Purpose: The main aim of the study is the analysis of the awareness of competency needs in businesses in relation to the development of Industry 4.0 and the possibility of meeting those needs within business cooperation networks.

Methodology: We formed a model of competency needs for companies operating as part of Industry 4.0 in Poland, considering the needs of managers and other staff members. The model was then employed in empirical studies. The pilot empirical study was conducted using two methods: a quantitative CAWI method, which covered 81 companies from the metal processing and machine industry in Podlaskie Voivodship, and a qualitative IDI on a sample of 25 organizations.

Findings: Manufacturing companies are not fully aware of the competency needs related to Industry 4.0, covered by the established model. Moreover, we found that the most strongly felt competency needs – both by managers and other employees – may not be met within the business cooperation network. In order to satisfy these needs, partners must be found outside the studied network. The business cooperation network that we studied may only satisfy the less noticeable competency needs.

Implications: The developed competency model should be studied and further verified, including testing with a larger sample of companies, specifying the behavioral competency gaps related to Industry 4.0, their filling in using formal education systems, lifelong education, internships, and apprenticeships. The need for further research is dictated by the intensity of processes occurring within the Fourth Industrial Revolution.

Value: The pilot nature of the study and its limited sample do not undermine its contribution to the body of knowledge as it confirms that the competencies of managers and other staff members are one of the key determinants of successful implementation of the Industry 4.0 concept in Poland.

Purpose: This study aims to explore the role open data assumes in social innovation initiatives that combat the effects of Covid-19, in which quantitative information about these projects is complemented with the analysis of open data innovation capabilities.

Methodology: A mixed methods approach is adopted. Initially, quantitative data regarding the number of innovative projects is extracted from the OPSI framework. Then, in a second phase, qualitative data from each project is explored to explore the open data innovation capabilities offered by each initiative.

Results: The results reveal that most social innovation initiatives focus on the area of data visualization dashboards and open datasets. However, some projects address other areas, e.g. hackathons, service availability, and tourism information.

Implications: Covid-19 profoundly affects the lives of people and businesses, and open data can assume a determinant role in mitigating these effects and improve information transparency and collaboration between public and private entities.

Originality/Value: This study is relevant for the establishment of supportive public policies that promote the emergence of open-data-driven initiatives to mitigate the effects of Covid-19 in several areas such as the economy, education, and leisure.

Purpose: Entrepreneurship is a vital tool for the economic development of any country. As a fiel of research, entrepreneurship has become a diversified area of study. A plethora of studies appeared that investigate the antecedents of entrepreneurial intention, most of them focus on personality traits and other psychological factors. However, the studies focus less on practical entrepreneurial education such as internship and business incubation. Thus, the current study seeks to fill this gap by empirically investigating the impact of business incubators and internship programs on student’s entrepreneurial intention in the Pakistani context.

Methodology: The authors collected data through a structured questionnaire from students and ran partial least square structural equation modeling technique by SmartPLS software. Findings: The results show that business incubators and internship programs have a strong and positive statistically significant impact on entrepreneurial intentions.

Implication: The current study can help policy-makers get a better insight on entrepreneurship so as to improve its innovation, proactivity, and risk-taking ability and how these factors can amend the lack of entrepreneurial awareness among business students.

Purpose: Since the higher education environment has become highly competitive, the application of marketing principles to the education environment becomes increasingly evident. In order to attract new students and continue business, the institutional brand also gains on importance. Considering the scant literature on the influence of the perceptions of service quality dimensions on brand equity in general and higher education in particular, this exploratory study seeks to determine whether the SERVPERF dimensions of service quality make significant influencers of the overall brand equity of select (South African) universities, and whether the overall service quality significantly influences the overall brand equity.

Design: The authors conducted a survey among a judgmental sample of 400 students from two selected university campuses, using the SERVPERF scale. The data were analyzed with inferential statistical methods, such as multiple regression analysis, with the help of SPSS.

