Jan'20
The IUP Journal of Management Research
Focus
What needs to be done to optimize the wealth formation by the firms by applying advanced management strategies has become a subject of debate. With regard to this proposition, some start-ups have been able to chalk out long-term sustainable action plans with the application of techno-centric practices. As such, increasing the efficiency levels of the firms becomes the core agenda for the management. The current issue makes an attempt to deal with this issue by featuring some related papers.
The growing population of India indicates the possibility of huge untapped potential in the Indian general insurance sector. Thus, many companies are striving to reach the optimum levels of market penetration, and in the course of it, there has emerged a competitive scenario in the insurance business. In the first paper, "Efficiency Evaluation of Indian General Insurance Companies", the authors, Mahesh Chand Garg and Swati Garg, attempt to measure the efficiency in Indian general insurance companies, by applying Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) techniques. This paper ranks the general insurers on the basis of their super-efficiency, which is a unique feature. The difference between public and private sector insurers with regard to their scale of performance is pointed out in this paper. The paper suggests that the Indian general insurance sector should pay more attention to scale efficiency to gain overall efficiency.
Employee engagement happens to be the most serious concern for the organizations in view of the fact that new generation workforce has new perspectives and aspirations towards life and work. This is so in the realm of real estate sector as it is still in the formative stage of acquiring corporate structure and operations. In the second paper, "What Engages the Salesforce Optimally in Real Estate Sector: A Study", the authors, Venkateswarlu Karumuri and S Rajani, identify workplace recognition, vision and style of leadership, work-life balance, interpersonal relationships, ethics and challenging jobs, HR policies, etc. as the prominent motivational factors that are crucial in the context of increasing the efficiency of the salesforce in real estate sector.
With regard to the influence of the social media networks in recent times, a debate is emerging on how best to channelize this technology for better delivery of outcomes on various fronts of business management. Since the perceived usefulness of social network sites varies from context to context, in the third paper, "Usefulness of Facebook: A Study of Users' Perception", the author, Parinda V Doshi, identifies the drivers of usefulness of Facebook for individuals and society. The findings convey a message for effective utilization of Facebook in the larger interests of society as well as individuals in a more productive way.
Consulting Editor
Efficiency Evaluation of Indian General Insurance Companies
The aim of the present paper is to evaluate the efficiency of the Indian general insurance companies and to find out the reason for their inefficiency. The paper intends to rank these companies on the basis of their efficiency. 12 general insurers are studied using Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) for a period of 12 years, i.e., from 2005-06 to 2016-17. The study is based on secondary data collected from annual reports of insurers and Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority of India (IRDAI). The study concludes that not more than one-third of the insurers are found to be technically efficient. Pure technical efficiency was observed for 50-75% insurers. This makes it clear that the main reason for inefficiency is the scale inefficiency. The same is reinforced by super-efficiency results. Public sector companies should reduce their scale dimension and private sector companies should work for the enhancement of their scale dimension, so that they can achieve the most productive scale size and become more efficient.
What Engages the Salesforce Optimally in Real Estate Sector: A Study
Wholehearted engagement in the given work on the part of the employees is becoming a problem to the organizations as the expectations of the employees are different from one another. The present paper tries to understand the various drivers of salesforce engagement in the real estate sector in Visakhapatnam, Andhra Pradesh, India. A structured questionnaire is used to elicit responses from the salesforce working in real estate companies in Visakhapatnam. Factor analysis is used to identify the significant salesforce engagement drivers. The results are of help to the real estate sector to engage the salesforce in an optimum manner by concentrating on these vital drivers.
Usefulness of Facebook: A Study of Users' Perception
There is a constant increase in the usage of Social Networking Sites (SNSs) around the world. People use SNSs for varied purposes like remaining in touch with family and friends, building new relationships, developing business, sharing information, spending time, entertainment purpose, etc. Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube, Instagram, WeChat, etc. are some of the most popular SNSs in the world. Different SNSs have dissimilar features and applications which help in fulfilling the varied needs of the users. Due to dissimilarity in features and applications, different SNSs are used for different purposes. It is also observed that perception of their usefulness differs among the users of the site, resulting in a difference in the purpose and proportion of their usage. The present study was conducted to identify the drivers of usefulness of 'Facebook' for individuals and society. All the drivers under study were found to have a positive and significant correlation with the perception of usefulness for society, while a few drivers were found to be significantly correlated with the perception of usefulness for individuals.