Place of Women in Sri Lankan Society: Measures for Their Empowerment for Development and Good Governance

Despite far-reaching economic, social and political developments in Sri Lanka over the last century or so, Sri Lankan women continue to occupy a subordinate status. While women are not subjected to extreme forms of oppression, many adverse structures and forces, such as the patriarchal social structure, woman’s role in the family, traditional values, rituals and myths, the division of labour and unequal pay, and women’s lack of participation in politics contribute to the continuing subordination of Sri Lankan women. In this context, this article seeks to address the socio-economic, cultural and political processes that shape the status and the progress of women in Sri Lanka. It emphasizes the policy makers to ensure that Sri Lankan women are empowered to participate in development. For this to happen, the article, however, argues that an attitudinal change and a paradigm shift in the minds of policy makers and the society at large must be accomplished. KeywordsEmpowerment, Sri Lanka, Subordination, Wome

Strategic orientation based research model of SME performance for developing contries

Performance of Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs)has been considered as one of the most important driving force behind economies of both developed and developing countries due to their multiple contributions.In most of the developing countries, the performance of the SMEs is a key issue today.Strategic orientation of SMEs is one of the most critical factors for their success. The SMEs in developing countries are considered less strategically oriented than those of developed counties.But most of the studies in developing countries have focused the effect of single strategic orientation coupled with other factors on SME performance.This study proposes a research model of SME performance based on strategic orientation for developing countries. The proposed model suggests significant interaction between three major strategic orientations and SME performance in developing countries. An interaction among market orientation, entrepreneurial orientation, learning orientation and SME performance has been incorporated into the model.The model contributes for better understanding of complex interactions between strategic orientations and SME performance in developing countries

Impact of Organizational Factors on Sales Force Unethical Behavior in the Sri Lankan Life Insurance Industry

As a service providing company the image and the success of the insurance industry vastly depend on the ethical behavior patterns of their salesperson as they are the persons who have direct relationships with customers which in turn build up the customer’s satisfaction and trust towards the organization. Therefore, the managers must have the knowledge of the key determinant of the unethical behavior of their salespersons if they want to ensure the ethical behavior among the salespersons. Different factors contribute to these behavior patterns and organizational factors are more important among them. The main purpose of this research was to identify the organizational factors affecting the unethical behavior patterns of salespersons in the Sri Lankan life insurance industry. An extensive literature review was conducted, and five organizational factors were identified as impacting on unethical behaviour of salespersons in the Sri Lankan life insurance industry. Namely, they were supervisory role, sales targets, organizational culture, code of ethics and a rewarding system. Data were collected from 200 individual salespersons from 10 life insurance companies through structured questionnaires. The stratified random sampling method was used for the selection of the respondents to the sample and data were analyzed using multiple regression. The findings of the research indicated that the supervisory role, sales targets and rewarding system significantly predict the unethical behavior of salespersons. Further, it revealed that sales targets predicted unethical behavior strongly, compared to the rewarding system and the supervisory role. Findings of this research also gave some implications on the code of ethics. It was found that there is no code of ethics in the companies or if exists they are not practiced or enforced. Accordingly, the research provides recommendations that can be used to minimize the unethical behavior patterns of the salespersons. To improve the generalization of the findings, future research should broaden the sample by including general insurance companies and finance companies. Continuing research is needed to analyze the other factors in addition to organizational factors and future research could also look at the customer perspective rather than the salesperson perspective. KeywordsBusiness Ethics; Life Insurance Industry; Organizational Factors; Salesperson; Unethical Behavior Patter

Grassroot Institutions for Regional Development: Sri Lankan Experience

Regional development has become a matter of great interest to all stakeholders interested in development, because of growing regional disparities and the fact that poverty levels have remained very high, despite the various strategies adopted by successive governments since independence in Sri Lanka. Therefore, in regional development rural institutions have been regarded as vitally important mechanisms to achieve regional development . The Divisional Secretariat System and the Pradeshiya Sabhas are the two main rural institutions operating at the divisional level in Sri Lanka. This paper analyses people’s participations in decision-making and their involvement in contribution to regional development at the grassroot levels with special reference to Palagala division of the Anuradhapura District in the North Central Province in Sri Lanka. Analysis of data revealed that the achievement and the progress in people’s participations is poor and very limited despite the various attempts made over the two decades or more. The conclusion of the study is that the mere establishment of rural institutions is not the answer to the problems of peripheral development. It is equally important to identify the needs and the priorities of the people to have opportunities for them to play a stakeholder role in decision making

STRATEGIC ORIENTATIONS AND SME PERFORMANCE; MODERATING EFFECT OF ABSORPTIVE CAPACITY: A RESEARCH MODEL OF FIRM PERFORMANCE

Small and medium sized Enterprises (SME) performance has been considered as one of the most important driving forces behind economies of both developed and developing countries due to their multiple contributions. In most of the developing countries, the performance of the SMEs is a key issue today. Purpose of this study is to propose a research model of SME performance based on strategic orientations and absorptive capacity. The model presents complex interactions among strategic orientations, absorptive capacity and SME performance. Entrepreneurial orientation, market orientation and learning orientation have been incorporated into the model as independent variables. Firm level absorptive capacity is supposed to strengthen the relationship between strategic orientations and SME performance with a significant moderating effect. Keywords: SME Performance, Strategic Orientations, Absorptive CapacityFor full Paper: [email protected]