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Though executive sponsors generally drive project execution, confusion remains regarding their specific job tasks. This paper compares two cases in the US and Kazakhstan to better analyze their tasks.

Paper abstract

Although an active and engaged executive sponsor is typically the most important driver of project implementation success, according to a report by the Project Management Institute (PMI, 2018), an average of 38% projects do not have active executive sponsorship. The Executive Sponsor is generally defined as someone who is in touch with the mission of the team. That mission is something they care about and is related to their core business operations. While a project manager’s role is traditionally focused on day-to-day execution, executive sponsors typically have more high-level responsibilities and often focus on strategy development and creating conditions for success instead of implementation. An effective executive sponsor is especially critical to the success of IT business programs.

There seems to be much confusion as to what the executive sponsor is expected to do as part of their leadership job and their specific roles greatly vary in different organizations (Perkins, 2005). Thus, in an attempt to fill this persistent gap, this paper seeks to conduct a comparative analysis of two IT case studies - the case of Zenly, a social media location sharing app developed by local software engineers in Kazakhstan, and the case of Healthcare.gov, the US federal health insurance website established under the Affordable Care Act (ACA) - to better understand the specific roles executive sponsors should actually play in IT business project implementation processes.

The findings of this research should not only help fill the gap related to the role of executive sponsors in project implementation but also contribute to comparative studies of developed and developing nations.

References:

Perkins, B. (2005, Sep 12). Executive Sponsors: What They Really Do. Retrieved from: https://www.computerworld.com/article/2557218/executive-sponsors--what-they-really-do.html#:~:text=There%20are%20widely%20differing%20opinions,protection%20and%20problem%2Dresolution%20skills.

Project Management Institute (2018, Feb 15). $1 Million Wasted Every 20 Seconds By Organizations Around the World. Retrieved from: https://www.pmi.org/about/press-media/press-releases/2018-pulse-of-the-profession-survey

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What is the role of think tanks in policymaking processes? Can they become drivers of policy change and how much influence do they actually have? These questions are central to the research on think tanks as institutionalized embodiments of expert communities. In the context of West European and North American democratic societies, they have been studied extensively. However, we still know little about policy impact and functions of think tanks in nondemocratic and hybrid political settings. This paper addresses this gap by analyzing the work of think tanks in Kazakhstan. This is done in the context of the Covid-19 crisis, which presented a major test of state capacities in protecting public health and preserving public safety. The paper particularly engages in the following questions: (How) do think tanks attempt to expert influence on policymaking processes and societal developments? What kind of advice do they provide and what functions do they assume in times of crises? Finally, how do think tanks assess their own impact? Methodologically, the paper draws on an original set of 24 semi-structured expert interviews with think tank representatives, conducted in Almaty, Astana and online in the period between April and September 2022. The interview data is complemented with content analysis of think tank publications covering different aspects of the Covid-19 crisis. The findings are discussed against the background of Kazakhstan’s ongoing political reforms and the current governance structures. Empirically, the paper offers the first systematic examination of the kind in the context of Central Asia. Conceptually, it contributes to a better understanding of the role of expert communities by suggesting a taxonomy of functions think tanks exercise in political settings beyond consolidated liberal democracies.

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Objective: This paper is an attempt to analyze the impact of COVID-19 on Small and Medium Sized Enterprises (SMEs) in Herat, Afghanistan. Methods: This research is descriptive and data is first-hand data gathered from a survey. In addition, a Likert-type questionnaire of 23 questions distributed to the sample. According to the Ministry of Commerce & Industry of Afghanistan. the number of SMEs is not determined in Herat Province and there is no exact figure. therefore, the indefinite sample size method used for SMEs and 385 was the sample size for this research. The questionnaire distributed as per the simple random method. According to the Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin Measure of Sampling Adequacy test, this sample size has 89.8 percent adequacy. Findings: From the figures, it can be analyzed that COVID-19 had a negative impact on SMEs in Herat Province, Afghanistan. It highly decreased financial ability, market, and employees' situation, and highly increased the cost of SMEs. Data shows that, at a 95 percent confidence interval, there is no evidence to accept the null hypotheses for all five hypotheses because the significant values are less than 0.05, and it can be analyzed that COVID-19 had an impact on each factor of the study for this reason all research hypotheses have been accepted. On the other hand, as per the Nagelkerke R square test, it can be analyzed that, COVID-19 had a 38.2 percent impact on the SMEs in Herat Province. Generally, it can be concluded that COVID-19 had an impact on SMEs in Herat Province. Novelty: this paper is done in the Herat province of Afghanistan for the first time, it has been done in 2022- 2023, first-hand datagathered, the reliability of the questionnaire checked twice, it has a structural model, the data are analyzed as per the non-parametric test theories

Keywords: Covid-19, Small and Medium Enterprise, Finance, Market, Cost, Employee,

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This paper provides an analytical account of the evolution and nature of formal and informal institutions in Afghanistan from 1880 to 1992 and analyzes their implications for the country’s trajectory of economic development. Using an analytical institutional approach and drawing from archival materials, we argue that there have been minimal quantitative improvements in the emergence of some crucial institutions of property rights and contract enforcement mechanisms over the study period in Afghanistan. However, there is no evidence of significant improvements in the average quality of institutions in this country. We contend that the persistence of exclusive institutions and consequent economic stagnation in Afghanistan can be attributed to two interlinked factors. 1) the recurrent institutional discontinuities in the process of institutional evolution that hindered the prospects of gradual transformation. And 2) the reform-limiting role of the traditional elites and conservative elements within the de jure courts who, favoring the status quo, resisted modernizing reforms when, at times, the state allowed for such improvements under extractive institutions. The paper also contributes theoretically by elucidating how informal institutions and economic activities grow as a by-product of fragile and exploitative de jure institutions.