Dr Demola Obembe

• Higher Education Student Motivations for Extracurricular Activities: Evidence from UK Universities
  Higher Education Student Motivations for Extracurricular Activities: Evidence from UK Universities Chapman, Gary; Emambocus, Washad; Obembe, Demola Higher education students are required to demonstrate value beyond their curricula achievements to secure jobs in increasingly competitive labour markets. Focusing on extracurricular activities as one-way students can do so, this paper uses a motivation perspective to examine what drives students to engage in extracurricular activities, and how student motivation varies between early and late-stage students. We conducted 46 in-depth interviews with students in a post-92 widening-participation university and found that four motivations – extrinsic, intrinsic, social, and pro-social – explained extracurricular participation. The motivations varied across types of extracurricular activities; extrinsic motivation was prominent for employment, academic, society and volunteering extracurriculars; intrinsic and social motivations were vital for sports and societies; and pro-social motivation for academic, volunteering, and society extracurriculars. Moreover, we found important differences between the motivations of early-year and final-year students, suggesting that motivations vary across the university journey. Our paper contributes to the literature on extracurricular activities within higher education by providing new evidence on the motivations that propel students to engage in (different) activities in the current marketized higher education environment and by identifying the level of study as an important boundary condition shaping motivations for extracurricular participation. The file attached to this record is the author's final peer reviewed version. The Publisher's final version can be found by following the DOI link Chapman, G., Emambocus, W. and Obembe, D. (2023) Higher Education Student Motivations for Extracurricular Activities: Evidence from UK Universities. Journal of Education and Work,
• Cognition and gender diversity in top management teams: what do we know and where do we go?
  Cognition and gender diversity in top management teams: what do we know and where do we go? Mueller-Horn, Fabian; Fournier, Sebastian; Arndt, Felix; Obembe, Demola This paper reviews research on cognition and gender diversity in top management teams (TMTs) with a focus on identifying linkages among those two constructs. We suggest that while TMTs in general have attracted extensive research attention, the linkages between TMT cognition and gender diversity offer a largely neglected vantage point for understanding TMT decision-making, and feature opportunities for theoretical and methodological progress. This review of studies published in FT-50 journals from 1990 to 2022 is focused on how team gender diversity affects team cognition – building on the notion that teams are more than the aggregation of their elements. By developing a stage-based research agenda, we derive intriguing research questions that help exploring the cognition–diversity link in teams at different stages of the decision-making process. The file attached to this record is the author's final peer reviewed version. The Publisher's final version can be found by following the DOI link. Mueller-Horn, F., Fournier, S., Arndt, F. and Obembe, D. (2022) Cognition and Gender Diversity in Top Management Teams: What do we know and where do we go? Management Review Quarterly,
• Bank Lending Behaviour and Small Enterprise Debt Financing
  Bank Lending Behaviour and Small Enterprise Debt Financing Ogunmokun, Olapeju Comfort; Mafimisebi, Oluwasoye; Obembe, Demola Our reason for concern is the rapid decline in loans to small enterprises which is critical to their performance, compared to large businesses following the periods of banking reformations in Nigeria. Thus, the primary purpose of this paper is to investigate the influence of risk perception on bank lending behaviour to small enterprises. It also investigates the impact of government intervention, consolidation, and recapitalization on the relationship between risk perception and bank lending behaviour to small enterprise. This study empirically analysed (ordinary least square) secondary data obtained from the Central Bank of Nigeria Statistical Bulletins, Annual Statement of Accounts covering the period 1992-2020. The results show that the absence of government interventions and the presence of banking reformations have statistically negative significant effect on bank lending to small enterprises. Our findings challenge the argument that generally assumes risk aversion of banks towards small enterprise lending because of small enterprise’s inability to prove their credit worthiness and consequently constraining access to finance to the sector. Instead, the results and analysis from this study found theoretical support for the variation of bank behaviour in lending to small enterprises depending on the status of wealth of the financial system. A key lesson from this study for government concerned about promoting performance of the small enterprise sector is that regulating and enforcing lending requirements on access to debt financing of the sector is necessary if constraints in access debt finance is to be eliminated. Second, while strategies such as bank consolidation, recapitalization etc. may help strengthen and make financially robust the banking system; it places the banks in a gain position where losses looms to them than gain. The file attached to this record is the author's final peer reviewed version. The Publisher's final version can be found by following the DOI link. Ogunmokun, O.C., Mafimisebi, O. and Obembe, D. (2022) Bank Lending Behaviour and Small Enterprise Debt Financing. Journal of Entrepreneurship in Emerging Economies,
