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Transnational education (TNE), interpreted as the mobility of education programmes and providers between countries, has grown exponentially as a worldwide phenomenon in recent years. Higher education institutions (HEIs) have mainly used such opportunities to internationalise their degrees and programmes, and have paid scant attention on preparing academics to teach cross-culturally. As a result, academics being at the coalface of teaching and learning often feel under-informed, under-supported, underprepared and under-confident when it comes to cross-cultural teaching, suggesting that universities have largely failed to prepare their academic faculty members to face the challenges of internationalisation. This is particularly important for new and young players such as the post-92 universities in the UK. However, such institutions have largely been ignored by the previous research in this area. Reverting the research focus on young HEIs, the purpose of this paper is to highlight the importance of preparing faculty staff members in the context of a post-92 university in the UK, to teach cross-culturally at partner institutions via the TNE route.

The paper adopts Deardorff’s intercultural competency process model to develop a framework (focussing on three core elements of knowledge, skills and attitudes) that could help the academic staff members to prepare for teaching internationally. The paper is based on a detailed analysis of university’s internationalisation strategy, policy documents and related reports for the 1999–2016 period. The initial analysis is further supplemented by 11 interviews with the main stakeholders, i.e. academics, educational developers and policy makers.

As the post-92 university in focus, like its counterparts, continues to proliferate its degrees and programmes through the TNE route, academics who are tasked with transnational teaching have an increased responsibility to develop the competencies required to work with learners from diversified cultural backgrounds. However, there has been less interest at university or faculty level in ensuring that academic faculty members who teach in transnational context are prepared for the specific rigours of transnational teaching.

The research findings have broader implications at individual, organisational and industry-level for individual academic faculty members to progress further in their career, HEIs to improve the quality of training programmes and policies and the HE industry to adjust the strategy towards internationalisation.

In the absence of any formally structured training, the paper proposes pre-departure informal training workshops/seminars conducted by seasoned academics at faculty, school or department level to help new academics transform their knowledge, skills and attitudes in order to facilitate positive interactions with students in a cross-cultural teaching environment. Although the focus is on one post-92 university; however, the proposed framework could be adopted across HEIs worldwide.

The paper is based on a detailed analysis of university’s internationalisation strategy, policy documents and related reports for the 1999–2016 period. The initial analysis is further supplemented by 11 interviews with the main stakeholders, i.e. academics, educational developers and policy makers. Informed by the best practices, the paper also discusses the implication of intercultural competencies for cross-cultural teaching.

The purpose of this paper is to empirically examine the effect of investments in organisational resources and corporate governance features on market-based performance of Islamic banks (IBs).

The required data to calculate different constituents of banks’ investment strategies and governance mechanism were hand collected from 268 annual reports. Different regression models were used to determine the impact of investment in human and structural capital and corporate governance features on market performance of IBs.

The paper finds that investments in knowledge resources (human capital, in particular) have a significantly positive impact on the market value of IBs. The results further reveal that IBs’ strategy to rely on long-term human capital accumulation can be seen as idiosyncratic problem-solving knowledge capital. Based on market measure, the paper finds role duality to have a significant positive impact and the size of the advisory board to have the opposite effect on market value.

This study includes IBs only and ignores other Islamic financial services providers such as Takaful (insurance) companies. The study leaves this chasm to be filled by future researchers.

The findings may serve as a useful input for both Islamic bankers and regulators to apply knowledge management in their institutions. Furthermore, the dominant role of human capital also provides insight to managers with respect to business performance levers.

The main contribution of this paper is to provide insight into the Islamic banking business model using a unique hand-collected data set, to identify the effect of investments in organisational resources and bank governance on market value in before, during and after financial crisis.

The purpose of this paper is to empirically examine the effect of intangible resources, i.e. intellectual capital (IC) on financial performance of 64 Islamic financial institutions (IFIs) operating in 18 different countries for the period 2007-2011, while controlling for firm-specific variables, namely, bank size, level of risk, listing status, and firm complexity.

The required data to calculate different constituents of IC are derived from Bankscope database. Value Added Intellectual Coefficient (VAIC) methodology devised by Pulic is used to determine the impact of IC on financial performance of IFIs.

Results indicate a significant positive relationship between VAIC and accounting performance based on return on assets (ROA). The results further indicate a significant positive relationship between accounting performance and capital employed efficiency (CEE) and human capital efficiency (HCE), but no significant relationship with regards to structural capital efficiency. Overall, the results suggest that value creation capability of IFIs is highly influenced by HCE and CEE.

The main limitation of the present study lies in its methodological tool, the VAIC methodology, which has been criticized by some researchers as not really measuring IC. Despite the inherent limitation of the VAIC methodology which relies on secondary data published in annual reports, it is still considered by some researchers as one of the best available tool to measure firms’ IC in the absence of access to detailed internal information on IC.

The findings may serve as a useful input for Islamic bankers in managing their investments in IC within their institutions.

The main contribution of this paper is to use a previously little-studied area, Islamic banking and finance, to identify the effect of intellectual capital on performance.

The purpose of this study is to analyze the Entropy generation analysis and heat transport in three-dimensional flow between two stretchable disks. Joule heating and heat generation/absorption are incorporated in the thermal equation. Thermo-diffusion effect is also considered. Flow is conducting for time-dependent applied magnetic field. Induced magnetic field is not taken into consideration. Velocity and thermal slip conditions at both the disks are implemented. The flow problem is modeled by using Navier–Stokes equations with entropy generation rate and Bejan number.

Von Karman transformations are used to reduce the nonlinear governing expressions into an ordinary one and then tackled by homotopy analysis method for convergent series solutions. The nonlinear expressions for total entropy generation rate are obtained with appropriate transformations. The impacts of different flow variables on velocity, temperature, entropy generation rate and Bejan number are described graphically. Velocity, temperature and concentration gradients are discussed in the presence of flow variables.

Axial, radial and tangential velocity profiles show decreasing trend for larger values of velocity slip parameters. For a larger Brinkman number, the entropy generation increases, while a decreasing trend is noticed for Bejan number.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, no such analyses have been reported in the literature.

The novel mechanical, chemical and thermodynamics characteristics of both single- and multi-wall carbon nanotubes (CNTs) make them a subject of much attention for the scientists and engineers from all domains. Fluid flows subject to CNTs are significant in biomedical engineering, energy storage systems, domestic and industrial cooling, automobile industries and solar energy collectors, etc. Keeping such effectiveness of CNTs in mind, this paper aims to examine peristaltic flow subject to CNTs in an asymmetric tapered channel. Both single and multiple walls CNTs are considered. The viscosity of nanomaterial depends on nanoparticles volume fraction and temperature. Total entropy rate through second law of thermodynamics is calculated. Heat source/sink and nonlinear heat flux are accounted.

The complicated flow expressions are simplified through lubrication approach. The velocity, temperature and entropy expressions are numerically solved by the built-in-shooting method.

The solutions for entropy generation, temperature and velocity are plotted, and the influences of pertinent variables are examined. The authors noticed that entropy generation is an increasing function of the Brinkman number.

The originality of this work is to communicate peristaltic CNTs-based nanomaterial peristaltic flow of viscous fluid in an asymmetric channel. No such consideration is yet published in the literature.