Best Paper Award for UKZN Academic

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Professor Theuns Pelser of UKZN’s Graduate School of Business and Leadership (GSB&L) won the award for the best paper presented at the 12^th International Business Conference in Mauritius.

The conference, co-hosted by several South African business schools, aims to provide an international platform for the presentation, discussion and debate of different academic and professional approaches and research on recent developments in an ever-turbulent business and political arena.

It is also designed to provide an opportunity for academics, practitioners and postgraduate students to have their work validated and benchmarked within the academic and professional community.

The conference received 199 full-length competitive papers and 55 work-in-progress papers. The nominated best papers were adjudicated by external reviewers who included international academics. 

Pelser’s winning paper - one of three he presented at the conference - was titled: An Organisational Alignment Framework to Improve South African Mining Companies.

Said Pelser: ‘It was a real honour and surprise for me to receive the overall winner award. The organisers jokingly said that I must defend my title next year. I will surely take them up on their challenge and hopefully more UKZN academics will participate at this intellectual stimulating conference.

Other UKZN academics at the conference included Dr MacDonald Kanyangale who presented a paper titled: Seven Snags of Research Ethics on the Qualitative Research Voyage.

Kanyangale was also a co-author with GSB&L students Mr Cosmas Anayochukwu Nwankwo and Mrs Nobuhle Dyasi of papers titled: Deconstructing Entrepreneurial Marketing Dimensions in Small and Medium Sized Enterprises in Nigeria - Literature Analysis and Misaligned Implementation; and A Case of the Municipal Water Services of a District Municipality in South Africa.

GSB&L staff member Dr Bibi Chummun co-authored and presented a paper titled: Factors that Influence Environmental Performance in the Waste Management Industry in KwaZulu-Natal. Her co-author was Mr Kyle Gaffar.

For more information on the conference visit: http://ibc-conference.com/

Words: Lungile Ngubelanga 

Photographs: Supplied

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