Retail carts were recently introduced in the terminals at JHB International Airport and a need was identified by the researcher to gain an understanding on the buying behavior of low cost passengers. This segment is growing in double digits yearly and an opportunity for enhancing Airports Company's revenue exists by offering a tailor-made product to this segment. A profile was established on the low cost passenger in this study, enabling the development of a customized product for this segment. The current product offering was matched to preferences and expectations of the low cost passenger, with recommendations on enhancing retail opportunities and revenue streams within the terminal building contained in this study. / Thesis (MBA)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, 2005.

Information Communication Technology (ICT) is used by private sector companies to differentiate themselves from their counterparts. Some companies view ICT as a strategy enabler and through its integration have improved their service offerings and increased production.This study assesses the integration of ICT in the South African public sector. It compares two government departments: the Department of Home Affairs (DoHA) and the Department of Social Development (SASSA). It highlights the investment these departments make into ICT, assesses the level of management at which ICT is integrated, the perception of managers towards ICT integration and the alignment of ICT processes to the departments' core businesses (Information Systems - Information Technology alignment). The purpose of the study is to resonate to managers in the public sector the benefits ICT can bring in their environment and to highlight the value it can contribute towards improved service delivery if implemented appropriately. Simple random sampling was used to gather data. Questionnaires were distributed in the two departments. At DoHA 23 questionnaires were collected and used as sample and at SASSA 34 questionnaires were collected and used a sample. The descriptive and inferential statistical analysis were done and data presented in the form of tables and charts. The analysis of data shows different approaches to ICT integration in the two departments. The Department of Social Development (SASSA) placed emphasis on ICT integration at both functional and strategic levels of management. The DoHA had no clearly defined approach and a level of indecision amongst the employees was observed. The age of respondents in the two departments had an influence in the manner ICT integration is viewed by employees. The younger respondents accepted ICT integration more readily in their environment, the older respondents reflected some resistance to ICT integration. The data presented shows that SASSA had younger employees up to the age of 49 years whereas at DoHA there were older employees up to the age of 60 years. / Thesis (MBA)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, 2009.

Change is a process that affects everyone and businesses differently and it is constantly happening, whether it be planned or unplanned. The planned change of Mission Directed Work Teams (MDWT) at Richards Bay Minerals (RBM) was implemented from 01 July 2005, and its continuous improvement and mission orientation effect on employees and the performance of the company were vital to improved business success and growth. The effect of change on organisations can be assessed by people's attitudes and outlooks. In the global world of business, companies that cannot adapt to change or implement planned change successfully will be heading for disaster and failure. The ability to react to change and implement change timeously and effectively will determine the difference between success and failure. Change management therefore plays a crucial role in today's fast-paced world of business, and is a vital skill for any manager that wants to succeed beyond expectations. This dissertation describes and evaluates the process of change at RBM during the implementation of MDWT and the change management approach that was adopted. Kurt Lewin's Force Field Analysis (Misselhorn, 2005), semi-structured interviews and statistical analyses showed that MDWT impacted positively on employee attitudes and short-term financial performance, but the management of the change process was short-circuited in a few critical areas and needs to be addressed, especially with regards to involvement of the relevant stakeholders, training requirements and change reinforcement. Although organisations need to adapt to their environment, they tend to feel comfortable operating within the structure, policies and procedures which have been formulated to deal with a range of possible situations. To ensure operational effectiveness, organisations often set up defences against change and prefer to concentrate on the routine things they perform well. It is important, therefore, for management to understand the reasons for, and the nature of, resistance to change and to adopt a clearly defined strategy for the initiation of change. Change management requires maintaining the balance of the socio-technical system that influences the behaviour and attitudes of individuals and groups, and thereby the level of performance and effectiveness within organisations. Successfully managing change is therefore clearly essential for continued economic performance and competitiveness in the tough world of business. It is therefore important that change be managed, because if the pressure to change is ignored, it will eventually become a destructive force that will put the survival of the business in jeopardy. / Thesis (MBA)-University of KwaZulu Natal, 2006.

