Entertainment, being such a lucrative market, receives fewer academic endeavors than most other types of tourism provision. The purpose of this dissertation is to investigate the entertainment destination experience via conceptualization, scale development, and empirical testing. Entertainment has been acknowledged as one of the driving forces of the global economy and received increasing scholarly interest in hospitality and tourism research. A mixed-methods approach was adopted to achieve the study purpose, consisting of three studies. Study 1 examined the concept manifestation of the entertainment destination experience. Visual and textual analytical techniques were employed to analyze 318 online reviews from TripAdvisor. Following the well-established scale development procedures, Study 2 included three phases to develop a scale for the entertainment destination experience by conducting 21 in-depth interviews and collecting 602 usable surveys. With a total of 373 valid responses, Study 3 examined the impact of the entertainment destination experience on emotions, memorability, destination satisfaction, and behavioral intention by employing the partial least squares structural equation modeling. This dissertation identified the core attributes of the entertainment destination experience. The multi-dimensional and formative nature of the entertainment destination experience was revealed. The current research identified six dimensions of the entertainment destination experience, consisting of hospitality, affective, cognitive, sensory, intellectual, and social entertainment. The study results uncovered the positive impacts of entertainment destination experience on emotions, memorability, destination satisfaction, and behavioral intention. Emotions and memorability were found to mediate the relationship between entertainment destination experience, destination satisfaction, and behavioral intention. This dissertation makes pioneering efforts to investigate the entertainment destination experience. The current study is one of the first attempts to manifest the conceptual attributes of the entertainment destination experience. Also, it is one of the first to go beyond a unidimensional perspective by exploring the multi-faceted nature of the entertainment destination experience. The findings shed light on the entertainment research in hospitality and tourism and advance the understanding of tourist experience by establishing a scale for entertainment destination experience. In addition, this dissertation adds new knowledge to entertainment literature and tourism and hospitality research by uncovering the impact of the entertainment destination experience on emotions, memorability, destination satisfaction, and behavioral intention. From a managerial perspective, the present study offers important practical implications for industry practitioners who aim to tap into the entertainment market. The findings highlight the core attributes and dimensions of the entertainment destination experience for destination policies and regulations. Employing the entertainment destination experience scale as a toolkit, destination managers are recommended to evaluate entertainment products and services to shape the tourist experience and improve the destination image.

Tourism consumption is a systematic aesthetic appreciation experience that combines human lives with extraordinary nature and culture. While the bridge linking aesthetics and tourism has significant potential of helping to explore how tourism contributes to human life, the study of aesthetics in tourism remains unclear and fragmented. To fill this research void, this study aims to cultivate a comprehensive understanding of the nature of aesthetics in tourism by exploring and defining a Chinese classical aesthetic concept – Yijing. Specifically, the objectives are to (1) explore the manifestation of aesthetics in tourism, (2) unveil the formation of Yijing through tourist gaze, (3) uncover the connotation of Yijing, (4) comprehend how Yijing contributes to human life, (5) delve into the formation of Yijing through social media gaze, and (6) examine the impacts of Yijing on intention to transformational changes. Guided by the realism paradigm and employing an exploratory sequential mixed-method approach, this dissertation initially undertook a two-phase qualitative study, performing netnography to explore both tourists' and online audiences' activities on a travel platform. The sample for the narrative analysis consisted of 35 content-rich travel blog posts (total word count: 776,993; total number of pictures: 11,924), along with corresponding comments (total word count: 9,541) and interactive responses from online observers. A quantitative study was then conducted to test the conceptual model developed based on the qualitative findings with a generalized population. The main study (n=395) was analyzed with PLS-SEM. Findings from the qualitative study suggested a Yin-Yang philosophical approach to understanding aesthetics in tourism, proposing a new way to define "Beauty" and "Ugliness." A two-stage framework of Yijing's formation (i.e., preparation and realization) and a three-level pyramid of Yijing's connotation (i.e., perceptual appreciation, transcendence, and Epiphany) were revealed. The three levels of Yijing ideally correspond to the three realms of people's outlook on life and trigger individuals' behavioral, psychological, and transformational changes. Findings from the quantitative study further validated the three levels of Yijing and its significant influence on self-transformation in a global setting. This dissertation bears valuable theoretical contributions to studying aesthetics in various disciplines and fields such as tourism, hospitality, education, psychology, and marketing from a unique Eastern philosophical perspective. It also yields insightful practical implications for organizations and practitioners to practice aesthetic placemaking.

