Operational Excellence in Manufacturing, Service and the Oil & Gas: the Sectorial Definitional Constructs and Risk Management Implication

The current global business climate has not been favorable to most firms irrespective of industry affiliation. That condition necessitated companies to adopt operational excellence as a strategy for optimising output with little resources, reducing lead time with the efficient use of assets and employees and avoiding safety and health issues to people and the environment. As a result of the need for operational excellence, many kinds of literature defined the concept based on the context of industry or sector. Industries such as manufacturing, services, oil and gas, mining and so many industries to mention a few, have their unique construct in the definition and therefore causing dilemma on which dimension to hold on to. It is against this backdrop that this paper synthesizes and integrate all the varying dimensions and fuses out similarities, differences and the antecedence of research directions taken on the few mentioned sectors. The paper thus concludes that the unique construct among all the definitions is continuous improvement, cost reduction, quality, time utilization, operational efficiency, staff involvement and output optimisation. However, they varied on risk management, staff health, safety and the concern for the environment, which is unique to oil and gas industry and that can affect the choice of research variables

Mediating effect of enterprise risk management implementation on operational excellence in the oil and gas industry: the case of Nigeria

The rising cost of production, risk, environmental concerns and desire to perform, made oil and gas companies adoptedoperational excellence strategy to remedy the situation. In recent time, incidences on safety and health, the cost of exploration, and ageing facility risks in the Nigerian oil and gas industry are rising. The situation if not checked could lead to a continued decline in oil production, revenue,economicperformance and the aspiration of the country to becoming a regional economic force and one of the world’sbest economies will be unrealistic. It is as a result of this development that this study investigatedthe mediating effect of enterprise risk management implementation on the relationship between enterprise risk management determinants and operational excellence in the Nigerian oil and gas sector. The study employed a quantitive survey approach, where seven oil and gas companies were chosen purposively for the research and 179 managers and engineers were surveyed,and data were collected via a closed-ended questionnaire. SPSS 23 was used for the preliminary data analysis,and smart PLS-SEM 3.0 was used for the final analysis. The result showed that regulatory framework, firm characteristics, staff capacity and information technology as independent variables had a significant relationship with operational excellence. Enterprise risk management implementation was found to have a significant relationship with operational excellence and also mediates its relationship with firm characteristics and staff capacity.The study findings substantiate the importance of enterprise risk management implementation in operational excellence in the oil and gas sector.The outcome of the research also indicated a theoretical contribution to the body of knowledge of enterprise risk management implementation as well as operational excellence. It also showed practical improvement in the operations of oil and gas sector as regards risk management and operational excellence in the Nigerian oil and gas sector, specifically the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation

Operational Excellence and the Implications for Health, Safety and Environmental Performance in the Oil and Gas Industry

The rise in the cost of production, health, safety and environmental issues are some of the daring challenges faced by the oil sector in recent time. This article is aimed at reviewing literature (reports, articles and theses) and antecedents of research in operational excellence and related field in order to understand the actual problems and their root causes. The performance of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC)’s refineries, health and safety, the environment and revenue generation was also discussed. The findings indicated that although operational excellence was adopted, the health, safety and environmental (HSE) performance has been falling down, as incidents and fatalities issues are rising. Oil spillage and gas flaring are no way near stopping, outdated regulations, increasing unplanned plant shutdown, refineries performing below capacity and production deferments. The paper thus concludes that the Nigerian oil sector, particularly the NNPC should imbibe risk management culture and training, deploy dynamic technologies, employ enterprise-wide risk management strategy and upgrade the entire regulatory framework governing oil and gas activities

Antecedent of Corporate Entrepreneurial Orientation on the Performance of Small and Medium Manufacturing Enterprises in the Post Covid 19 Era: The Case Nigeria

Even in the post-pandemic period, the Covid-19 pandemic still has a multiplier effect on the performance of SMEs. As sales revenues dropped, branches were closed, and employees’ jobs and overall performance were impacted negatively around the world. This paper aims to review literature to determine research antecedents on the relationship between firms’ entrepreneurial orientation and manufacturing SMEs' performance in the post-Covid-19 era in Africa and the rest of the developing economies. This is to note the area needed to cover some of the major causes of the variation in this sub-sector of the economy for future research. A literature survey methodology was employed for the current article. Articles were reviewed from sources including journals (Google Scholar, ScienceDirect, Academia, and ResearchGate platform), and ordinary articles that spanned from 2002-2022 to understand the antecedents of research contexts and variables explored. The findings revealed that most studies focused on large-scale manufacturing firms and SMEs and considered external environmental factors like regulation, competition, interest and a few others to explain variation in enterprise performance. Furthermore, the result shows that non-multidimensional measures of enterprise performance were used. Consequently, a new conceptual framework was developed to look at firms’ inward entrepreneurial orientation as the driving factor for organisational performance improvement. The implication of the proposed framework developed is to harness strategies for performance improvement, growth, and survival in a complex and dynamic business environment. Thus, the paper concludes that the way to this development is for SMEs to build capacities that entrench their corporate entrepreneurial orientation to suit every business situation.