Money laundering is the act of converting money gained from illegal activity, such as drug smuggling, into money that appears legitimate and in which the source cannot be traced to the illegal activi ty. Criminal proceeds also include that which is derived from tax evasion. Estimates of the scale of money laundering globally range between 2 and 5% of the worlds Gross Domestic Product. Another study refers to money laundering as the third largest industry globally. Money laundering has devastating consequences for countries individually and for the global economy as a whole. Potential macroeconomic consequences include inexplicable changes in money demand, greater prudential risks to banks' soundness, contamination effects on legal financial transactions and greater volatility of international capital flows and exchange rates due to unanticipated cross-border asset transfers. A number of initiatives have been established for dealing with the problem at international level. Amongst the most significant is the formation of the Financial Action Task Force (FATF), a body that was established by the G-7 nations in 1989 to develop a coordinated international 096572 response to money laundering. South Africa was recently accepted as a full member of the FAFT, having satisfied the FATF recommendations with the implementation of a Financial Intelligence Centre Act. The provisions of the Act came into effect on 1 June 2003. The Act imposes reporting obligations on accountable institutions like banks, insurance companies, estate agent and casinos. The Financial Intelligence Centre (FIC) is established by the Act in order to identify the proceeds of unlawful activities and to combat money-laundering activi ties. It aims to do so by making information collected by it available to investigating authorities (South African Police, Scorpions, Asset Forfeiture Unit etc. including SARS). The FIC will in the course of its functions build up a database of information, which it will retain and utilise to support the above-mentioned bodies in the performance of their functions. The FICA creates a special relationship particularly with SARS. The FIC data will assist SARS to combat tax evasion and to collect taxes more effectively. The Act explicitly requires all institutions to report any transactions that may be relevant to the investigation of any evasion or attempted evasion of any tax, levy or duty. Money laundering by its very nature does not lend itself to being accurately measured but based on estimates discussed above, this can amount to a substantial loss to the fiscus. The estimated range of between 2 and 5% of the world's GDP would translate to between R24 and R60 billion being laundered annually in South Africa. If one applies the minimum marginal tax rate of 18%, one arrives at a potential loss of between R4.32 and RI0.8 billion to the fiscus. Whilst the new Financial Intelligence Centre Act cannot totally eradicate the laundering of undeclared or criminal proceeds, the many obligations now placed on accountable institutions in terms of the Act is most likely to be a further deterrent or obstacle to tax evasion. / Thesis (M.Com.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, 2004.

The problem addressed in this research is to assess and analyse what actions lead to value creation and enhancement in Red Sea Bottlers Share Company. This research problem is broken down into three basic objectives namely: determining the value drivers of the company, evaluating how and to what extent the company is creating or destroying value, and evaluating what the management is doing in enhancing the value of the company. Company annual financial statements and other secondary documents were used to collect data for the second objective and Questionnaire was used for the first and third objectives. Seven Value drivers of Rappaport's framework are used to ascertain what managers are doing to enhance the value of the company. According to the study to increase revenue managers will increase local sales, strengthen marketing, establish local sales offices and advertise the products. Similarly to increase the profit margin building employees' morale by increasing wages and salaries, being more selective to suppliers, effectively use of resources, increasing product quality and improving production efficiency are being undertaken by managers. There is no visible attempt to reduce the tax expense. As far as the investment decision is concerned, renovating and maintaining the fixed assets has been done. There is no visible value enhancing measure in the working capital management except in inventory management. In relation to the financing decision the company is not using any long-term liability and is lacking the advantage of its gearing effect. Last, as to the growth duration of the value the company's brand name, high capital investment and established distribution channels could be mentioned as entry barriers to potential entrants and become factors of lengthening the value growth duration. Overall what the managers are doing in enhancing the company's value is positive and is to be promoted and encouraged. The main performance measurement tools recommended to determine whether the company is creating value or not are the multi-period measurement tool Total Business Return and the single period tool Economic Value Added. According to these measurements the company is creating value as per the measure of Total Business Return and destroying value as per the measure of Economic Value Added. / Thesis (MBA)-University of Natal, 2004.

