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Prospective students and other stakeholders in the education system use global and national rankings as a measure of the quality of education offered by different higher educational institutions. The ranking of an Institution is seen as a measure of reputation and has a significant role in attracting students. But are students happy in the top-ranked institutions? Does a high rank translate into high student satisfaction? This study answers this question taking data from top educational institutions in India.

This study examines how the top-ranked higher education institutions in India fare on student satisfaction. Using the data on key performance indicators published by the National Institutional Ranking Framework (NIRF) and student satisfaction scores of these institutions reported by NAAC, the study explores a possible relationship between the ranking of an institution and its student satisfaction score.

The study finds no significant relationship between the ranking of an institution and its student satisfaction score. The only institutional performance dimension which has a positive correlation with student satisfaction is graduate outcome. The diversity dimension is seen to be negatively correlated with student satisfaction.

The importance of modifying the ranking frameworks to account for the real drivers of student satisfaction is highlighted. The items in the student satisfaction survey should be regularly updated to reflect the actual concerns of the students. This is very important given the fact that the number of Indian students going abroad for higher education recorded a six-year high in 2022 at 750,365.

With more than 50,000 institutions catering to over 40 million students, India has the largest higher education system in the world. Given the high level of competition among these institutions, ranking and accreditation have become important parameters used by students for selection of an institution. But do top-ranked higher education institutions have the most satisfied student community? The assumption is disproved using the most credible secondary data. This study is the first of its kind in the Indian context. It has huge implications for the most respected ranking frameworks.

Total quality management (TQM) has been a universally applienod management strategy to improve organizational performance and thereby to achieve competitiveness. Compared with the scholarly and practical attention paid to identify the consequences of implementing TQM practices, little is known about how those practices enhance organizational image and employee satisfaction. This paper aims to address that research gap and is designed to empirically prove the relationship between TQM practices, organizational image and employee satisfaction.

A questionnaire-based survey of 285 employees including administrators, managers and heads of departments of 21 National Accreditation Board for Hospital and Healthcare providers-accredited hospitals in India was conducted. The proposed research model was tested using partial least squares based structural equation modelling.

The results revealed that TQM practices have positive direct and indirect effects on employee satisfaction, confirming the partial mediation role played by organizational image in the relationship between TQM practices and employee satisfaction.

From the findings, leaders can understand that by implementing TQM practices, organizations can enhance image of the organization and bring high level of employee satisfaction.

The study tries to answer questions largely ignored in the TQM literature: the effect of TQM practices on organizational image and employee satisfaction, and the mediating role of organizational image on TQM practices and employee satisfaction.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the role of product and customer dimensions in the contribution of brand experience to the formation of true brand loyalty. The dimensions included are brand credibility, affective commitment and involvement. Synthesising past studies, the researcher proposes brand credibility and affective commitment to mediate the relationship between brand experience and true brand loyalty. Furthermore, the researcher investigates the variation in hierarchical pattern, i.e. brand experience-brand credibility affective commitment-true brand loyalty, under different levels of involvement.

The variations in hierarchy were compared by design. The authors investigated the variations in hierarchy on the basis of products which belong to different level of involvement, on the basis of individual differences in involvement, and on the basis of the interaction of product involvement and subject involvement. Multi-group invariance tests in SEM were used to explore model variations.

The hierarchy-of-effect model was found to vary based on the level of product involvement, subject involvement and interaction involvement. Three patterns of hierarchy have been observed: the first pattern was observed in high-high groups (both product involvement and subject involvement were high), the second pattern was observed in low-low groups (both product and subject involvements were low) and the third pattern among high-low or low-high groups.

The variation observed highlights the need to segment the market by interaction involvement. This would be useful for managers engaged in building sustainable consumer-brand relationships.

This study considered the interaction of product approach and subject approach in defining involvement which is rarely attempted in research. The study also integrates the variations in the role of customer dimensions, namely involvement, brand credibility and affective commitment with the relationship between the central constructs brand experience and true brand loyalty. The variations observed are among a socio-economically homogeneous sample of respondents.

Fourth Industrial Revolution (IR 4.0) technologies have strong potential to affect consumer well-being, positively or negatively, so the current paper aims to review potential opportunities and threats that these technologies represent for consumers in several core economic sectors: health care, education, financial services, manufacturing and retailing.

