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27 August 2019 | Story Valentino Ndaba | Photo Pierce van Heerden
Prof Brownhilder Neneh
Prof Brownhilder Neneh’s research paper was selected as Highly Commended in the 25th annual Emerald Literati Awards for Excellence.

Customer orientation is a firm strategic capability that enables businesses to identify opportunities that can be exploited to improve their performance outcomes. However, the gap between this capability and actual firm performance is quite wide when it comes to Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs), possibly because of the limited resources to effectively utilise this capability. So what can be done to ensure that all businesses that have this capability benefit from it?

This is the question which a paper by Prof Brownhilder Neneh seeks to address. The article, titled Customer orientation and SME performance: the role of networking ties, was recently published in the African Journal of Economic and Management Studies. Both the theoretical weight and practical implications of the research led to the journal’s editorial team selecting the article as Highly Commended in the 2019 Emerald Literati Awards. 

Finding solutions to real-world problems 

Not only is Prof Neneh responsible for innovating the way she leads as the Head of the Business Management Department at the University of the Free State (UFS), but her goal is to also constantly impact the way problems are solved in the business world. “Growing up, I was always fascinated about entrepreneurial stories, how people start and grow their businesses. However, I later learned that businesses had a very high failure rate,” she says. 

“As such, given the significant role that entrepreneurship plays in economic growth and addressing socioeconomic issues in our societies, I became motivated to find evidence-based solutions that could be implemented by businesses to enhance their chances of success.”

Research goals

Prof Neneh says her outlook for the future is “to continue producing high-quality research that can make a meaningful impact in advancing both the theory and practice of entrepreneurship”.

Seeing that governments the world over are increasingly depending on entrepreneurship for economic growth and addressing most of the existing socioeconomic issues, evidence-based entrepreneurship is increasingly needed. For Prof Neneh, moving forward means continuing to channel focus in this area.

News Archive

Kovsies wins the National Cricket Club Championships
2010-10-07

Kovsies who represented Free State at the National Club Championships were, from the left: Obus Pienaar, Patrick Botha, Wiann van Zyl and Juanre van Wyk.

The first cricket team of the University of the Free State (UFS) recently represented the Free State at the National Club Championships. Under the leadership of Rudi Steyn, Free State Provincial Coach, the team came out victoriously and brought back the trophy to the Free State for the first time in eleven years. The games were as follow:

Day 1: UV vs. Pretoria High School Old Boys (Northerns) – won by 17 runs
Day 2: UV vs. Burma Lads (Griqualand West) – won by 122 runs
Day 3: UV vs. Impala (North-West) – won by 3 wickets
Day 4: UV vs. Brackenfell (Boland) – won by 5 runs
Day 5: UV vs. Old Edwardians (Gauteng) – won by 5 wickets
Day 6: UV vs. Crusaders (KwaZulu-Natal) – won by 5 wickets

Three players, Juanre van Wyk, Obus Pienaar, and Patrick Botha, received Man of the Match Awards for games played during the week and Wiann van Zyl, Captain, received the award for the bowler of the tournament. Kovsies was the only team to end the week undefeated.
 

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