Making the strange familiar and the familiar strange: A critical reflection on teacher educators and the coronavirus crisis

This chapter uses the framework of making the strange familiar and the familiar strange to discuss the sudden shift from face-to-face to online instruction in higher education during the coronavirus crisis. Educators should employ critical reflection questioning the familiar or the taken-for-granted and the underlying assumptions of ordinary everyday teaching and learning experiences as though they are entirely unaccustomed or strange. More specifically, the chapter focuses on teacher education and pedagogy and applies this framework to shifting to online teaching. The chapter explains possible questions that would be raised by both the familiar and the strange. The discussion includes examples and implications for professors as they transition from traditional teaching to online instruction. © Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021. All rights reserved.

Transformative marketing in the new normal: A novel practice-scholarly integrative review of business-to-business marketing mix challenges, opportunities, and solutions

Transformative marketing has been heralded as the future of marketing. While the initial catalyst for trans -formative marketing was the desire of customers for more meaningful engagement, the global impact of great crises (or mega disruptions) has accelerated the evolution of transformative marketing. With a focus on business -to-business (B2B) marketing, this article aims to offer transformative marketing insights to support B2B mar-keters in preparing for, navigating in, and recovering from great crises using the great lockdown that transpired during the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic as a case. To do so, this article employs the marketing mix as an organizing framework and performs an integrative review of practice and scholarly articles relating to B2B marketing and COVID-19. In doing so, this article delivers a seminal integrative review that is informed by both practice and scholarly sources in B2B marketing, thereby establishing its methodological novelty and value. More importantly, this article highlights "what" is necessary and "how" B2B marketers can (re)configure the product, price, place, promotion, people, process, and physical evidence elements of their marketing activities to steer their B2B marketing operations toward success in a world where global crises are a commonplace. Therefore, this article contributes in two major ways: the first from a theoretical perspective, by extending the theoretical generalizability of transformative marketing, and the second from a managerial standpoint, by shedding light on practitioner issues and offering practical suggestions for B2B marketers to prepare for, navigate in, and recover from great crises in the new normal.

Fears and uncertainty about the pandemic in Spain: an exploratory analysis of social inequalities

The Covid-19 crisis impacted Spanish society, modifying its habits and customs. Society shows concerns that evolve into fear and uncertainty of what will happen in the future in different aspects. The main objective of this study is to delve into those fears and evaluate the social inequalities revealed by how those fears are perceived. We analysed the "Efectos y consecuencias del coronavirus" survey from CIS at three different moments: October 2020, September 2021, and December 2021. The results show a higher prevalence of social fears compared to economic ones. However, the perceived economic concerns reveal the main differences in educational level, age, and place of birth. In addition, women express concern the most. It is necessary to wait to see how the crisis unfolds to assess how these fears evolve.

COVID-19 pandemic and the impact of cross-cultural differences on crisis management: A conceptual model of transcultural crisis management

In this paper, leadership tasks and stakeholder response during transboundary crisis management are analyzed based on findings from Hofstede's study, GLOBE Project, and theoretical concepts in cross-cultural management. Accordingly, a conceptual model of transcultural crisis management is proposed. Seven propositions (P) and sixteen sub-propositions (SP) are developed and then tested using the case method. The case of the COVID-19 pandemic is studied to note the effects of cross-cultural differences and intercultural communication in the pre-crisis, crisis, and post-crisis stages. Cross-cultural differences are found to affect sense-making, decision-making, sense-giving and meaning-making during pre-crisis and crisis management stages. Implications of these findings and further research agenda are discussed. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved)