Studies on financial development and economic growth in sub-Saharan Africa

Doctoral thesis submitted in fulfilment of the requirements for the award of Doctor of Philosophy The Graduate School of Business Administration, Wits Business School University of the Witwatersrand June, 2017Financial sector development has been projected to play a very significant role in economic growth through the provision of improved quality and quantity of financial services. While financial development–growth nexus has received much attention in the literature, important research gaps still remain largely in areas such as financial–real sector interaction in growth trajectory, threshold effects, finance–volatility–shocks linkages; and legal system–information asymmetry nexus. Knowledge of these relationships is extremely crucial in regulating the financial sector and conducting prudent macroeconomic policy more generally. Using sub–Saharan Africa (SSA) as a case, this thesis consists of four self–contained empirical essays each investigating a critical gap relying on several advanced econometric techniques. In the first essay, we examine the effect on economic growth when financial sector growth outstrips the solvency needs of the real sector. In this context, we find that more than two–thirds of our sampled countries in SSA have experienced at least one episode of excessive credit growth relative to real sector needs. While financial development supports economic growth, the extent to which finance helps growth depends crucially on the simultaneous growth of real and financial sectors. The elasticity of growth to changes in either size of the real sector or financial sector is higher under balanced sectoral growth. We also show that rapid and unbridled credit growth comes at a huge cost to economic growth with consequences stemming from financing of risky and unsustainable investments coupled with superfluous consumption fuelling inflation. However, the pass–through excess finance–economic growth effect via the investment channel is stronger. A good understanding of the optimal level of credit consistent with long run economic growth is needed as existence of an undisturbed equilibrated growth of real and financial sectors is a necessary condition for a smooth economic growth. By introducing a previously missing link, our findings resolve the seemingly conflicting and highly contested results in the finance–growth literature. The second essay investigates whether the impact of finance on growth is conditioned on the initial levels of countries‟ income per capita, human capital and financial development. While financial development is positively and significantly associated with economic growth, our evidence suggests that, in almost all the threshold variables, below a certain estimated threshold, financial sector development is positively and insignificantly related to growth. In other words, below the threshold level of per capita income, human capital and the level of finance, economic growth is largely insensitive to financial development while significantly influencing economic activity for countries above the thresholds. The main conclusion drawn is that higher level of finance drives long run growth and so is the overall level of income and human capital. In the third essay, we disaggregate volatility into its various components in examining the effect of financial development on volatility as well as channels through which finance affects these volatility components. What emerged is that while financial development affects business cycle volatility in a non–linear fashion, its impact on long run fluctuation is imaginary. More specifically, well–developed financial sectors dampen volatility. The findings also revealed that while monetary shocks have large magnifying effect on volatility, their effect in the short run is minuscule. The reverse, however, holds for real shocks. The channels of manifestation shows that financial development dampens (magnifies) the effect of real shocks (monetary shocks) on the components of volatility with the dampening effects consistently larger only in the short run. A key implication emanating from this essay is that, strengthening financial sector supervision and cross–border oversight may be very crucial in examining the right levels of finance and price stability necessary to falter economic fluctuations. In the final essay, the study re–interrogates the role of law in financial development in the light of evolving legal systems in SSA as well as how legal origin explain cross–country differences in economic volatility through its effect on information asymmetry. Our evidence suggests that legal origin significantly explains cross–country differences in financial development and economic volatility. More importantly, relative to civil law, English common law countries and those in Southern Africa have higher financial sector development both in terms of financial activity and banking efficiency on the back of lower volatility. While private credit bureau positively (negatively) affects financial development (economic volatility) with economically large impact for English legal legacy countries, the latter effect is contingent on the form of legal origin suggesting that, the establishment of information sharing offices per se may be insufficient in taming growth vagaries. The effectiveness of law is exceedingly relevant. At the policy front, maintaining more agile and effective legal systems that are responsive to changing financial landscape while forcing economic agents to improve information infrastructure is healthy for both financial sector development and macroeconomic stability.MT201

