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Leadership in the UAE
(Edward Elgar Publishing Ltd., 2011) Suliman, Abubakr M.; Hayat, Rehana
Extract from the INTRODUCTION : The United Arab Emirates (UAE) as a modern nation came into being following Britain’s 1968 announcement of its decision to withdraw from its colonial holdings East of Suez within three years. Up to this date, Britain had been the dominant foreign power in the region for over 200 years (Crystal 2011), concluding a series of treaties with local rulers including the Treaty of Maritime Peace in Perpetuity (1853) and exclusive agreements for the defence and foreign affairs of what had become known as the Trucial States. With Britain’s withdrawal, the seven Emirates of the Trucial States (Abu Dhabi, Dubai, Ajman, Fujairah, Sharjah, Ras al-Khaimah and Umm al-Qaiwain) became the federal nation that is the UAE. In the context of the region, the politics of the UAE has been relatively stable: Sheikh Zayed came to power in Abu Dhabi in a widely supported palace coup in 1966, and Sharjah has seen power disputed in 1972 and 1987, but recent successions have been smoother (Crystal 2011; see also MiltonEdwards 2006) despite the recent resurrection of the succession dispute in Ras al-Khaimah (Kerr 2010). The UAE has also been fortunate in its natural resources, with around 9 per cent of world oil resources (see Chapter 1, Table 1.6). However, this has led to particular challenges in other ways, especially in dealing with large numbers of migrant workers – up to 80 per cent of the population (Davidson 2008; UNDP 2009) – a challenge that will be discussed in...
Enterprise web services-enabled translation framework
(Springer Nature Switzerland AG, 2011) Serhani, Mohamed Adel; Jaffar, Ahmed; Campbell, Piers; Atif, Y.
Managing multilingual documents is a time consuming, error prone and expensive task, particularly when dealing with dynamic documents such as web contents. A broad spectrum of organizations such as corporations, NGO's and Governments are committed to offer such documents in a number of languages where the content is further localized to suit specific cultural settings. In this paper, we propose a business model supported by a web services-enabled framework, which facilitate all aspects related to multilingual web contents management, from negotiating translation-request quotations through production of final localized output as well as its verification, and delivery. This service is based on a collaborative internet-based translation framework, referred to in this paper as Translation Management System (TMS). Our approach uses XLIFF, a Web service standard developed by OASIS, in order to interoperate enterprise translation services and related Web applications. We present and implement a translation business model centered around standardized processes, which we validate through a case study in the context of a Web translation project. We also propose a QoS monitoring model to satisfy the quality-related requirements of a translation job. Finally, we evaluate the usability of our streamlined Web translation services through users' perception in terms of flexibility, ease of use, and quality of translation. The results revealed interesting performance tradeoffs relative to translation workflows and content-translation accuracy as well as flexibility, and diversity of TMS provided services. © 2010 Springer-Verlag.
GCC economic integration : statistical harmonization for an effective monetary union
(Springer New York, 2012) Gurrib, Ikhlaas
The 1970 Werner Report on economic and monetary union in the European community states a monetary union implies inside its boundaries the total and irreversible convertibility of currencies, the elimination of margins of fluctuation in exchange rates, the irrevocable fixing of parity rates and the complete liberation of movements of capital (The Werner Report of 1970). Alternatively stated, three aspects should characterize a monetary union or a currency union. These are (1) a single currency or several currencies that are fully convertible at an irrevocably fixed exchange rate, (2) union-wide monetary policy that is determined by a single central bank or a system of central banks, and (3) a sole external exchange rate policy (Masson and Pattillo 2001). This chapter follows the line of thought that uses the single currency and a monetary union interchangeably, given that exchange rates are irrevocably fixed. © Springer Science+Business Media New York 2012. All rights are reserved.
Corporate e-learning environment using concept maps : a case study
(Praise Worthy Prize, 2013) Ghatasheh, Nazeeh A.; Najdawi, Anas R.; Abu-Faraj, Mua’ad M.; Faris, Hossam
This research aims to study the possibility of using an innovative and collaborative elearning system to support the corporate workers by presenting the accumulated knowledge in a clear manner. It will present the benefits of using concept maps to represent corporate knowledge in flexible and adaptive form to aid the workers in completing their tasks. The study tackles the technological enablers on one hand; on another hand it suggests an appropriate approach on how effectively adopt concept maps. Our findings are drawn from a review of the electronic learning research, exploring and developing an application based on current technological trends as HTML5, and several guidelines from literature. Our findings guided us to develop a preliminary prototype for a web based application, and defining a suitable approach to go further in building reasonable concept maps. Our goal is to put in hand suggested system architecture to be applied in the Jordanian context for the meantime. © 2013 Praise Worthy Prize S.r.l. - All rights reserved.