Cryptocurrency is virtual money that is secured by digital information and cryptographic techniques, enabling fast and secure hospitality and travel transactions without risks of fraud, conversion costs, or certain transaction fees. Despite its potential benefits, customers are hesitant to adopt cryptocurrency for purchases. Prior literature mostly utilized technology acceptance models to conceptualize individual cryptocurrency adoption in hospitality and tourism, preventing an interdisciplinary comprehension of this phenomenon that integrates technology, finance, and e-commerce aspects. This dissertation aims to explore factors explaining individuals' intentions to use cryptocurrency for hospitality and tourism purchases and to develop a conceptual framework that generalizes adoption intention towards cryptocurrency. To achieve these objectives, a mixed-method approach was employed, involving 29 semi-structured interviews and 401 online surveys with cryptocurrency holders. The interviews were analyzed using thematic analysis to validate the proposed model's constructs and scales, while the online surveys were analyzed using structural equation modeling to test inter-construct relationships. Multigroup structural equation modeling estimations were also conducted to examine the moderation of personal innovativeness, risk propensity, and familiarity with cryptocurrency. The study revealed that performance expectancy, social influence, facilitating condition, price value, and perceived trust had positive impacts on usage intention while effort expectancy and stickiness to traditional payment were identified as barriers to customers' willingness to use cryptocurrency. The findings also showed that perceived ubiquity was determinant of perceived trust and performance expectancy, while perceived structural assurance predicted perceived trust and perceived risk. The study also confirmed the invariance in the relationships between adoption intention and its antecedents regardless of individuals' personal innovativeness, risk propensity, and familiarity with cryptocurrency. This dissertation provided valuable theoretical contributions to individuals' cryptocurrency adoption in hospitality and tourism from an interdisciplinary perspective, and practical implications for practitioners in these sectors and payment service providers to optimize their implementation of digital currency.

This dissertation consists of two essays on the topic of bidding in multi-unit common value auction. Essay one examines the role of capacity constraint on the auction results and bidding behavior. We consider a general case where bidders are unconstrained, and a second setting where bidders are capacity constrained. We document downward sloping demand curves for individual bidders. Bidders shade their bids by submitting quantity-price pairs and spreading their bids. The winner's curse is strong in the unconstrained treatment, but we find no evidence of the winner's curse when bidding constraints are imposed. Unconstrained bidders shade bids significantly more and their quantity-weighted prices are much lower than those in the constrained treatment. Interacting with the information structure, the capacity constraint has a significant impact on the auction results including the market clearing price, market efficiency, and the degree of market concentration. We provide evidence that efficient price discovery in multi-unit auctions with diverse information is possible, but careful attention to auction design will make this outcome more likely. Essay two examines how the introduction of a noncompetitive bidding option affects outcomes in a multi-unit uniform-price auction. The experimental design incorporates many of the characteristics of the markets that pertain to the issuance of new equity securities. Important features of the bidding environment include endogenous bidder entry, costly information acquisition, bidders that differ by capacity constraint, and substantial uncertainty with respect to the intrinsic value. We use a standard uniform-price auction as our baseline setting where only competitive bids are accepted. Our results show that introducing the noncompetitive bidding option improves auction performance by increasing revenue and reducing price error. Underpricing is found in both treatments, but is less severe in the presence of the noncompetitive bidding option. The incorporation of this option significantly increases both the small bidder participation rate and allocation, and reduces the incentive for small bidders to free ride by submitting extremely high bids. Under both treatments, information acquisition increases large bidders' profits but proves unprofitable for small bidders, and pricing accuracy is increasing in the rate of information acquisition.

No description available.

No description available.

South Africa abandoned its apartheid system in 1994, which enabled the country to be integrated into the global economy. Due to the lack of global competitiveness, between 70 and 80% of start-ups fail within five years (Goosain, 2004:23). People lost their jobs and the unemployment rate escalated from 17% to 28% (Kingdon and Knight, 2003). Government increased its support to small businesses in order to stimulate economic growth and development as an alternative means of job creation. However, studies conducted to determine the performance of small businesses reveal that most of these businesses fail irrespective of the support they receive from government due to a lack of financial management skills. The study being reported here investigated which financial management skills owners/managers of small business have and which ones are lacking in order to recommend appropriate training interventions required to develop and improve the financial management skills of such owners/managers and ultimately the management of their businesses. A literature review was conducted regarding the small business environment, training interventions and financial management skills. Financial management skill sets relevant to small business were identified and listed for empirical research purposes. Empirical research was conducted on the target population within the indicated geographical area. The study confirmed that most small business owners/managers have limited financial skills. Recommendations will be put forward on the type of skills future training needs to focus on. / Finance and Risk Management and Banking / M. Com. (Business Management)

