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This article describes the findings of a phenomenological study whose purpose was to understand the essence of education from the analysis of the relationships emerging between the main educational actors (professors and students).

This research was approached from the qualitative paradigm and from a method of phenomenological analysis; specifically, heterological phenomenology is proposed, which is presented as the search for human relationships as a founding condition of education. For collecting information, a phenomenological interview with twelve professors from public and private universities in the city of Manizales (Colombia) was used.

The results reveal the experiences had in education from the relationships that have left their mark on the subjects and discover education as a relationship with the Other of welcome, hospitality, vocation and responsibility.

The originality of the study is in the particular method, heterological phenomenology, which investigates the experience of human relationships as a scenario for constructing a reality in which the starting point is the narrative that the Other (research subject) makes of his encounters with his-Other (subject present in the narrative).

Mexico has an economic dynamic mostly associated with low added value sectors; regions of Guerrero and Michoacan highlight at national and even international levels in the agri-food production, however, they present substantial lags in their development and competitiveness. The purpose of this paper is to analyze the innovation policy in the agri-food sector of these regions through its regulations and local policy.

The present work has a qualitative approach through a case study with the treatment of units of analysis (UA), in which innovation policy in the agri-food sector as main UA, whose sources of interpretation have been direct observation and documentary sources such as laws and the guiding instruments of the regional public policy on innovation and the agri-food sector.

This paper identifies severe institutional weaknesses, a lack of incentives and structures for generating certainty and innovation capabilities in the agri-food sector. Both regions have weak and poorly articulated institutions in their innovation policy, with few incentives and scarcely defined property rights tending to increase uncertainty among the actors participating in the agri-food sector, although the economic dynamics of both regions is mostly associated with that sector, therefore, the low development and lack of competitiveness are a direct consequence of a minimum priority of innovation policy.

Our research is useful for the academic sphere by contributing to applied knowledge on the implications of innovation policy at the sectoral level on the development and competitiveness of regions, particularly in an emerging country such as Mexico, allowing to generate bridges gaps between theory and practice.

The main contribution is for policymakers, allowing them to compare and facilitate a better design of regulatory and public policy instruments that enable them to address and enhance economic vocations through innovation for regional development.

The research focuses on a debate at the regional level on the institutional limitations of promoting innovation through public policy. This study approaches economic and political processes having as empirical evidence of two undeveloped Mexican regions that stand out internationally in agri-food production. These regions have sectoral dynamics inserted in global value chains but have not achieved a local articulation, which has negatively affected their competitiveness and development. The cases of Guerrero and Michoacan are examples of regions like many others, which present diverse institutional weaknesses and lack of incentives associated with innovation policy that limit the development and articulation of their territorial capabilities.

The aim of this study is to explore and understand corporate governance patterns in family firms across Latin America. This is in response to several calls in the academic literature urging for more empirical studies in corporate governance in developing regions.

Following a configurative perspective, a hierarchical cluster analysis is applied to a sample of the 155 largest Latin American family firms.

The authors identify three main corporate governance configurations across Latin American countries. First, the exported governance model resembles many characteristics of Anglo-American and Continental Europe governance patterns of public listed control, having independence from the board of directors, and mainly hiring non-family management. Second, the super-familial governance model describes private ownership where one or multiple families control both the board of directors and the top-management team. Finally, the hybrid governance model is the largest cluster identified in the sample and combines governance characteristics of both of the foregoing configurations. This configuration exhibits ownership structured through public offerings of shares combined with leadership of the board of directors by a family member as well as moderate family influence on the board and management.

This is the first study to investigate corporate governance in the largest listed and privately-owned family firms in Latin America. The article extends the conversation on family firm heterogeneity and contributes to the configurative approach in the family business field by offering a cross-country perspective and identifying meaningful taxonomies that are applicable beyond national boundaries.

The board of directors of a firm is a governing body exercising key top-level decisions. Due to the involvement of the controlling families, boards of directors of family firms have been found to behave differently than those of other organizations. Besides family control, national and/or regional contexts have been suggested to influence how companies are governed. Boards of directors of family firms have been studied mostly in developed regions and knowledge from developing regions such as Latin America is scarce. This chapter summarizes the main findings about boards of directors in family firms and compares this research with our knowledge from Latin America. It discusses the different challenges and opportunities that owners of family firms and boards of directors face in the Latin American context. Finally, it suggests that research on boards of directors of family firms in Latin America has a very promising future as it still has to validate and/or contextualize findings in developed regions, overcome some theoretical and empirical limitations, explore some salient characteristics related to the institutional context in depth, and provide recommendations linking board characteristics and firm performance.

The purpose of this paper is to evaluate a continuous improvement project (CIP) at a Mexican university designed to increase engineering graduate student loyalty.

A plan-do-check-act problem-solving methodology was implemented, and a SERVQUAL survey was conducted on 67 master’s engineering students.

Five factors were found to affect student loyalty: facility cleanliness; faculty teaching skills; evening student services; master’s degree student management roles at work; and master’s degree students’ ages. After the implementation of the improvement and control actions, there was a 7.7% increase in the engineering master’s degree students’ loyalty scores.

However, there were several research limitations: data availability (such as student loyalty, student satisfaction and a small master’s degree student population size) and factors outside the CIP’s scope (such as the country’s economic situation, university rankings, master’s programme accreditations and COVID-19).

The findings from this research study could be used by other higher education institutions (HEIs)to improve student loyalty and as a reference when conducting similar studies in other service organisations such as hospitals and hotels.

This research work took a different approach in assessing student satisfaction and student loyalty in a HEI by using the SERVQUAL survey as the data collection instrument for conducting CIP.

This paper aims to consider the development of corporate social responsibility (CSR) projects by Catoca, a diamond mining company in Angola, along with the effectiveness of these projects, and the benefits to stakeholders.

The research method used was direct observation and semi-structured interview with executives and administrative employees of the company, and collaborators of CSR projects, during 2010, 2011 and 2012. We also analyse documents about CSR projects developed by Catoca and identify the challenges faced.

The management of CSR projects is hampered by the low disclosure of results and the absence of social indicators. This may generate inadequate results compared to investment. The assumption of low stakeholder expectation and the absence of social indicators may lead to neo-philanthropic or preconceived actions that ignore local peculiarities.

This study is limited to one company, and the lack of social indicators means it is difficult to evaluate the reported results.

This paper improves understanding of the challenges involved in CSR projects in Africa and may also be useful for companies that develop CSR projects, drawing attention to issues that could compromise the proper use of resources and hamper results.

This study considers Angola, which is using its natural resources to boost economic and social development, establish partnerships with foreign companies and encourage the development of CSR programmes which often end up filling gaps left by the absence of government action.

This study contributes to the largely under-researched area of CSR projects in Angola.