Impact of pulling down regulatory state barriers on uranium in Australia : is there a need in order to maintain and increase australia’s global market share of uranium?
(Virtus Interpress, 2013) Gurrib, Ikhlaas; Alshahrani, Saad
This paper sets a prospective framework to study the impact of opening more mines to meet future growing demand on Australia’s economy. The structure is aimed at decomposing investments and exports variables into Uranium exports and Uranium Exploration expenditure and analyse their impacts on each State GSP (Goods State Product) and for Australia as a nation. The demand and supply factors affecting the uranium market are defragmented before providing the research methodology and data specifics. Later analysis is expected to have policy implications by serving as a guide to pull down State Regulatory barriers like those imposed currently in Queensland, which is rich with uranium deposits and allow only uranium exploration but no uranium mining. Empirical findings would suggest whether exporting the carbon free energy would add value to Australia’s different competing states and as a whole globalized economy. © 2013, Virtus Interpress. All Rights Reserved.
A reconceptualization of entrepreneurial orientation in an emerging market insurance company
(Taylor and Francis Ltd., 2013) Madichie, Nnamdi O.; Hinson, Robert; Ibrahim, Masud
The authors examine how entrepreneurial firms gain competitive advantage and hence entrepreneurial success by optimizing their dynamic capabilities. Using a single case design, incorporating in-depth interviews with key informants within an insurance company in Ghana, the authors attempt to highlight the limitations of an existing model. Their key proposition is that the growth and profitability exhibited in the case study are largely attributable to its ability to leverage its entrepreneurial orientation. They argue, therefore, that despite the ability of the resource-based view to translate into competitive advantage at the firm level, it falls short of longer-term competitive advantages and entrepreneurial success-especially in the financial services sector with homogeneous product offerings. © 2013 Copyright Taylor and Francis Group, LLC.
Analytic Hierarchy Process and Sensitivity Analysis Approach for Social Media Impact on Pharmaceutical Relationship Marketing Tactics
(Decision Science Institute, 2013) Enyinda, Chris I.; Ogbuehi, Alphonso O.; Hamouri, Suhair
Pharmaceutical relationship marketing (PRM) bodes well with the social media environment. Pharmaceutical industry can build and maintain relationships with consumers through social media. Firms that leverage social media to enhance their PRM tactics will be viewed favorably in terms of trust, transparency, openness, and honesty. This paper explores the sensitivity analysis (SA) of PRM tactics within the social media environment using analytic hierarchy process (AHP) approach. Results revealed customer engagement as the most important PRM tactic, followed by communication, and trust. The performance SA carried out on the PRM tactics showed that the ranking associated with social media channel options remained robust or insensitive to small perturbations.
Mr-arm : a map-reduce association rule mining framework
(World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte Ltd, 2013) Thabtah, Fadi; Hammoud, Suhel
Association rule is one of the primary tasks in data mining that discovers correlations among items in a transactional database. The majority of vertical and horizontal association rule mining algorithms have been developed to improve the frequent items discovery step which necessitates high demands on training time and memory usage particularly when the input database is very large. In this paper, we overcome the problem of mining very large data by proposing a new parallel Map-Reduce (MR) association rule mining technique called MR-ARM that uses a hybrid data transformation format to quickly finding frequent items and generating rules. The MR programming paradigm is becoming popular for large scale data intensive distributed applications due to its efficiency, simplicity and ease of use, and therefore the proposed algorithm develops a fast parallel distributed batch set intersection method for finding frequent items. Two implementations (Weka, Hadoop) of the proposed MR association rule algorithm have been developed and a number of experiments against small, medium and large data collections have been conducted. The ground bases of the comparisons are time required by the algorithm for: data initialisation, frequent items discovery, rule generation, etc. The results show that MR-ARM is very useful tool for mining association rules from large datasets in a distributed environment. © 2013 World Scientific Publishing Company.