This paper proposes a conceptual framework for how IR 4.0 technologies affect consumer well-being in five representative sectors: health care, education, financial services, manufacturing and retailing. The authors argue that the potential transformations of these specific sectors, facilitated by these technologies, may have profound effects on consumer well-being, with urgent public policy implications.

Emerging technologies, such as artificial intelligence, robotics, the Internet of Things, three-dimensional printing, machine learning and blockchain, provide customers with novel approaches toward decisions regarding health, education, finances and other fundamental parts of their lives. The organizations that provide these services, such as hospitals, universities and banks, actively adopt the innovations offered by IR 4.0. These evolving and disruptive technologies thus are changing reality for consumers and providers.

This paper proposes some novel public policy implications of IR 4.0 technologies for consumer well-being, and it outlines further research directions that can enhance understanding of relevant technologies and the consequences of their use for society.

This paper aims to explore how varsity football athletes and coaches negotiate meanings when faced with the unmet expectations of a new head coach brought into lead a turnaround process. It also aims to pay particular attention to the role of history in this meaning making process.

This paper draws on semi‐structured interviews with players and coaches at two points in time. To preserve the richness of their experiences and illuminate the historical aspects of change, it focuses on the stories of three players and one supporting coach.

Numerous symbols of change emerge that have multiple and contradictory meanings. The meanings around success and failure are renegotiated over time as individuals struggle with the unmet expectations of change. Moreover, individuals are unable to shed the failures of the past and move forward.

Change is a complex and messy process of managing multiple meanings. Understanding change entails more than a snapshot picture of an organization. New leaders have no control over the past, yet they need to be aware of how individuals experienced the past in order to increase the likelihood of success in the present.

Success and failure are experienced as an ongoing process as athletes and coaches experience, reflect on and interact with others. In illuminating the role of history in how change is experienced in the present, the paper demonstrates that the past can serve as both an immobilizing force, as well as a comparative point enabling individuals to rationalize their emotions.

Entrepreneurs are networking with others to get advice for their businesses. The networking differs between men and women; notably, men are more often networking for advice in the public sphere and women are more often networking for advice in the private sphere. The purpose of this study is to account for how such gendering of entrepreneurs’ networks of advisors differs between societies and cultures.

Based on survey data from the Global Entrepreneurships Monitor, a sample of 16,365 entrepreneurs is used to compare the gendering of entrepreneurs’ networks in China and five countries largely located around the Persian Gulf, namely Yemen, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates.

Analyses show that female entrepreneurs tend to have slightly larger private sphere networks than male entrepreneurs. The differences between male and female entrepreneurs’ networking in the public sphere are considerably larger. Societal differences in the relative prominence of networking in the public and private spheres, and the gendering hereof, correspond well to cultural and socio-economic societal differences. In particular, the authors found marked differences among the religiously conservative and politically autocratic Gulf states.

As a main limitation to this study, the data disclose only the gender of the entrepreneur, but not the gender of each advisor in the network around the entrepreneur. Thus, the authors cannot tell the extent to which men and women interact with each other. This limitation along with the findings of this study point to a need for further research on the extent to which genders are structurally mixed or separated as entrepreneurs network for advice in the public sphere. In addition, the large migrant populations in some Arab states raise questions of the ethnicity of entrepreneurs and advisors.

Results from this study create novel and nuanced understandings about the differences in the gendering of entrepreneurs’ networking in China and countries around Persian Gulf. Such understandings provide valuable input to the knowledge of how to better use the entrepreneurial potential from both men and women in different cultures. The sample is fairly representative of entrepreneur populations, and the results can be generalized to these countries.

This is a comprehensive list of books, some pamphlets, and a few sound recordings about or by Ronald (and Nancy) Reagan. Collections of photographs and cartoons as well as biographies, political commentary, speeches, quotations and even recipes are represented. Omitted are books in which there is only brief mention of him. The bibliography was compiled in connection with a major exhibit on Ronald Reagan at the Colorado State University Library. It is the author's intention to continue to collect Reagan materials.

This paper explores and interprets the linkage between total quality management (TQM) practices and organizational performance measures for improving the healthcare firms’ performance. Indian healthcare firms are aware of TQM practices and their benefits, but the awareness level varies among the firms and staff. The study looks into the effectiveness of quality awareness to meet quality performance in Indian hospitals.