Social work for vulnerable and marginalized people during COVID-19 in Japan

During the Coronavirus disease pandemic (COVID-19), working conditions became increasingly difficult for social workers, as they had to deal with new challenges and added workloads. This study describes the difficulties faced by social workers of the Self-Reliance Support System in Japan and clarifies the solution for each difficulty while conducting their duties to support vulnerable people during COVID-19. To this end, we conducted an open-ended questionnaire survey and an interview survey. The data were analyzed using qualitative coding. The results showed that the difficulties faced in consultation support work included supporting hitherto socially invisible groups such as sole traders and foreigners. Social workers also faced an ethical dilemma, as they could not provide support to clients who "did not try to solve their problems” or for whom "interventional attempts did not lead to counseling support” and who only sought benefits at the risk of becoming isolated and impoverished. Following this, consultants collaborated to resolve such difficulties while maximizing the use of various local resources. The study's findings clarify that it would be effective to understand the difficulties faced by social workers to obtain hints toward their resolution. © 2023 John Wiley & Sons Australia, Ltd.

The Influence of Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) Practices on US Firms' Performance: Evidence from the Coronavirus Crisis

This study explores the influence of total and individual ESG practices and the coronavirus crisis on US firm performance (FP). A large and recent sample of 406 US firms that adopted ESG issues during 2016–2020 was used. This study uses the generalized least-squares (GLS) regression estimator, the dynamic analysis technique, and robustness tests. The results indicate that firms with heightened ESG practices have better performance measures. In most cases, the results suggest that firms with heightened environmental, social, and governance performances have better performance measures. The results suggest that the coronavirus crisis negatively affected FP measures. In addition, the analyses of the differences suggest significant distinctions in FP due to the coronavirus crisis. This study's findings have important implications for stakeholders. Managers could benefit from the results of this examination by recognizing the status of ESG practices and FP before and during the coronavirus crisis and identifying the linkage between the fulfillment of ESG responsibilities and FP. This study provides noteworthy practical implications that could enable managers to develop strategies and policies for adopting and enhancing ESG practices to achieve the best performance. Furthermore, the results could influence trading processes as investors and financiers pursue attractive financial returns from investments in businesses concerned with ESG issues. © 2023, The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature.

SMALL BUSINESS IN NORTHERN REGIONS OF RUSSIA IN THE CORONACRISIS CONDITIONS: FACTORS, ISSUES AND CONSTRAINTS OF DEVELOPMENT

Objective: This study examines formation issues of the small business entrepreneurial ecosystem in the Northern regions of Russia in the conditions of coronavirus crisis. The importance of small business in the regional economy is not only legally enacted but is also scientifically based and disclosed by researchers. Social and economic infrastructure with a wide range of service support for small enterprises plays a special role in the activity of small enterprises in the Northern oil and gas producing regions. The purpose of the study is to analyze and economically assess small businesses development in the Northern oil and gas producing regions, using the case study of the Khanty-Mansi Autonomous Okrug – Yugra based on retrospective data and to elicit existing relations between the state-of-the-art of small business and the periods of crisis events as well as to assess major problems and constraints. Methods: In this paper, the research is based on the Northern regions of Russia with a high level of state support for small businesses activities. Results: The authors of this study suggest that the coronavirus crisis has had a significant impact on the transformation of small business in Northern regions of Russia and this negative impact of the crisis may cause adverse consequences for the entire economy of the region. This assumption is verified using the case study of changes in basic parameters of small business and the impact of crisis processes on its development. Conclusion: The revealed regional features of the economic development in the Northern regions of Russia are considered by the authors not only as being negative factors but also as potential opportunities;for example, amid biological threats, those Northern regions being remote from the Centre and borders were in a better situation, in terms of spreading infection, etc. © 2022, Centro Universitario Curitiba - UNICURITIBA. All rights reserved.