The key corporate objective of any company should be the constant creation of shareholder value. This can be achieved either organically by earning revenue from the value proposition they offer customers or through mergers and acquisitions. Sage plc, a FTSE 100 company on the London Stock Exchange is a stalwart contender that believes an effective growth strategy has to be the right kind of acquisition - a business combination that increases the power of the customer value proposition allowing the combined entity to achieve genuine organic growth. As one CEO put it, - believe that you don't get better by being bigger, you get bigger by being better.. (Internet Ref 7) This study undertakes to evaluate Sage plc's strategy of protecting and improving shareholder value through acquisitions. It will also determine whether all management's thoughts and actions, from strategizing with respect to competitive positioning and cutting costs and streamlining operations to creating a productive environment that provides employees with economic benefits and opportunities for advancement, correlate to preserve and increase the organic growth of the firms they are managing and whether effective shareholder value was created or diminished over the designated period of major acquisitions. In order to address this issue the thesis presents a general view on the different approaches used to create shareholder. The use of mergers and acquisitions, to increase growth in an organisation, is discussed and analysed. A key aspect to value creation is measurement. A suitable value based management metric must be established in order to measure value creation. The study will examine all different metrics used to measure shareholder value creation and find the most appropriate measurement. Finally this study makes recommendations, based upon its finding on value creation and measurement. / Thesis (MBA)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Westville, 2006.

The call centre is often the first human interaction a customer has with a company and many customers form their perception of a company based on their experience with that call centre. The call centre industry is growing rapidly and South Africa is fast becoming a desired destination for outsourced call centres. The main aim of this study was to determine the level to which people are satisfied with call centre service delivery in South Africa and the reasons causing customer dissatisfaction. A non probability sample of 106 consumers was drawn from the city of Durban with respondents being over the age of 21 years. The sample was composed of 61% females and 39% males. Of the sample, 55% were between the age group of 21-30 years, 25% were between the age group of 31-40 years, 12% between the age group of 41-50 years and 8% between the age group of 41-50 years. Data was collected using a self administered questionnaire as this proved to be most effective for this study. Respondents from all companies and parts of Durban were recruited as participant for the study. The SPSS software package was used to capture and analyse the data. Frequency bar graphs and cross tabulation frequency results were used to present the data. Statistical results showed that there was a positive association between service quality and customer satisfaction. Descriptive frequency analysis highlighted issues that are causing most dissatisfaction to people using the call centre. Results indicated that users of the call centres found customer service levels to be acceptable which was in contrast to international findings where results indicated that consumers were less than 30% happy with call centre service delivery. Results showed that consumers increasingly wish to communicate with companies using newer technologies, and value having access to multiple channels. It was found that web chat followed by SMS and email was a preferred medium of communicating with the call centre. The findings of the study indicated that long waiting times on the phone, calls being dropped, lack of accountability, irrelevant voice menus and repetition were the main reasons for their causes of customer dissatisfaction. / Thesis (MBA)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Westville, 2009.

The objective of this thesis is to investigate the relationship between motherhood and women's labour force participation in South Africa. The key problem in estimating this relationship is the endogeneity of motherhood/childbearing with respect to women's labour force participation. Childbearing behaviour and decisions to participate in the labour force are jointly determined; and unobservable characteristics which influence childbearing behaviour are also correlated with women's labour force participation. This thesis shows that the definition of motherhood can exacerbate these sources of endogeneity bias. International studies typically identify mothers as women with biological children aged 18 years or younger who are co-resident with at least one of their children. In South Africa, however, a sizeable sample of women is not co-resident with their children. The remaining sample of co-resident mothers are a non-random sample of all mothers who are less likely to participate in the labour force than all mothers. Placing a co-residency restriction on motherhood therefore biases the relationship between motherhood/childbearing and labour force participation. In particular, it overestimates the negative relationship. In the international literature instrumental variable (IV) estimation has been used to disentangle these causal mechanisms. This thesis also considers an application of same sex sibling composition, first introduced by Angrist and Evans (1998), as a strategy to identify the exogenous effects of childbearing on women's labour force participation in South Africa. Little or no research has investigated this relationship in South Africa. One possible explanation for this is that studies on female labour force participation in South Africa have not been able to match women to their children with the datasets that have been analysed: most nationally representative household surveys in South Africa do not contain detailed birth history information. The first part of this thesis analyses what data are available to identify women with children and the quality of these data; it also outlines four different methods to match women to their children using these data. The second part of this thesis investigates the relationship between motherhood/childbearing and women's labour force participation in South Africa. / Thesis (M.Com.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, 2008.

