Darwina Arshad

Factors Contributing to SMEs Innovative Culture in Punjab, Pakistan: A Pilot Study

The objective of this research is to measure the reliability and validity of SMEs innovative culture and its construct developed by Rao & Weintraub (2013). 60 questionnaires were used to collect the responses from SMEs’ CEOs and senior top executives in Punjab, Pakistan. The study adopted the simple random sampling method for data collection. The reliability and validity of the instrument were assessed through experts from academia and industry and also from small sample of the data. Results provide the evidence of validity and reliability of the instrument. This study will help to identify the factors contributing for innovative culture in SMEs Pakistan.

The effect of innovative cultural processes on performance of small and medium size enterprises

Article history: Received: May 28, 2018 Received in revised format: July 19, 2018 Accepted: July 30, 2018 Available online: July 30, 2018 The purpose of this study is to identify the influence of innovative cultural processes (ICP) on SMEs performance in Punjab, Pakistan. Data was collected through survey method. 60 usable questionnaires were used for collecting the information from SMEs CEOs/owners/senior managers from Punjab, Pakistan. Research design was consisted on developing the hypothetical framework with innovative cultural processes set as an independent variable to test SMEs performance as a dependent variable. Validity and reliability of the scale were assessed by experts and also a small set of the data was used for analysis through SPSS version 20.0 and PLS-SEM 3.0 for analyzing the effect. The results of the research confirmed the validity and reliability of the instrument used in this study. The findings of this study also validate the empirical linkage between capturing ICP and SMEs performance in Punjab, Pakistan. This study has some practical implications especially for SMEs in Pakistan and recommendations to have ICP for enhancing the performance of SMEs.

Use of social media, student engagement, and academic performance of business students in Malaysia

Social media is a popular communication tool for college students in many countries including Malaysia. Even though the literature indicates that the use of social media in a higher learning environment is likely to enhance academic performance of college students, the mechanism that explains such association is yet to be explored. Based on the claims that the integration of social media use is purposeful to enhance student engagement, the purpose of this paper is to investigate the role of student engagement as a potential mediator between social media use and academic performance of college students in Malaysia.,A total number of 227 business students in one of the public universities in Malaysia were randomly chosen to participate in this study. Questionnaire was used as the main data collection technique, which was personally administered during class sessions. Data were analyzed using structural equation modeling-partial least square (SEM-PLS).,The result showed the multidimensionality of student engagement. It also indicated that cognitive engagement mediated the relationship between social media and academic performance, but not behavioral, emotional, or agentic engagement. The result suggests that social media has the potential to be used in a learning environment as it promotes cognitive engagement of students in class and subsequently their academic performance and success.,One of the limitations of the present study is that the generalizability of the finding to a much larger population of students may be limited as the sampled students were recruited from business students in one of the public universities in Malaysia only. Students of different academic programs in different universities may have a different pattern of using the social media.,This study will help higher learning institutions and educators think of ways to integrate the use of social media in learning activities to help students achieve better academic performance. As shown by the findings, such use can encourage students to be cognitively engagedt in class in which the students can be more active learners.,The present study adds to the literature in social media use by addressing the issue of how it helps enhance academic performance of college students in a single model. Past studies tended to examine the role of social media and student engagement and the effect of student engagement on academic performance separately. Furthermore, this study took into consideration various types of social media used by college students who tend to have multiple accounts.