Institutional Response Strategies of Health Crises Through Public's Lens

This descriptive study employs the Social Mediated Crisis Communication Model [SMCC] to primarily identify the crisis response strategies adopted by the Palestinian Ministry of Health in facing the Corona Covid-19 pandemic. The extent to which the public accepted these strategies approved by the ministry following the form of the messages directed to the audience is consequently examined. The study, at the same vein, attempts to detect the audiences' emotional responses that have been shaped following the selected form of messages under analysis. Traditional media, social media or offline word-of-mouth entail the form of message. A content analysis was conducted on the ministry's communications during the study period. To triangulate the data, a questionnaire has been designed and electronically distributed on a sample of 370 students enrolled at Hebron University, Palestine. The analysis has shown that the supportive strategies are the most acceptable responses to the audience. They create a positive emotional reaction following the type of message source applied. The study also concludes that—in health crises—social media and offline word-of-mouth are more convenient as a form of message at the outbreak and during the pandemic. The form of message is highly influential on the development of internal and external dependent-attributed emotions. The current study argues that it is essential to adopt social media and offline word-of-mouth as a communication form during health crises. © 2023, The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG.

Monetary Policy After the Coronavirus Crisis

In response to the global coronavirus crisis, central banks all over the world have cut interest rates and introduced other measures to ease monetary policy. The aim of this chapter is to analyze this response, how it changed compared with their response to the global financial crisis of 2007–2009, and how monetary policy might evolve further. In particular, I examine the adequacy of aggregate demand management and interest rate cuts in reference to the global coronavirus crisis and the potential economic impact of the interest rates staying lower for longer. I argue that setting interest rates too low for too long can impair their signaling and allocation functions and cause significant harm in the long run, such as misallocation of resources, excessive risk-taking, zombification of the economy, and accumulation of too much debt. © 2022, The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG.

Service Innovation and Value Creation in Local Journalism During Times of Crisis

Journalism innovation, according to service innovation theory, is about providing new journalistic services that create value for audiences, society, and the news organisation itself. This study explores how local news media responded to the Coronavirus crisis in terms of service innovation. Based on interviews with editors and top management representatives at two local newspaper groups in Norway (N = 20), we show how local newspapers developed new digital services in response to audiences' need for guidance, overview, and a sense of togetherness, and how the media operations generated revenues in the process. Theoretically, the study identifies two key innovation dynamics in local journalism during a crisis: A social-economic value creation dynamic which captures how local newspapers appropriate their business model to accommodate new service offerings and balance social and economic value creation considerations;and a service system-audience experience dynamic which captures how innovation in journalistic offerings are linked to concurrent innovations in journalistic production processes. This research enhances the understanding of journalism innovation as a value-creating phenomenon and the factors that stimulate such value creation during crises. [ FROM AUTHOR]

Monetary Policy After the Coronavirus Crisis

In response to the global coronavirus crisis, central banks all over the world have cut interest rates and introduced other measures to ease monetary policy. The aim of this chapter is to analyze this response, how it changed compared with their response to the global financial crisis of 2007–2009, and how monetary policy might evolve further. In particular, I examine the adequacy of aggregate demand management and interest rate cuts in reference to the global coronavirus crisis and the potential economic impact of the interest rates staying lower for longer. I argue that setting interest rates too low for too long can impair their signaling and allocation functions and cause significant harm in the long run, such as misallocation of resources, excessive risk-taking, zombification of the economy, and accumulation of too much debt. © 2022, The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG.

Collaborative behaviours and social dilemmas during the coronavirus pandemic: does gender matter in the context of Moroccan firms?

The current COVID-19 pandemic challenges require collective actions aiming at ensuring the preservation of human health by developing a social and an economic resilience. Moreover, experiences show that cooperative and civic behaviours are so credible in a context of solidarity and reciprocity according to a win-win cooperation among all social stakeholders and countries from a micro to a macro – analysis level. The present study explores the choices and decisions made by Moroccan firms through the lens of the game theory and investigates cooperative behaviours occurring during 2020 within social dilemmas. It contributes for a better formalisation of social and behavioural compliance to public policies in times of coronavirus crisis. This research provides then an enhanced understanding of gender differences related to people's behavioural responses to the COVID-19 pandemic and emphasises the importance of adopting individual and collective behaviours required for the coordination of separate actions. Copyright © 2022 Inderscience Enterprises Ltd.