Findings: Tangibles and Empathy were significant and positive influencers of the students’ perception of the institutions’ overall brand equity and the overall service quality as a significant predictor of the overall brand equity. It also became evident that the overall service quality has a significant and positive influence on the overall brand equity when it comes to the students’ perceptions of the surveyed universities.

Implications: Tangibles and Empathy must be closely monitored and carefully managed, while the important role that service quality plays in the overall sense in increasing brand equity perceptions implies that – in the branding efforts of higher education institutions – management and leadership should pay particular attention to offering high levels of service quality to increase the value of their brands.

Research limitations: Only two campuses from one public higher education institution in South Africa was included in the survey, thus any generalization of the research findings must be circumspect.

Originality/value: Management and leadership of higher education institutions must know the service quality dimensions which promote the brand of the institution and manage them to promote a positive image of the institution since these are the dimensions of quality emphasized by the students.

Purpose: The purpose of the paper is to better understand why some SMEs who pursue a niche strategy on the international scale are more effective with a differentiation via innovation while others with marketing differentiation.

Methodology: Therefore, the paper studies the effectiveness of different points of differentiation (innovation, marketing) of hidden champion type of companies: (1) from the perspective of the unknowns of the key success factors in the specifc market segment, and (2) from the perspective of the professional mindset/education of the strategist.

Findings: The results show that differentiation via innovation positively impacts frm performance when there are many market unknowns over key success factors, whereas marketing differentiation positively impacts frm performance when there are few market unknowns over key success factors. On the other hand, when top management earns a business education, the impact of marketing differentiation on frm performance is signifcant, positive, and strong. The effectiveness of differentiation via innovation does not depend on education.

Research limitations/implications: These results mostly consider the hidden champion type of companies, which prefer not to reveal themselves or their data to the public. The transferability of this research is thus limited.

Originality/value: This paper studies the hidden champion type of companies, which usually receive little attention from researchers, through the lens of differentiation via innovation and marketing differentiation as two distinct ways of competing as their effectiveness is contingent on the market unknowns.

Purpose: This study empirically investigated the factors that affect customer retention in the airline industry in North Cyprus. These factors were service quality attributes, perceived safety, customer satisfaction, loyalty reward program, relationship commitment and customer loyalty. The study also investigated four different groups for purposes of travel (business, education, vacation and family visit) in the empirical model.

Methodology: A descriptive approach was chosen to conduct this research. A quanhip between customer retention and the related study factors; however, not all of these relations are significant. The results also showed that the different purposes of travel had different influences on the variables regarding the positive and significant relations between them. Some independent variables had a negative effect on the dependent variables.

Conclusions: This research was limited to one group and place: the students of Eastern Mediterranean University in North Cyprus.

Originality: This study connected the retention, loyalty, satisfaction and service quality factors as attributes. In addition, this research was the frst to include other independent factors affecting satisfaction and loyalty in a comparison between four different groups regarding the purpose of travel in the airline industry.

Purpose: This study argued that desipite what the content of the debate might suggest, there is
a conflict between the two concepts of rigour and relevance and their actual relationship is a symbiotic
one. Drawing on a definition of symbiosis, the study showed that the concepts of rigour and
relevance are actually two separate “organisms” that are bound by a long term relationship that
benefits both sides.

Methodology: The study reviewed selected literature concerning rigour and relevance and presented
the historical development of the debate and theoretical models of the relationship between the
two concepts.

Implications: The implications were presented from a PhD student’s perspective and included
suggestions on how to approach the issues of rigour and relevance in the research project and how
to cope with their seemingly conflicting nature.

Originality: The originality of this study resulted from approaching the issue of rigour and relevance
from a biology perspective and extending the definition of symbiosis to the relationship between
the two concepts.

Purpose: The aim of the study is to analyse marketing challenges facing Polish public universities. Polish universities must urgently adjust their educational offers to deep declines in internal demand and to increased internationalisation of the educational market. The author explores the impact of management decentralisation in faculties of higher education institutions upon their market orientation, relationships with the external world and commercialisation of educational services targeting foreign students.