Employee engagement and engaging leadership are subjects receiving attention from organisations. The link between employee morale, motivation and business productivity is important as well managed organisations can derive benefit from such linkages. The aim of this study was to determine whether the engagement models, leadership practices and tools utilised by New Age Beverages (NAB) had impacted positively on the morale and motivation of NAB employees. The study also considered whether there was a positive correlation between morale and motivation of employees in relation to overall business productivity. A probability sample of 50 employees and managers were drawn from a population of 120 employees. The sample frame was drawn from the NAB employee database. A questionnaire which was comprised of 25 quantitative and 5 qualitative questions was used to elicit information from management and employees at NAB. Data mining was conducted to determine trends with regards to quantitative data over the past 3 years relating to Human Resource Key Performance Indicators. The evidence confirmed that engaging leadership has a positive impact on the morale and motivation of NAB staff. It also confirmed that employees perceived a positive correlation between leadership tools and practices such as integrated management practices and “on the level” conversations on the morale and motivation of staff at NAB. Data mining evidence confirmed that integrated management practices resulted in compliance and quality levels increasing to 100% in year 3, machine efficiency and cases produced increased from 78% to 89% and 77% to 91% respectively, proving a positive correlation between employee morale, motivation and business productivity. Key recommendations being for NAB to focus on lower scoring areas, such as trust levels between leadership and management on one hand and employee development on the other, in order to gain further benefits from their programmes. It is suggested that a qualitative study be undertaken. / Thesis (MBA)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban, 2012.

The motivation of employees is a topic that has become popular in the business world and is a “centuries-old puzzle”. It is hard to argue with accepted wisdom (backed by empirical evidence), that a motivated workforce means better corporate performance. It leads to low rates of employee turnover and retention of key skills. However, this has not been the case in many companies, since many managers are either still reluctant to spend their company’s resources on motivating their employees, or lack the know-how and skills to be effective. The broad objectives of this study were to determine the effectiveness of the management practice within a Durban Manufacturing Plant’s Production and Logistics Division (DMP) in lieu of low employee morale resulting in high turnover and to grasp the motivation factors that would influence the retention of their salaried employees and improve performance. The methodology used encompassed data collection techniques using an electronic close-ended questionnaire. The design-approach of the research was quantitative. The sample of 207 salaried employees was drawn from the DMP, with a total population size of 207 salaried employees, representing a confidence level of 100%. The sample was composed of 77.5% males and 22.5% females. Of the sample, 18% were managers and above and 82% were sub-ordinates (14.5% assistant managers, 7.5% principal engineers and 60% other administrationsupport members). There were 200 respondents, resulting in a response rate of 96.62% and the data collected was validated-analysed using both descriptive and inferential statistics, with a Cronbach’s alpha of 0.82. The salient findings from the study were that motivation can significantly increase the performance of employees, whilst the management practice in the DMP was inconsistent and ineffective as they did not employ the process of motivation in their company. The study revealed that while there are many ways of motivating employees, the management of the DMP did not employ these methods to motivate their employees, resulting in low morale, leading to high turnover. The recommendations offered to the management of the DMP, actions to ensure sustainable motivation of their employees that will assist with future retention as well as significant improvements in their morale, and to create a consistently high-performing-thriving workforce, thereby boosting overall performance. / Thesis (MBA)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban, 2012.