The aim of this research is to understand the effect of product quality, medical price and staff skill on patient’s loyalty through cultural impact in medical tourism. In this study, three exogenous con-structs; namely product quality, medical price, and staff skill constructs were adopted to find their effects on patient’s loyalty. Meanwhile, the cultural impact is also adopted as a mediator construct. This study uses confirmatory approach as Covariance based Structural Equation Modeling (CBSEM) for testing the research hypotheses. The study explores inbound medical tourists loyalty from 324 respondents sampled comprised from different countries using stratified sampling. In terms of the direct effect, the method reveals that medical price and staff skill had positive significant effects on cultural impact and patient loyalty. In terms of indirect effect, the cultural impact mediates the relationships between product quality, medical price, and staff skills on patient’s loyalty.

Innovation has become unavoidable choice for companies to survive. However, a high percentage of new products fail, which increase the risk of using innovative ideas. Therefore, to control and reduce the risk of introducing new products, most companies need to invent new products that can meet the customers’ real needs. Accordingly, customer must be the main source of the information through which the ideas of new products are generated. Having the knowledge about the market needs and trends is not enough as the knowledge needs to be translated into real products. Hence, capabilities, in this context, play a vital role to enhance product innovation performance of the organizations. Thus, this study investigates the role of manufacturing capabilities in enhancing the or-ganizations’ abilities to translate the ideas into the right product that can meet customers’ needs. Moreover, this paper discusses the link between customer knowledge management and developing manufacturing capabilities. The study is conducted in Malaysia, and uses the information of 134 manufacturing companies for the survey. Partial least square is used to obtain the results. The findings are discussed and compared with other results in the literature.

One of the primary objectives in product development is to reach an appropriate design perspective. This paper proposes a methodology, which uses functions, mechanisms, and attributes of the product to solve a design problem. The proposed approach works as a supporting methodology to assist young researchers as well as design engineers and the implementation of the method is demonstrat-ed using a real-world case study of home appliances. A survey is conducted to identify six home appliances that have the highest frequency of daily use and to determine the one, which creates troubles for its users. The results of this study can be further used in TRIZ to identify innovative solutions.

The purpose of this paper was to examine the relationships among work overload (WO), compensation (COM), organizational identification (OI) and organization embeddedness (OE) in the context of manufacturing industry in China through social identity theory. A 37-item questionnaire was filled by 384 new generation of rural migrant workers. Data were examined through a two-stage of first-order of reflective model and second-order reflective-formative hierarchical model using PLS-SEM. The empirical results indicate that COM and OI positively and significantly predicted OE, while WO was found to have no direct effect on OE. In addition, COM positively and significantly was associated with OI, whereas WO affected OI, negatively. Further examination of the mediation effects of OI revealed that OI could fully mediate the relationship between WO and OE. Moreover, OI also had a partial mediator role in the relationship between COM and OE. The study concluded with several implications and recommendations for future research.

This paper identifies the mediating role of innovation and moderating role of size of enterprise on the relationship between entrepreneurial orientation and performance of Micro and Small Enterprises (MSEs). For the purpose of this study, the necessary data is collected from 384 MSE's operating in Punjab province, Pakistan. Initially the data are analyzed using SPSS 22 and then, for the development of structure equation modeling, Smart PLS-3 is used. Two aspects of entrepreneurial orientations; namely risk taking and pro-activeness are analyzed and innovation is considered as mediat-ing variable. The major contribution of the study is to identify any moderating effect of size of the enterprise on the relationship between entrepreneurial orientation, innovation and performance of MSEs. These elements basically show the contribution that is made by the innovation and performance of the MSE's. The results reveal that the size of enterprises moderated the relationship between risk taking and performance, pro-activeness and performance as well as innovation and performance.

The purpose of this study is to identify the influence of innovative cultural processes (ICP) on SMEs performance in Punjab, Pakistan. Data was collected through survey method. 60 usable questionnaires were used for collecting the information from SMEs CEOs/owners/senior managers from Punjab, Pakistan. Research design was consisted on developing the hypothetical framework with innovative cultural processes set as an independent variable to test SMEs performance as a dependent variable. Validity and reliability of the scale were assessed by experts and also a small set of the data was used for analysis through SPSS version 20.0 and PLS-SEM 3.0 for analyzing the effect. The results of the research confirmed the validity and reliability of the instrument used in this study. The findings of this study also validate the empirical linkage between capturing ICP and SMEs performance in Punjab, Pakistan. This study has some practical implications especially for SMEs in Pakistan and recommendations to have ICP for enhancing the performance of SMEs.