• Microfinance and Entrepreneurship: The Enabling Role of Social Capital among Female Entrepreneurs
  Microfinance and Entrepreneurship: The Enabling Role of Social Capital among Female Entrepreneurs Babajide, Abiola; Obembe, Demola; Solomon, Helen; Woldesenbet, K. This paper examines mechanisms through which social capital strengthens microfinance impact on fostering female entrepreneurial success. Specifically, the study focuses on how and to what extent resources embedded in social networks determine microfinance impact on entrepreneurial success. Survey data were collected from 276 female micro- institutions entrepreneurs using multi-stage stratified random sampling across 80 micro-finance institutions in three South-Western Nigerian states. Hypotheses were tested using ordinal regression analysis. The study found that relational and network social capital had a positive and significant influence on female entrepreneurial success. Specifically, intra-group trust and productive network ties among female entrepreneurs in poor communities predicated the positive impact of microfinance on entrepreneurial success. Also, resources embedded in networks are more positively correlated to education level and marital status. Furthermore, microfinance could have a more positive impact for borrowers with sustainable relationships with loan officers who organise microfinance provisions and understand the entrepreneurs' context. The research provides empirical evidence for the relationship dynamics between female entrepreneurs and microfinance institutions by emphasising the importance of deploying different forms of social capital in sustaining microfinance impact on female entrepreneurial success. The file attached to this record is the author's final peer reviewed version. The Publisher's final version can be found by following the DOI link. Babajide, A., Obembe, D., Solomon, H. and Woldesenbet, K. (2022) Microfinance and Entrepreneurship: The Enabling Role of Social Capital among Female Entrepreneurs. International Journal of Social Economics.
• Picking up the pieces: social capital, psycho-social support and livelihood recovery of displaced populations in Northeast Nigeria
  Picking up the pieces: social capital, psycho-social support and livelihood recovery of displaced populations in Northeast Nigeria Kolade, Oluwaseun; Smith, Robert; Obembe, Demola; Taiwo, Abigail; Eyong, Joseph; James, Saliba; Kibreab, James The file attached to this record is the author's final peer reviewed version. The Publisher's final version can be found by following the DOI link. Kolade, O., Smith, R., Obembe, D., Taiwo, A., Eyong, J., James, S., and Kibreab, G. (2022) Picking up the pieces: social capital, psycho-social support and livelihood recovery of displaced populations in Northeast Nigeria. Journal of Development Studies,
• The Palgrave Handbook of African Entrepreneurship
  The Palgrave Handbook of African Entrepreneurship Kolade, Oluwaseun; Rae, David; Obembe, Demola; Woldesenbet, K. This comprehensive handbook offers a state-of-the-art guide to new frontiers of African entrepreneurship. Written from a Pan-African perspective by a cast of international authors, the book addresses the rapid modernisation and evolution of African entrepreneurship and business practices. It maps new developments in entrepreneurial ecosystems, technology and digital entrepreneurship, entrepreneurship in conflict zones, and gender and diversity issues. It proposes new models for entrepreneurial financing and explores the contrast between entrepreneurship in high-technology urban centres with peripheral rural districts and conflict zones. Bringing together empirical insights and case studies from countries across Africa, the Handbook illuminates regional and contextual differences and shares theoretical and practical insights which inform policy and practice. It is an ideal guide for researchers and students working on international business, entrepreneurship and emerging economies. It will also inform policymakers in developing context-informed entrepreneurial policies and initiatives in Africa. Kolade, O., Rae, D., Obembe, D., Woldesenbet Beta, K. (Eds.) (2022) The Palgrave Handbook of African Entrepreneurship. Cham: Springer International Publishing.
• Introduction to Palgrave Handbook of African Entrepreneurship
  Introduction to Palgrave Handbook of African Entrepreneurship Kolade, Oluwaseun; Rae, David; Obembe, Demola; Woldesenbet, K. Kolade, O., Rae, D., Obembe, D., Woldesenbet Beta, K. (2022) Introduction to Palgrave Handbook of African Entrepreneurship. In: Kolade, O., Rae, D., Obembe, D., Woldesenbet Beta, K. (Eds.) The Palgrave Handbook of Africa Entrepreneurship, Cham: Springer International Publishing, pp.1-15.
