Digitalizing South African Universities: Exploring Benefits, Barriers and Risks

University leaders in South Africa have employed various leadership styles which focus on improving employee, departmental, faculty and organizational performance. However, digital leadership style is not popular and applied by leaders in universities in South Africa despite compelling benefits associated with digital leadership in universities which include improvement in communication with the key university stakeholders, enhancing the learning and teaching process, quality research outputs, community engagement, leadership and management. The present study aims to provide an understanding of the digital leadership in relation to other seminal leadership approaches which are pertinent in universities. This study further ascertains the benefits, challenges and risks in digitalizing campuses in the epoch of the Fourth Industrial Revolution. It significantly shapes university policies on digital technology, practices and theories on leadership styles which can bring radical changes in universities. This chapter equips university leaders to harness digital leadership style benefits and capacitate university leaders on risks associated by leading with technology. Application of the digital leadership style will assist university leaders in different employment categories to digitally improve employee and organizational performance, eliminate wastage and provide smooth communication channels and regular feedback

The Paradox of the Regional Centres Unit: The Case of eThekwini Municipality

Municipalities have been operating without the unit or departmental strategic plans aligned to the Integrated Development Plans (IDPs). This has led to the fragmentation of their organograms or structures. The resultant to silo-ed organisational structures are characterised by inefficiency and ineptitude caused by cadre deployment, which has directly paralysed service delivery. The primary purpose of this study was to reveal the root causes of poor customer service and delivery in municipalities by interrogating the eThekwini Municipality’s Regional Centres Unit operational activities. A qualitative case study research method was employed in this study. Data was collected through indepth interviews with a population size of 56 employees, as well as through focus groups constituted of 24 employees. A notable finding of this study was the unavailability of the approved unit’s strategic plan which has resulted to the unaligned silo-ed structure, and unclear roles and responsibilities; and ineptitude of employees. The unaligned and silo-ed structures to the approved strategic plan within eThekwini Municipality’s Regional Centres Unit have the potential value add to the literature in public administration on the ways to detect the hidden municipal administrative bottlenecks in improving the efficiency, effectiveness and acceleration of the municipal services to its customers

A Synthesis of Risks in Dairy Value Chains in Southern Africa: Cases of South Africa and Zimbabwe

An increase in frequency and intensity of slow- and fast-onset disasters in Southern Africa has crippled milk producers’ value chain with catastrophic effects to consumers. Milk production is vulnerable to disruptions from natural disasters, poor transport and infrastructure. The chapter considers the cases of South Africa and Zimbabwe, two countries that have organized dairy production. Against this bleak backdrop, this chapter explores the contribution of the milk industry to the economy and the benefits to consumers of milk and dairy products. The chapter also identifies the key players in the dairy supply chain in Southern Africa. It explores different types of disaster risks prevalent in Southern Africa and how they affect the production of raw and processed milk along dairy supply chains. It further interrogates risk management strategies employed by the key players to mitigate these risks to make dairy supply chains sustainable. This chapter reviewed literature and analyzed governments, nongovernmental organizations, and industries’ documents with the aim to present value chain resilience strategies. This chapter also presents an insight into the policymakers and milk industries on the risk reduction strategies that are employed to mitigate the effects of risks on the milk and dairy products’ value chain

An exploratory study on the impact of social media of selected commercial banks in the Eastern Cape Province, South Africa

The emergence of social media in financially high-risk institutions has had a negative impact on employees’ perceptions towards utilization of social media for team collaboration and communication. This study investigates social media impact in commercial banks and explores the contribution it has brought among teams, thus, ascertaining collaboration and effective communication within the banking industry. It adopted a quantitative research method whereby 194 questionnaires were distributed and 102 completed, thereby generating a response rate of 53%. The study findings revealed 60% of the research participants who agreed, 14% undecided, and 27% disagreed that social media present an opportunity for people to commit fraud and attracts hackers. This study will contribute to the body of knowledge in South Africa as there is a limited number of published studies on the impact of social media in financial institution

An empirical investigation into the information management systems at a South African financial institution

The study has been triggered by the increase in information breaches in financial organizations worldwide. Such organizations may have policies and procedures, strategies and systems in place in order to mitigate the risk of information breaches, but data breaches are still on the rise. The objectives of this study are to explore the shortfalls of information security on a South African financial institution and further investigate whether business processes are responsive to organization’s needs. This study employed both quantitative and qualitative research methods. Questionnaires were sent to staff level employees, and semi-structured in-depth interviews were conducted with senior management at the organization. The study revealed that employees require training on information management and that there are major training deficiencies for training officers to conduct beneficial information management training at the organization. Information security program that include business risk analysis were not implemented, which results in inadequate information management planning and decisions. A standardized or uniform house rule policy was not consistently implemented across the organization, which resulted in certain areas not protecting information. The qualitative findings revealed that the external cleaning company could obtain access to customer information, if customer data are left lying around. Furthermore, there is major misalignment between policy setters and employees in this organization. The findings allow senior managers to construct projects and program with their teams to improve the state of information management in the organization which spans across the people aspect, technology systems and general information management processes. Furthermore, external companies should start signing Non-Disclosure Agreements - which is not being done currently as this opens the door for data fraud. The organization has information management and security policies in place, but the study concluded that employees do not understand these policies and should receive specialized training to ensure understanding and, ultimately, have employees following these information security policies. Keywords: data breach, information management, business processes, information legislation. JEL Classification: G

Artisanal mining versus sustainability of agricultural food supply chains: effects of the conflicts in Southern Zimbabwe

This article seeks to establish the social and environmental consequences of artisanal mining on economic sustainability of agricultural food supply chains in Zimbabwe. Following a descriptive research design, interviews were conducted with 36 farmers. Interviewees were purposively sampled from potential respondents in Southern Zimbabwe. Interview results were triangulated with data from published reports and newspaper articles. Data was analysed using NVivo application version 12 and presented in vignettes. The results of this study are useful to artisanal miners, farmers, and government. Recommendations for further studies are given. KEYWORDS: Artisanal mining farmers food supply chains Zimbabwe sustainabilit