Nigerian students and the “allure” of Foreign (UK) Education: A Curious Reflection
(Adonis and Abbey Publishers Ltd, 2013-01-01) Madichie, Nnamdi O.; Madichie, Edward I.
The purpose of this paper is to highlight the duality in the appeal of UK higher education degrees vis-à-vis the poor perception of African degrees (notably the Nigerian degree). We relied upon an online focus group of African academics and professionals outside the UK, in a bid to provide deeper insights on the problems and reasons why Nigerian students opt to study overseas - notably in the UK. Key questions discussed with our respondents revolved around the allure of foreign (UK) education, the challenges of higher education infrastructure/resources, employability concerns, and the growing security issues in the Nigerian higher education (HE) landscape. Finally we provide policy prescriptions in the light of recent developments in the UK HE sector – notably the “London Metropolitan University (i.e. LondonMet) saga,” - whose licence was recently revoked and immigrant visa powers stripped by the UK Borders Agency. © 2013 Adonis and Abbey Publishers Ltd. All rights reserved.
Doing Business in Ghana's Informal Sector - Auntie Muni & the "Waakye" Kitchen
(Adonis and Abbey Publishers Ltd, 2013-01-01) Madichie, Nnamdi O.; Hinson, Robert E.
This exploratory study pools together two complementary streams of literature - i.e. marketing and entrepreneurship, drawing upon a single case study of "Auntie Muni," an informal woman-owned business in the food sector in Ghana's East Legon area. In our estimation and based on our in-depth interview, Auntie Muni has braved all odds to remain in business despite all the harsh conditions facing her line of business. With a poor educational background, her resilience as a mother not just to her kids (but to most young people in the community, hence the name Auntie) and her optimistic outlook to life in general makes her a worthy case deserved of research attention. It also highlights some policy implications on the need of the government to recognise, reward and assist such informal ventures into more formalized ones. In the end we hope to have a holistic view of the entrepreneurial landscape of the food business (i.e. restaurants) in what we hope would become an assemblage of challenges and achievements for class and other scholarly discussions in Sub-Saharan Africa. This is with a view to teasing out areas where lessons might be learnt, and identifying other areas for further policy intervention as the continent muddles its way towards the 2015 deadline of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). © 2013 Adonis and Abbey Publishers Ltd. All rights reserved.
Corporate governance in Islamic perspective
(Emerald Group Publishing Ltd., 2013-08-23) Choudhury, Masudul Alam; Alam, Mohammad Nurul
Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to delineate the substantially different theory and application of corporate governance idea in Islamic financial theory contrary to the perceived one in the literature. Thus, a comparative and contrasting examination of the topic is provided. Design/methodology/approach – A theoretical and extensively comparative study of the literature to bring out the objective of presenting the systemic theory of Islamic corporate governance underlying its specific epistemological foundations. Findings – The hetrodox theory of Islamic finance in regards to the theme of corporate governance is shown to be a viable alternative way of understanding this topic in the light of the particular Islamic epistemological premise. Thus, Islamic financial perspective, exemplified here in terms of corporate governance, is expounded. Research limitations/implications – Empirical extension can be made but such epistemological responses are presently not available from the Islamic financial institutions because of their imperfect premise on the epistemology of unity of knowledge and organization on which the theory of Islamic corporate governance rests. Social implications – A vast social implication of corporate govarnance is opened by its epistemological inquiry comprehending integrated decision-making and systemic complemenatrities expending across society at large. Thereby, a socio-financial theory of corporate governance in the epistemological context is elaborated upon. Originality/value – This is a pathbreaking paper premised on its epistemological approach of unity of knowledge and learning systems as a distinct contribution in the theory of corporate governance in the field of ethical socio-financial perspective. © 2013, © Emerald Group Publishing Limited.
