeability parameter, etc., are extensively discussed and illustrated in this paper.

With the help of appropriate similarity variables, the governing partial differential equations are converted into ordinary differential equations. The transformed equations are solved using the spectral homotopy analysis method (SHAM). SHAM is a numerical method, which uses Chebyshev pseudospectral and homotopy analysis method in solving science and engineering problems.

The effects of all controlling parameters are presented using graphical representations. The results revealed that the applied magnetic field in the transverse direction to the flow gives rise to a resistive force called Lorentz. This force tends to reduce the flow of an electrically conducting fluid in the problem of heat and mass transfer. As a result, the fluid velocity reduces in the boundary layer. Also, the suction increases the velocity, temperature, and concentration of the fluid, respectively. The present results can be used in complex problems dealing with double-diffusive MHD non-Darcy convective flow of heat and mass transfer.

The uniqueness of this paper is the examination of double-diffusive MHD non-Darcy convective flow of heat and mass transfer. It is considered over a stretching sheet embedded in a thermally-stratified porous medium. To the best of the knowledge, a problem of this type has not been considered in the past. A novel method called SHAM is used to solve this modelled problem. The novelty of this method is its accuracy and fastness in computation.