The utilization of Business Intelligence (BI) to yield financial management among manufactures has been one of the main advantages of managing businesses through strategized financial performance. The BI can be conceptualized as a decision-making process, which is an emerging topic within technology management and financial decision making. Furthermore, such factors influencing the adoption of this type of strategized decision-making process are under extensive investigation. The main objective of this research is to develop a BI framework to provide a data analytics and action plan to help Malaysian Halal Food Manufacturing Industry (MHFMI) strategize financial performance. The specific objective of the study is to assess and validate the relationship between the adoption of BI and MHFMI. The methodology of the study starts with the theory adoption of BI parameters and methods, followed by the development of the adopted and adapted theoretical models using the conceptual framework developed and MHFMI involvement into the strategic financial performance management. The managers of the MHFMI is requested to provide the necessary information about their companies, perception of BI and financial performances. Reliability analysis is used to validate the constructs and test measurements in variance. The study applies regression analysis to determine the effects of different decision making strategies on BI. The research output indicates that the BI data analytics and the action plan as well as the conceptual framework could improve the financial performance by the adoption and the adaptation of the conceptualized strategy among MHFMI. This study is believed to be the first in Jordan that shed light on how human resource functions could provide environmental performance in health service organizations particularly in hospitals. It supports the literature of Green HRM and environment protection which is not well developed in developing countries like Jordan.

The recent paradigm shift from recruitment of international students to retention of students encouraged radical changes on the consumption of educational services from university serving the students for creation of mutually beneficial relationship between the students and the university. The impact of globalization hit the economy in two paradoxes; first, consumers have more choices but less satisfaction; second, service providers have more strategic options, which yield less value. Against this background, this study proposed and validated destination loyalty model to arrest the increasing students’ attrition at study location. The declining state funding of higher education challenged the management of education sector to design sustainable competitive advantage strategy not only to attract but also to retain students at their study destination. A total of 498 data was solicited from international students at Malaysian public universities, partial least square structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) was used to test the reliability and validity of items and constructs. The results show that relationship marketing dynamism of service quality, students’ satisfaction, perceive image, perceived value and personal reasons were stable for international student loyalty to study destination. A new model called 2S2P was developed for emerging education destinations. Theoretical and practical implications as well as directions for future studies were documented in the paper.

Women-Empowerment is one of the most crucial challenge in Pakistan. Pakistani women are con-tributing only 25-30% in nation’s economy which is quite low as compared with other developed as well as developing countries such as United Kingdom (UK), United States of America (USA), Ma-laysia, China, Indonesia and India. To address this problem, the primary objective of this study was to examine the role of microfinance institutions in women-empowerment. Moreover, moderating role of vulnerability was also examined. Quantitative research approach and cross-sectional research design were adopted. Data were collected from the female clients of microfinance institutes in Southern Punjab, Pakistan. Survey was conducted to collect the data and questionnaires were dis-tributed by using area cluster sampling. SmartPLS (SEM) was used to analyze the data. It was found that non-financial services of microfinance institutes such as training/skill development pro-grams and social capital development had positive contributions towards women-empowerment. Moreover, vulnerability moderated the relationship between social capital and women empowerment. Thus, this study contributed in the body of literature by investigating vulnerability as moderating variable. Hence, this study is beneficial for microfinance institutes to enhance women-empowerment through training/skill development and social capital development.


This article has been retracted.

The field of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) has been growing very exponentially over the past decade. There are continuous opposing views of the role of the firms in society and disagree-ments as to whether wealth maximization should be the sole goal of any corporations out there. With Insurance companies facing and fulfilling in the intense demand of diverse stakeholders, this study explores the impact of CSR disclosures on Financial Performance among the listed domestic-owned companies in Malaysian insurance sector. Although CSR is a hot topic in Malaysia and throughout various industries, no detailed study has been conducted to ascertain whether Malaysian insurance companies derive any benefits therefrom. The study examines the impact of CSR on financial performance using an extensive content analysis method on annual reports from 13 domestic-owned Malaysian insurance companies over the past 9 years (2008-2017). The content analysis data is further transformed into GRI CSR Disclosure Index table before matching the findings against the Financial Performance indicators (return on assets (ROA), return on equities (ROE) and earnings per share (EPS)). The relationship between CSR and ROA, ROE and EPS is tested using correlation analysis. The results indicate significant relationship between CSR disclosure and Financial Performance; designates CSR has significant impact on ROA; whereas relationship between CSR and ROE & EPS is found to be insignificant. The study suggests and indicates that insurance companies in Malaysia ought to carry out efforts continually in a bigger scale so that their CSR activities are more aligned with the reporting regulatory standards as well as to bring a positive impact in the current prospect. In addition, the remedial action proposed by Bursa Malaysia from year 2016 is expected to improve the findings of this study and bring a tremendous improvement to the exiting regulatory guidelines.