A questionnaire based on previous research was circulated among the managers and medical staff. The model linking TQM and organizational performance is analyzed with structural equation modelling and confirmed the hypotheses stated. Interpretations to improve hospital performance are made.

The study identified ten relevant TQM factors and confirmed their importance towards the improved organizational performance of Indian hospitals. Top management initiative, continuous process improvement and team work are the most contributing TQM factors. Differences in the awareness levels by the management staff and medical staff are attributed. The managers and medical staff are aware of the benefits of TQM towards firm performance, but it is to be improved further.

Cross-validation and interpretation are affected due to the limited sample size. Longitudinal study is recommended to explore the individual hospital as specific cases. Larger sample size is suggested as an extended work to overcome the demographic and infrastructural limitations of the firms included.

The management is more interested in TQM, but there is lack of awareness among the staff. The quality awareness and customer focus by medical staff are the most weakly loaded factors, and the weaknesses can be remedied by the lead role by the hospital management in providing proper training and thereby improving the attitude of the medical staff.

Effectiveness of hospital operations is highly dependent on customer focus. Properly communicated, committed and trained staff with good-quality awareness can better implement TQM and thereby improve hospital performance. Lead role by the management is very important, and the paper lists ways to attain these outcomes.

Very little is reported from the Indian healthcare sector linking TQM and outcome performance. The quality awareness, customer focus, communication and learning by the medical staff are to be improved, and the paper suggests ways to link TQM more effectively to improve the performance in hospitals. These findings may be useful to the managers, medical staff and researchers in healthcare to bring better results.

This article aims to present a model linking loyalty intention, brand commitment, brand credibility and brand awareness. The model shows the mediating role of brand commitment and brand credibility on loyalty intention. The researchers also investigated the changes in the given model under high and low involvement conditions, explicitly considering involvement as between-subject differences rather than between-product differences. The change in customer loyalty intention under varying levels of product involvement is a highly debated topic among researchers.

The model was tested on a sample of 318 executives who have bought and are using deodorants. The respondents had given responses for loyalty intentions, brand commitment, brand credibility, brand awareness and involvement towards the brand of deodorant that they use. Confirmatory factor analysis was used to validate the tool for measurement of constructs and multi-group structural equation modelling for testing the hypotheses and comparing the nested models.

The difference between high and low involvement groups in the given model supports the hierarchy-of-effects view. We found that attitude precedes behaviour for highly involved individuals but followed a different hierarchy among the individuals with low involvement.

This research investigates the proposed model for a single product category and so the scope of generalisability is limited to the product selected. This research has considered behavioural intention rather than the behaviour in this study.

The study demonstrates the differences in the hierarchy-of-effects among low/high involvement groups. Thus, the findings will have an impact on the approach of practitioners, as different strategies will have to be adopted for the enhancement of loyalty intentions based on the difference in perceived involvement of consumers.

This paper shows the need to differently target consumers with different levels of perceived involvement, within the same product class and thus between-subject involvement can be used as a segmentation variable.

Technological progress and the advancement of the 4th Industrial Revolution (IR 4.0) are well underway. However, its influence on the transformation of core sectors from the perspective of consumer well-being remains under-explored. Seeking to bridge this gap in the marketing and public policy literature, this study aims to propose a conceptual framework to explicate how data-driven, intelligent and connected IR 4.0 technologies are blurring traditional boundaries between digital, physical and biological domains.

This is a conceptual paper using primarily a literature review of the field. The authors position the work as a contribution to consumer well-being and public policy literature from the lens of increasingly important in our technology-integrated society emerging technologies.

The authors define and conceptualize technology-enabled well-being (TEW), which allows a better understanding of transformative outcomes of IR 4.0 on three essential dimensions of consumer well-being: individual, societal and environmental. Finally, the authors discuss public policy implications and outline future research directions.

The authors highlight specific gaps in the literature on IR 4.0. First, past studies in consumer well-being did not incorporate substantial changes that emerging IR 4.0 technologies bring, especially across increasingly blurring digital, physical and biological domains. Second, past research focused on individual technologies and individual well-being. What is unaccounted for is the potential for a synergetic, proactive effect that emerging technologies bring on the aggregate level not only to individuals but also to society and the environment. Finally, understanding the differences between responses to different outcomes of technologies has important implications for developing public policy. Synergetic, proactive effect of technologies on core sectors such as healthcare, education, financial services, manufacturing and retailing is noted.