• Agricultural value chain in a turbulent environment
  Agricultural value chain in a turbulent environment Adeyeye, Adebowale; Kolade, Oluwaseun; Obembe, Demola; Ogunsade, Adekunle The development of agricultural value chains is typically associated with strong institutions, supporting infrastructures and stable political and policy environment. In developing countries characterized by environmental turbulence, smallholder farmers in particular, grapple with a wide range of obstacles and challenges that hinder them from full participation and optimisation of agricultural value chain by smallholder farmers. These factors include regulatory, market, competitive, weather, economic and political turbulence factors. This paper reviews the extant literature on agricultural value chain in the context of a turbulent environment. Drawing insights from the empirical context of Nigeria, where agricultural and other economic activities have been severely disrupted by terrorist violence, political instability and derelict infrastructure, we propose a conceptual framework that maps the impact of environmental turbulence on agricultural production, and discusses the technological and strategic options for smallholders to overcome these challenges in order to benefit optimally from agricultural value chain Adeyeye, A., Kolade, O., Obembe, D., Ogunsade, A. (2021) Agricultural value chain in a turbulent environment. Paper presented at Institute for Small Business and Entrepreneurship Annual Conference 2021, Cardiff, Wales, United Kingdom, 28-29 October.
• Covid-19 and the tourism industry: an early-stage sentiment analysis of the impact of social media and stakeholder communication
  Covid-19 and the tourism industry: an early-stage sentiment analysis of the impact of social media and stakeholder communication Obembe, Demola; Kolade, Oluwaseun; Obembe, Funmi; Owoseni, Adebowale; Mafimisebi, Oluwasoye This paper examines tourist public responses to crisis communications during the early stages of Covid-19. Using the social-mediated crisis communication model, the paper explores the key factors that influence public sentiments during nascent periods of the crisis. The choice of data collection dates was determined by key milestones events with significant implications in relation to UK tourism. Sentiment analysis of data sets of public tweets and news articles were done in order to interrogate how the trends and performance of the airlines and the tourism sector have been shaped by the sentiments of the tourism publics, the crisis communication interventions from key institutional actors, and the news sentiments about tourism organizations, particularly airlines. Sentiment analysis, also known as opinion mining, falls under natural language processing (NLP) and is used to identify different sentiments and polarities in texts. Our findings indicate that institutional actors have a significant impact on the sentiments of tourism publics. Our study contributes to existing research on crisis communication by illuminating how public narrative about, and stakeholder responses to, crisis are shaped not just by organizational communication strategies but also institutional actors, on the one hand, and the interested publics too. open access journal Obembe, D., Kolade, S., Obembe, F., Owoseni, A., & Mafimisebi, O. (2021). Covid-19 and the tourism industry: an early-stage sentiment analysis of the impact of social media and stakeholder communication? International Journal of Information Management Data Insights, 1(2), 100040.
• The Impact of Digital Transformation on Knowledge Management During COVID-19
  The Impact of Digital Transformation on Knowledge Management During COVID-19 Obembe, Funmi; Obembe, Demola Technology and digital transformations are increasingly important in today’s world. The COVID-19 pandemic that the entire world has been grappling with for the last year has made this even more so. The speed at which different organisations across various sectors have had to embrace digital transformations has been unprecedented. In some sectors this has been driven by the need to simply survive during this pandemic. However, beyond just responding to crisis, digital transformation, and the use of data to drive it has over the years brought about disruptions which have led to great innovations and progress. In many instances these innovations have not only been driven by digital transformations but by a merging of digital transformations and intelligent/adaptive knowledge management systems that have arisen from it. Even before the emergence of the pandemic, digital transformations, AI, machine learning techniques and various innovative technologies had started to be used to design intelligent and adaptive knowledge management systems. COVID-19 has greatly accelerated the uptake of these technologies across a wide range of sectors. Organisations that would successfully navigate these times and be ready for the future need their knowledge management systems to be intelligent and highly adaptive. Digital transformations and innovative technologies are increasingly making this possible. In this work in progress paper, we start to explore the impact of digital transformation and innovative technologies on organisations’ knowledge management systems and the changes in the factors that contribute to whether organisations adopt these innovative technologies/digital transformations in times of crisis such as during the COVID-19 pandemic. Knowledge management systems that can respond to inevitable changes that arise in crisis situations such as COVID-19 are invaluable. These systems are positioned to naturally produce actionable intelligence resulting in competitive advantage. Obembe, F. and Obembe, D. (2021) The Impact of Digital Transformation on Knowledge Management During COVID-19. European Conference on Knowledge Management, University of Coventry, 2-3 September.

 Journal reviews: Organization Studies, Management Learning, Public Money and Management, Entrepreneurship and Regional Development. African Journal of Management.

Conference reviews British Academy of Management; International Conference on Information Systems