Post Covid-19 and business analytics

This paper highlights the way companies can apply artificial intelligence (AI) in the post Covid-19 period. We show that how the AI can be advantageous to develop an inclusive model and apply to the businesses of various sizes. The recommendation can be beneficial for academic researchers to identify several ways to overcome the obstacles that companies may face in post Covid-19 period. The paper also addresses few major global issues, which can assist the policy makers to consider developing a business model to bounce back the world economy after this crisis is over. Overall, this paper enhances the understanding of stakeholders of business about the importance of application of the AI in businesses in a volatile market in post Covid-19 period

Gender inequality and disabled inclusivity in accounting higher education and profession during financial crisis

In this paper, we find that during financial crises, the wage gap between female and male accounting professionals reduces and affects gender inequality in higher education. In addition, less support and lower wages for disabled accounting professionals demotivate disabled students in accounting higher education. Because of budget cuts during financial crisis, universities limit their support to women and the disabled. We consider 104 universities from the UK Higher Education Statistic Agency (HESA) database for 2005– 2011. The theoretical and empirical findings of this paper establish the positive growth in female students and the negative growth in disabled accounting students during the recent financial crisis. The established link between higher education and the accounting profession enriches the existing accounting literature and assists policymakers in identifying a better strategy to enhance equality and inclusion of disabled students in accounting higher education to address inequality and non-inclusivity in the accounting profession, especially during financial crisis

Outstanding Issues in Solar Dynamo Theory

The magnetic activity of the Sun, as manifested in the sunspot cycle, originates deep within its convection zone through a dynamo mechanism which involves non-trivial interactions between the plasma and magnetic field in the solar interior. Recent advances in magnetohydrodynamic dynamo theory have led us closer towards a better understanding of the physics of the solar magnetic cycle. In conjunction, helioseismic observations of large-scale flows in the solar interior has now made it possible to constrain some of the parameters used in models of the solar cycle. In the first part of this review, I briefly describe this current state of understanding of the solar cycle. In the second part, I highlight some of the outstanding issues in solar dynamo theory related to the the nature of the dynamo $\alpha$-effect, magnetic buoyancy and the origin of Maunder-like minima in activity. I also discuss how poor constraints on key physical processes such as turbulent diffusion, meridional circulation and turbulent flux pumping confuse the relative roles of these vis-a-vis magnetic flux transport. I argue that unless some of these issues are addressed, no model of the solar cycle can claim to be ``the standard model'', nor can any predictions from such models be trusted; in other words, we are still not there yet.Comment: To appear in "Magnetic Coupling between the Interior and the Atmosphere of the Sun", eds. S.S. Hasan and R.J. Rutten, Astrophysics and Space Science Proceedings, Springer-Verlag, Heidelberg, Berlin, 200

Lessons from COVID-19 and a resilience model for higher education

In this article, the authors first highlight major challenges that higher education institutions (HEIs) are facing during the Covid-19 pandemic. They then consider the challenges HEIs should expect in the post-Covid period. In practice, HEIs s are keen to maintain their core activities during the pandemic and in this context the authors examine how institutions can continue their activities efficiently by addressing issues related to the potential socio-psychological damage to stakeholders in higher education. To answer this question, they recommend the application of an all-inclusive resilience model at the beginning of the recovery period to withstand the shock of the pandemic and show how an HEIs can apply the antifragile model for the advancement and betterment of the experience of individuals associated with it. The recommendations of the study contribute to the literature related to HEIs and the coronavirus and constitute practical guidance for a post-Covid model that may be followed by HEIs around the world

How has the global financial crisis affected syndicated loan terms in emerging markets? Evidence from China

This paper examines the impact of the recent global financial crisis on the cost of debt capital (syndicated loans) in a leading emerging market, namely China, using the difference-in-differences approach. Before the crisis China adopted banking reforms allowing the entry of foreign banks and more domestic participation in the syndicated loan market. As a result, during the crisis the volume of syndicated loans grew steadily, in contrast to other countries. In addition, the amount of foreign syndicated loans decreased and average maturity increased compared to the pre-crisis period. Our findings provide useful information to policy makers for devising effective responses to financial crises

Innovation and family ownership: empirical evidence from India

Manuscript Type Empirical Research Question/Issue This study examines the direct effect of family ownership on innovation in emerging markets by using data from Indian family-controlled publicly listed firms as its sample. In particular, we study (1) the direct effects of family ownership on innovation and (2) the influences of business group affiliation on these family firms. Research Findings/Insights Using an unbalanced panel of 395 Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) listed Indian firms during the years 2001 and 2008, we found that the impact of family ownership on innovation productivity is positive (after controlling for possible endogeneity). We further emphasized the business group affiliation of family firms and distinguished between the innovation activities of group-affiliated and stand-alone family firms. We found that affiliating with top 50 business groups increases the innovation activities of these family firms. Theoretical/Academic Implications Theoretically, we complement agency theory by incorporating both the institutional perspective and the external resourcing perspective to provide a more robust framework for examining the impact of family ownership on innovation in emerging markets. Methodologically, we adopted a more rigorous econometrics method by providing a panel analysis that used a system GMM estimator and addressed the endogeneity issue thoroughly, which represented a significant improvement over the shortcomings of the methodologies found in the existing literature. Practitioner/Policy Implications Our findings suggest that the Indian government should provide support for affiliating family firms with business groups while improving policies on information disclosures; it should also establish a proper corporate governance mechanism for private and public family business. The findings further suggest that a corporate governance code should encourage family firms to have an independent professional CEO