Methodology: The study is based mostly on direct observations and an extensive review of international literature devoted to the model of the university of the future and its relationships with the environment. The author has been lecturing on marketing for many years; he also manages educational business programmes at a large public university in Poland where he acts in the capacity of a dean.

Findings: Future universities should develop an array of services based on the relationship marketing with key strategic partners (business, local authorities, students and graduates). The idea of a modern educational service should be based on an individual approach to students expanded with complementary services. Educational services should be developed interactively in cooperation with key stakeholders.

Practical implications: Polish public universities should become more marketing oriented and develop a set of commercial educational services addressed to foreign students and to entrepreneurial and internationally-oriented Polish students.

Originality/value: Conclusions formulated by the author result from his long personal experience and knowledge of the specifi city of the educational market in Poland and across the world and his experience in managing an interdisciplinary faculty of a large public university. The interdisciplinary approach to the subject combines elements of the relationship marketing and interactive development of new educational services.

Purpose: This text is a review of the results of a research project on Polish entrepreneurs and Polish enterprises in Silicon Valley, conducted by the author in Silicon Valley in The United States in the years 2007–2012.

Methodology: 81 participants took part in the research (members of 13 different companies and several government and third sector organizations). Among the organizations represented in the project there were companies established in the Valley by Poles, Polish companies present in the Valley, as well as institutions that are active in promotion and support of Polish business presence in the United States, especially in Silicon Valley.

Findings: The research indicates that there are three main areas for improvement in Poland, if it is to be home to companies characterized by a potential for rapid growth (as the ones that Silicon Valley is famous for). The first one concerns cultural aspects associated with low tolerance of risk and social censure of those who fail in business. The second includes financing, in particular limited access to venture capital and business angels networks. The third one refers to business education of entrepreneurs, for whom gaining practical experiences in world-class centers of entrepreneurship, such as Silicon Valley, is of utmost importance.

Purpose: recapitulation of educational experiences in the field of business ethics. Identification of risks and opportunities referring to ethical education, both on academic and
professional levels.

Methodology: a broad description with more profound analysis of chosen issues.

Findings: the essay gathers experiences from the field of business ethics education on different levels: organization and academic as well as postgraduate. It shows a specificity at each level, especially the differences between assumptions, and then evaluates efficiency. It underlines the didactic and formation aspects of business ethics. It enables one to follow the changes within business ethics as an educational subject with aims and methods. In the end, the changes lead to presenting business ethics as an efficient instrument of forming desirable attitudes and standards in organizations.

Originality: a presentation of the main problems of ethical education gives an opportunity to improve programs and methods in the area of education. The essay presents the ways of adapting the educational offer to the expectations of society as well as to market requirements.

Purpose: the essay focuses on some important instruments and measures supporting the desired actual (and not just declared) ethical behavior in banking practices.

Methodology: the essay first used a combination of comparisons to show similarities and differences between 10 banking codes of ethics in EU countries. Then qualitative analysis of indicators and scales assigned to bank rankings was also used to identify some possibilities to promote the ethical behavior of banks in more efficient ways.

Findings: ethical behaviors in the banks, despite a high awareness of moral norms, are largely declarative rather than actual. In order to approximate the actual behaviors to the declared ones, further improvements need to be introduced in the methods and instruments of education (codes of ethics, bank rankings), along with encouraging the implementation of management practices consistent with ethical behavior. This should start with redefinition of the functioning of the bank, i.e. broadening the task of achieving ambitious outcomes by adding respect for ethical standards.

Practical Implications: not every instrument of ethics education can be treated as directly useful in the process of training actual ethical behavior in banks. Some particular conditions must be taken into account that it should fulfill.

Originality: the author has distinguished three levels in business ethics education: ethical awareness and ethically oriented behaviors, both declared and actual. The essay described the necessary conditions for utilization of some educational instruments of ethics in the process of implementing actual ethical behaviors in the banks.. Such an approach has not been found previously in the subject literature.