On the scholarly contributions of the legendary George Adu

Beginning on a personal note, this paper succinctly presents the salient scholarly works of my teacher and mentor Dr. George Adu to the body of theoretical and empirical literature in economics. His contributions to the field of environmental and natural resources economics and macroeconomics in general cannot be overemphasized. While death might have cut his life short, George’s considerable contributions to knowledge and society will continue to live on. He is a legend.Keywords: George Adu; Environmental economics; Macroeconomic

The Effect of Boko Haram Insurgency in Borno State: A Study of Street Begging

The effect of Boko Haram insurgency in Borno State is one of the major problems confronting the state The insurgent has sacked almost all the Local Government Council of Borno State and forced the people to run to Maiduguri the capital city of the State to seek r efuge Maiduguri has become densely populated as a result of the influx of Internally Displaced Persons IDPs which gave rise to proliferation of street begging in the state capital Although before the activities of the insurgency it has been argued that street begging is common in the far Northern States of Nigeria Maiduguri inclusive The main objective of the study is to examine the effect of Boko Haram insurgency in Borno state on a study of street begging The specific objectives are to examine the causes of Mass Street begging and identify the people that constitute the begging class and its consequences in Maiduguri The study adopted political economy perspectives as the theoretical framework for analysis The political economy perspectives consider the notion of Boko Haram upon the premises of the social relation of productio

Logistics Management and the Performance of Manufacturing Firms in Selected States of Northern Nigeria

The study examined the role of logistics in manufacturing firms’ performance in some states in Northern Nigeria. A firm-level survey was conducted in a cross-sectional examination of members of the Manufacturers Association of Nigeria (MAN), with a sample of 144 firms. The study was underpinned by the resource-based theory, and data was analyzed using multiple regression analysis through the partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM). It was discovered that both inbound and outbound logistics have positive relationships with performance. However, the relationship between outbound logistics and performance was not significant. The findings implies that managers of manufacturing firms cannot entirely rely on the contributions of logistics to enhance performance. It was therefore recommended that management in the manufacturing sector could find ways of improving those outbound activities they perform; contemplate involving drivers, such as information technology to boost performance; and consider outsourcing those outbound activities

Studies On The Heterogenisation Of Sulphonic Acid And Guanidines On Silica And Their Catalytic Activity

The immobilization of three homogeneous catalysts namely; sulfonic acid, 1,1,3,3-tetramethyl guanidine and 1,5,7-triazabicyclo[4.4.0]dec-5-ene guanidine was carried out on silica from rice husk ash. Sodium silicate from the rice husk ash was immobilised with 3-(mercaptopropyl)trimethoxysilane. This was further oxidised to sulfonic acid in a simple one pot method. The solid acid catalyst was denoted as RHAPrSO3H. Analysis of the catalyst by nitrogen adsorption-desorption using Brunauer, Emmet and Teller (BET) method showed its surface area to be 340 m2g-1 with average pore volume of 0.24 cc g-1 and pore diameter of 2.9 nm. Acidity tests by cation exchange capacity and pyridine FT-IR adsorption, revealed the presence of acid sites on the catalyst surface. Similarly, the 29Si MAS NMR of RHAPrSO3H revealed the presence of Q4, Q3, T3, T2 and T1 silicon centres, while only Q4 and Q3 silicon centres were present in RHASiO2. The catalyst was used in the acetalization reaction of glycerol with benzaldehyde. Under the best reaction conditions of 120 °C temperature, 2:1 molar ratio of glycerol: benzaldehyde, 0.15g mass of catalyst and 8 h reaction time, significant conversion was achieved with high selectivity towards five member ring isomer

Record Keeping and the Bottom Line: Exploring the Relationship between Record Keeping and Business Performance among Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) in the Tamale Metropolis of Ghana

This paper explores the relationships between record keeping and business performance among SMEs in Ghana. Relying on a sample of 100 SMEs in the Tamale Metropolis, and employing simple regression analyses and Pearson Correlation Coefficient, we found a positive correlation between record keeping and business performance. In particular, we show that the two variables are linearly related. After swapping both the dependent and independent variables in the estimated models, we found a more robust impact on record keeping when it depends on business performance than when the latter depends on the former. We however could not show which variable causes changes in the other, necessitating further research efforts in this direction. While recognising the impact of record keeping on business performance, we conclude that at least in our study area, other performance metrics such as improved customer relations, access to sustainable finance, technology diffusion, and expanding the frontiers of access to internal and international markets are equally critical drivers of SME performance. This calls for conscious and coordinates efforts aimed at enhancing the performance of SMEs in Ghana. Keywords: SMEs, Record Keeping, Business Performance, Entrepreneurshi