Psychology in times of crisis: An economic psychological analysis of the coronavirus pandemic

When the SARS-CoV-2 virus reached us in Europe, we panicked. Life was scaled down to the bare essentials and tentatively loosened up again. The lockdown is followed by huge changes. There is no return to familiar normality in sight. How did we experience the threat to our health and the changes to the familiar rituals of life? What followed shock and fear? How did we manage to discard long-rehearsed rituals and accept the challenges? How will we talk about the policies after the lockdown, what will we remember and what will we have learned from the crisis? This Essential offers an economic psychological analysis of the complex interplay between state, organisations and people from the beginning of the crisis to the repair phase. The book's content includes: the coronavirus crisis from an economic psychology perspective;onset of the crisis at micro, meso and macro levels;living in the crisis at micro, meso and macro levels;repair and retrospection. Target groups include: entrepreneurs, the self-employed, political scientists, psychologists, sociologists, economists, economists and students of all social sciences. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved)

Key areas of neutralizing threats to the economic security of the Russian Federation in the post-pandemic period

In connection with the complicated economic situation in our country and in the world (global and local conditions), which has developed as a result of the coronavirus crisis, the search for new directions and areas for ensuring the economic security of socio-economic system is gaining more importance and becomes top priority. The subsystem of employment management can be considered as one of the named areas. The general idea and goal of that subsystem is to form a rational structure of employment as a key element of the recovery and subsequent development of the socio-economic system in the post-pandemic period. During the pandemic all the elements of economic system were involved, not only the national interests of the state in economic, social, internal (home) political, informational, international and in other spheres, but also sphere of individual interests felt a significant negative impact on themselves - many citizens were alienated from production processes, lost their jobs, which led to a significant imbalance employment within the labour market of the country. Thus, new directions for studying and researching the role of the labor market as one of the backbone factors of the socio-economic system, as well as the development of conceptual approaches to assessing and forecasting trends in the labour market in the context of maintaining national interests and ensuring the economic security of the socio-economic system, have become actualized. Analyzing conditions of the labour market, its performance in various situations, economic combinations can help in process of developing a balanced system of measures implemented in accordance with the strategy of economic development and aimed at forming and maintaining the required level of resilience of the region to crisis phenomena. The authors investigated the main modern challenges and threats to the economic security of the socio-economic system, have contributed significantly to the advancement of the-state-of-the-art in economic security of the socio-economic system, which impede not only the realization of national interests, but also the systematic economic recovery in the post-pandemic period. The necessity of applying the elements of mathematical modeling in order to overcome the imbalance in the labor market as a threat to the economic security of the Russian Federation in the new conditions is substantiated. © 2021 ACM.

Institutional Response Strategies of Health Crises Through Public’s Lens

This descriptive study employs the Social Mediated Crisis Communication Model [SMCC] to primarily identify the crisis response strategies adopted by the Palestinian Ministry of Health in facing the Corona Covid-19 pandemic. The extent to which the public accepted these strategies approved by the ministry following the form of the messages directed to the audience is consequently examined. The study, at the same vein, attempts to detect the audiences’ emotional responses that have been shaped following the selected form of messages under analysis. Traditional media, social media or offline word-of-mouth entail the form of message. A content analysis was conducted on the ministry’s communications during the study period. To triangulate the data, a questionnaire has been designed and electronically distributed on a sample of 370 students enrolled at Hebron University, Palestine. The analysis has shown that the supportive strategies are the most acceptable responses to the audience. They create a positive emotional reaction following the type of message source applied. The study also concludes that—in health crises—social media and offline word-of-mouth are more convenient as a form of message at the outbreak and during the pandemic. The form of message is highly influential on the development of internal and external dependent-attributed emotions. The current study argues that it is essential to adopt social media and offline word-of-mouth as a communication form during health crises. © 2023, The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG.