Causality analysis in business performance measurement system using system dynamics methodology
(American Institute of Physics Inc., 2014) Yusof, Zainuridah; Yusoff, Wan Fadzilah Wan; Maarof, Faridah
One of the main components of the Balanced Scorecard (BSC) that differentiates it from any other performance measurement system (PMS) is the Strategy Map with its unidirectional causality feature. Despite its apparent popularity, criticisms on the causality have been rigorously discussed by earlier researchers. In seeking empirical evidence of causality, propositions based on the service profit chain theory were developed and tested using the econometrics analysis, Granger causality test on the 45 data points. However, the insufficiency of well-established causality models was found as only 40% of the causal linkages were supported by the data. Expert knowledge was suggested to be used in the situations of insufficiency of historical data. The Delphi method was selected and conducted in obtaining the consensus of the causality existence among the 15 selected expert persons by utilizing 3 rounds of questionnaires. Study revealed that only 20% of the propositions were not supported. The existences of bidirectional causality which demonstrate significant dynamic environmental complexity through interaction among measures were obtained from both methods. With that, a computer modeling and simulation using System Dynamics (SD) methodology was develop as an experimental platform to identify how policies impacting the business performance in such environments. The reproduction, sensitivity and extreme condition tests were conducted onto developed SD model to ensure their capability in mimic the reality, robustness and validity for causality analysis platform. This study applied a theoretical service management model within the BSC domain to a practical situation using SD methodology where very limited work has been done. © 2014 AIP Publishing LLC.
Islamic tourism in India and Pakistan : opportunities and challenges
(IGI Global, 2014) Haq, Farooq; Medhekar, Anita
This chapter is based on a study of tourism in India and Pakistan and is associated with Islamic faith and practices in both countries. Islam-oriented destinations in both countries have been marketed as products of heritage, cultural, historical, or archaeological tourism. The aim of this chapter is to present the argument that all tourism destinations linked with Islam in India and Pakistan need to be marketed as Islamic tourism products. This chapter makes a contribution to the theory and practice of tourism, marketing, and Islamic marketing. The discussion in this chapter covers the historical perspective of Islamic tourism in literature review and provides an understanding of halal branding of Islamic tourism in the context of India and Pakistan. Recommendations are provided to governments at local, regional, and national levels, private sector, and the local population to reap benefits from opportunities arising from Islamic tourism. The findings and conclusion of this chapter also attempt to make a social and political contribution by promoting peace, mutual social harmony, and universal spiritual understanding between the people of India and Pakistan for economic prosperity. © 2015 by IGI Global. All rights reserved.
Halal branding for medical tourism : case of Indian hospitals
(IGI Global, 2014) Medhekar, Anita; Haq, Farooq
This chapter explores the emergence and development of Halal branded hospitals and medical facilities as a product of Medical Tourism for Muslim patients around the world and in India. Halal tourism is a sub-category of spiritual tourism, where one has to abide by the Sharia law to satisfy Muslim customers. The main objective of the chapter is to focus on a niche category of halal medical tourism, where Sharia rules are followed to attract the medical tourist mainly from Islamic countries. This chapter also proposes a typology of Muslim medical tourist's cultural sensitivities and recommends branding and certifying Halal Medical Tourism hospitals, healthcare facilities, pharmaceuticals, products, and services to attract Muslim patients, and provides challenges and opportunities with future research directions. The case studied in this chapter is of the Global Health City, the first Halal Certified Medical Hospital facility in Chennai, India. It presents a model for halal branding of Indian Medical Tourism based on the halal decision-making paradigm for Muslim customers designed by Wilson and Liu (2010). The model presented here indicates attitudes of being rational or emotional and elements reflecting affective and cognitive feelings for Muslim patients seeking halal treatment in halal hospitals. © 2015 by IGI Global. All rights reserved.
Associative classification approaches : review and comparison
(World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte Ltd, 2014) Abdelhamid, Neda; Thabtah, Fadi
Associative classification (AC) is a promising data mining approach that integrates classification and association rule discovery to build classification models (classifiers). In the last decade, several AC algorithms have been proposed such as Classification based Association (CBA), Classification based on Predicted Association Rule (CPAR), Multi-class Classification using Association Rule (MCAR), Live and Let Live (L3) and others. These algorithms use different procedures for rule learning, rule sorting, rule pruning, classifier building and class allocation for test cases. This paper sheds the light and critically compares common AC algorithms with reference to the abovementioned procedures. Moreover, data representation formats in AC mining are discussed along with potential new research directions. © 2014 World Scientific Publishing Co.
Women entrepreneurship in sub-Saharan Africa: a case-based approach
(Taylor and Francis, 2014-01-01) Madichie, Nnamdi O.; Hinson, Robert E.
