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This study investigates the intricate relationships between transformational leadership behaviours (TLB), job satisfaction (JS), organizational commitment (OC), and organizational citizenship behaviours (OCB) within the context of county governments in the United States. Drawing on a theoretical model that hypothesizes both direct and indirect effects of TLB on OCB, mediated by JS and OC, this research employs structural equation modelling to analyze survey data collected from 372 matched leader-follower pairs across various county governments. The findings substantiate the hypothesized model, revealing that TLB indirectly influences OCB through the mediating effects of JS and OC. Specifically, the study underscores the pivotal role of job satisfaction and organizational commitment as conduits through which transformational leadership exerts its positive impact on organizational citizenship behaviours. This research contributes to the literature by empirically validating a comprehensive model within the public sector context, thereby extending our understanding of the mechanisms through which transformational leadership fosters a conducive work environment that promotes OCB. The study's implications for leadership development and organizational policy within public sector organizations are discussed, alongside limitations and directions for future research.

Efficiency in farming productivity and optimum utilization of resources in the agriculture sector in developing countries is a challenge that can be addressed with technological advancement. There is also a strong need to work on the farming community’s engagement to make better farming decisions. This study aims to create an expert knowledge-based system (KBS) in a mobile application to help Indian farmers improve their agricultural practices and increase crop productivity. A prototype mobile application, ‘Farm-n-Pedia,’ is designed and used to fulfill the farmers’ informational and engagement needs. It provides a tool for agriculture management using a single platform. The expert KBS incorporates a crowdsourcing system as part of the knowledge base and interface design. The mobile application enables the users to access the worldwide information they want, get personalized expert guidance, interact with the local agrarian community, know about the latest farming techniques and technology, crowdsource data collection and increase agricultural productivity.

The main purpose of this study is to measure up to what extent the independent factors defined by capital adequacy ratio, non-performing loans ratio, cost-income ratio, liquidity ratio, and loans-to-deposits ratio impact the financial performance of sixteen commercial banks operating in the United Arab Emirates using panel data for the period of 2013-2019. The secondary data was collected from banks and examined by applying standard descriptive statistics and the random effect model for hypothesis testing. It is concluded from the regression outcomes that non-performing loans ratio and cost-income ratio have a significant negative impact on commercial banks profitability in the United Arab Emirates, while capital adequacy ratio, liquidity ratio, and loans -to-deposits ratio all have a very weak positive relationship on the return on assets but they are not determinants of bank’s profitability due to the insignificant statistical impact on it. It is therefore suggested that to enhance financial performance and minimize the risk of non-performing loans in the future, banks must watch very carefully the loans’ performance and analyze thoroughly the clients’ credit history and ability to pay back their debts prior to any approval of loan applications. Furthermore, banks should continuously improve their assets utilization, liquidity, and techniques of managing operating costs, improve the impact of capital adequacy, and the use of deposits for lending activities from a weak positive impact to a significant positive impact on their profitability. The researchers recommend that future studies on credit risk management influence on banks’ financial performance should consider more independent variables and longer periods of study such as twenty or thirty years to have more accuracy and generalized results.  

Virtual healthcare information technologies (HIT) are being adopted during the Covid-19 pandemic. We propose that even after Covid-19, virtual HIT can still have great potentials to address the challenges brought by the aging population on healthcare systems. The key questions are (1) what kinds of virtual HIT will be useful for seniors and (2) how these HIT will affect senior citizens’ health-related quality of life (HRQL)? Centered on the concept of HRQL and grounded on task-technology fit (TTF) theory, this paper builds a framework of useful virtual HIT in the context of long-term care for seniors. The framework proposes senior citizens’ human characteristics (i.e. restricted mobility, deteriorated working memory and attention, and social isolation) will influence their health-related tasks (task adaptability, autonomy, and interdependence). A set of virtual healthcare systems can be designed to fit seniors’ tasks. These HIT will increase seniors’ HRQL through increased task-technology fit (i.e. quality of healthcare, timeliness of healthcare, and relationships with seniors). This framework can serve as a base for researchers and practitioners in their endeavor to design more suitable HIT for seniors.