DEVELOPMENT OF E-COMMERCE IN TIMES OF THE CORONA CRISIS

In 2020 and 2021, the coronavirus crises lead to an extraordinary e-commerce growth. Based on an empirical study among 365 online retailers in Switzerland and Austria, the e-commerce developments during the corona crises were investigated. Nine out of ten online retailers demonstrate a sustainable e-commerce growth, and more than half have gained many new customers. In addition, many existing customers buy more frequently from online retailers, and/or buy larger quantities. In 2020, most online shops had a strong order increase in product groups like garden, do-it-yourself, toys, furniture, sports equipment, and food (more than 20% per year). Due to the e-commerce growth, online retailers are faced with different challenges in procurement, management, customer service, distribution, and IT. Moreover, new sales channels like messenger and social commerce arise and classical formats are adapted. Therefore, omni-channel retailers test showrooms, click and collect, experiential, self-service, or pop-up stores. Finally, this contribution provides strategic and operational implications for online shop operators. © 2022 IADIS Press. All rights reserved.

The Role of Mindfulness Therapy in Reducing the Psychological and Social Effects of the Novel Coronavirus on Clinical Social Workers in Saudi Arabia

The present research aims to identify the psychological and social effects of the novel coronavirus on clinical social workers in Saudi public hospitals, the role of mindfulness therapy in reducing these effects and the differences in the responses of clinical social workers to the role of mindfulness therapy in reducing these effects according to the variables of gender and medical experience. To achieve the research objectives, the author adopted the descriptive analytical approach and a questionnaire was used as a tool. The results showed that the patient's death, while his/ her beloved ones were away, was unbearable. Moreover, mindfulness therapy reduced the psychological and social effects of the Coronavirus crisis on clinical social workers. The research recommends preparing mindfulness therapy programs to train clinical social workers in how to handle the psychological and social effects of the novel Coronavirus crisis. © 2022 NSP Natural Sciences Publishing Cor.

Hindrances related to the coronavirus (COVID-19) crisis in the tourism sector in India

A novel coronavirus emerged in Wuhan, China in December 2019 and continues to spread across China and all over the world. Coronavirus is in fact recognised to be one of the deadly viruses as it has already taken the lives of many persons in almost all countries. This means that economic growth has been reduced considerably. More especially, it has almost shaken up all types of businesses including the tourism industry on a massive scale. Consequently, major travel organisations have temporarily closed their offices. In this perspective, the current research aims at determining the impacts of the coronavirus (COVID-19) crisis on the tourism industry in India. A secondary research methodology has been implemented and the necessary information was collected to reach the objectives of the study. Major importance was given to government documents and the statistical data gathered from renowned and authentic data sources. The main objective of the investigation is then to understand to what extent the coronavirus has influenced the tourism industry in India domestically and internationally. It seems that such a crisis has in turn affected the economic scenario of the country generating a generalised fear of unemployment.

Does the efficiency of working capital management affect a firm’s financial distress? Evidence from UAE

Purpose: This study aims to explore the relative efficiency of the working capital management (WCM) for Emirati firms before and during the coronavirus crisis. Next, this study explores the potential impact of WCM on the likelihood of financial distress. Design/methodology/approach: A data envelopment analysis (DEA) was applied to assess the relative efficiency of the WCM. This study uses the emerging market Z-score model to predict the likelihood of financial distress. The logistic regression was applied to investigate the impact of the efficiency of WCM on firms’ financial distress. Findings: The results of this study model showed a negative and significant influence of the efficiency of WCM on firms’ financial distress likelihood. Practical implications: The findings have important implications for many stakeholders, including decision makers, WC managers, financiers, investors, financial consultants, researchers and others, in increasing their awareness of firms’ WCM performance before and during the crisis. Further, the results could have implications for trading strategies as investors seek attractive economic gains from their investment in firms that care about WCM. Social implications: The implications of WCM performance on social interests would cause firms’ decision makers to operate efficiently and achieve the best practices to minimise the probability of firms' financial distress. Originality/value: This study advances a novel contribution to the literature by introducing a novel model to assess WCM based on DEA technology. © 2022, Emerald Publishing Limited.