This chapter highlights the challenges of women business owners in sub-Saharan African (SSA) using in-depth interviews from four different countries. The primary aim of the chapter is to pinpoint shared challenges of women entrepreneurs and/or business owners drawing upon their narratives and attributions. 1 The chapter unpacks four critical dimensions impacting upon the similarities and/or differences in experiences - notably owner’s background (nationality, ethnicity, education, family etc.); prior motivations (why they chose to start up); challenges (including start-up capital, government regulations, personal achievements), and plans for the future. © 2015 Sonny Nwankwo and Kevin Ibeh.
Entrepreneurial Orientation among SME Wood Manufacturers in Ghana
(Adonis and Abbey Publishers Ltd, 2014-01-01) Ibrahim, Masud; Madichie, Nnamdi O.
This study explores the entrepreneurial orientation of Small and medium size enterprises (SME) wood manufacturers in Ghana. Data for the study was obtained through an in-depth interview with the managers of four sampled wood manufacturers in Accra and Kumasi. Findings from the study indicate a strong relationship between the three dimensions of entrepreneurial orientation and competitive advantage in the furniture industry in Ghana. The study concludes that SME wood manufacturers in Ghana are entrepreneurial – i.e. innovative, risk taking and proactive. However, considering that the market is dynamic the study recommends that firms in this industry should constantly update existing competencies and seek new competencies, in order to have a sustained competitive advantage as well as profitability and growth. This paper evaluates entrepreneurial orientation and firm performance among small and medium enterprises from a developing country perspective. © 2014 Adonis and Abbey Publishers Ltd. All rights reserved.
Integration of functional areas of business : A research agenda
(Adonis and Abbey Publishers Ltd, 2014-01-01) Opute, Promise Abdullah; Madichie, Nnamdi O.
Since the early 1980's relationship marketing theorists have increasingly underlined the need to ensure harmonious interfunctional relationship between marketing and other functional areas, in order to profitably satisfy the customer. A major gap in the literature, however, is the lack of understanding of interfunctional relationship in the non-Western context. To contribute to addressing this imbalance in the literature, this paper aims primarily to inspire researches that illuminate the non-Western context, which will be characterised by cultural fabrics and trading patterns that contrast the Western norms. The methodological approach in this paper is two folds. First, review of literature is undertaken to identify the core themes (and variables) and the debates in the existing literature. Second, a template is proposed to guide knowledge development in the area. © 2014 Adonis and Abbey Publishers Ltd. All rights reserved.
A critical analysis of the "dialogic communications" potential of sub-Saharan African Police Service websites
(Elsevier BV, 2014-06) Madichie, Nnamdi O.; Hinson, Robert
The significance of partnership as a marketing strategy for Islamic spiritual tourism
(Emerald Group Publishing Ltd., 2014-06-03) Haq, Farooq
Purpose – This paper aims to highlight the significance of partnership among stakeholders as a marketing strategy for Islamic spiritual tourism. Partnership as a marketing strategy is studied by interviewing stakeholders on the supply side of Islamic tourism. Only recently, Islamic spiritual tourism has been identified, not recognised yet, as a growing segment of Islamic tourism that needs to be effectively marketed. Design/methodology/approach – Convenient sampling was used in this exploratory research to select and interview tourism operators selling in-bound and out-bound Islamic spiritual tourism in Australia and Pakistan. Cross-case content analysis was used to identify critical themes related to marketing Islamic spiritual tourism. Findings – Three issues emerged from the content analysis in this study: political, commercial and religious. The management of these three issues is found necessary to effectively build and implement horizontal partnerships among stakeholders on the supply side in Islamic spiritual tourism. Research limitations/implications – The selected sample is not the representation of the population based in the two countries. Only few potential participants agreed to be interviewed due to the perceived threat of manipulation of their views. Findings of this research contribute to the theory of marketing Islamic tourism specifically, and tourism in general. Practical implications – The three issues found in this study provide a guideline for crafting strategies to market Islamic spiritual tourism based on local and global partnerships. Social implications – The three issues found in this study provide a platform for cultural understanding and coherence. Originality/value – This original study advocates partnerships among tourism operators, government bodies, destination managers and religious organisations involved in Islamic spiritual tourism. The structure and implementation of partnerships should critically consider the political, commercial and religious issues. © Emerald Group Publishing Limited.

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