This study focussed on the budget control and monitoring challenges for school governing bodies. The study engaged a qualitative in-depth research into the challenges school governing bodies experience regarding budget control and monitoring based on the fact that budget control and monitoring are dimensional tools of financial management aimed at ensuring proper financial management and accountability. The research, grounded on social constructivism and employing a phenomenological pragmatic approach for data collection was purposely and conveniently confined to town schools in the Ekurhuleni District. Data was collected using interviews with school principals, finance officers and a treasurer and Institutional Development and Support Officers. Findings from the data indicated that while there were areas where school governing bodies did well, they faced numerous challenges in budget control and monitoring. It was found that there were challenges regarding the budgeting process in so far as budget preparation, budget implementation, and budget control and monitoring. Miscellaneous challenges influencing the budget control and monitoring process found included poor financial reporting, the low level of parental literacy which seemed to influence the meaningfulness of and realistic nature of the budgeting processes and the generic, inadequate and poor training school governors were provided with. Recommendation from the study mainly concern the provision of customised, focussed and needs-based training in financial and budget management after determining the skills audit to determine training and capacity building needs of school governors, holding principal to account for financial management as ex officio members of governing bodies, reviewing the quintile classification of schools based on the poverty index and considering the backgrounds of learners at town schools, who mostly are from previously disadvantaged backgrounds and ensuring that schools report on finances in languages parents understand and linking budgeting process to schools’ educational goals. / MEd (Education Management), North-West University, Vaal Triangle Campus, 2014

Uppsatsen, som tar avstamp i Ekonomistyrningsverkets kritik från 2008 och 2010, handlar om hur Försvarsmakten kan arbeta med processorientering för att möta Ekonomistyrningsverkets kritik avseende styrning och kontroll av organisationen. Intervjuer har genomförts med Högkvarterets analyschef på PlanEk och med kvaliteschefen på Södra Skånska Regementet P7 i Revingehed. Resultatet visar att det är stora skillnader mellan förbandet P7 och Högkvarterets syn på processorientering. Utbildning och en gemensam vision om processorienteringen kan vara nyckeln för att Försvarmakten ska vara en organisation som nyttjar processorienteringen på ett effektivt sätt / The essay, which have The Swedish National Financial Management Authority criticism from 2008 and 2010 as a starting- point, deals with the question how Swedish Armed Forces can adopt Business Process Orientation in order to respond to the criticism mentioned above. Interviews have been carried out at Armed Forces Headquarters (Head of Analysis at PlanEk) and South Skåne Regiment P7 (Quality Manager). The result of the study shows major differences between South Skåne Regiment and Armed Forces Headquarters referring to Business Process Orientation. Education and a common vision of what business process orientation is all about may be the key to how Swedish Armed Forces can use the Business Process Orientation to reach efficiency.

This study focussed on the budget control and monitoring challenges for school governing bodies. The study engaged a qualitative in-depth research into the challenges school governing bodies experience regarding budget control and monitoring based on the fact that budget control and monitoring are dimensional tools of financial management aimed at ensuring proper financial management and accountability. The research, grounded on social constructivism and employing a phenomenological pragmatic approach for data collection was purposely and conveniently confined to town schools in the Ekurhuleni District. Data was collected using interviews with school principals, finance officers and a treasurer and Institutional Development and Support Officers. Findings from the data indicated that while there were areas where school governing bodies did well, they faced numerous challenges in budget control and monitoring. It was found that there were challenges regarding the budgeting process in so far as budget preparation, budget implementation, and budget control and monitoring. Miscellaneous challenges influencing the budget control and monitoring process found included poor financial reporting, the low level of parental literacy which seemed to influence the meaningfulness of and realistic nature of the budgeting processes and the generic, inadequate and poor training school governors were provided with. Recommendation from the study mainly concern the provision of customised, focussed and needs-based training in financial and budget management after determining the skills audit to determine training and capacity building needs of school governors, holding principal to account for financial management as ex officio members of governing bodies, reviewing the quintile classification of schools based on the poverty index and considering the backgrounds of learners at town schools, who mostly are from previously disadvantaged backgrounds and ensuring that schools report on finances in languages parents understand and linking budgeting process to schools’ educational goals. / MEd (Education Management), North-West University, Vaal Triangle Campus, 2014