Entrepreneurial Orientation Components and Sales Volume of Selected Quoted Consumer Goods Manufacturing Companies in Nigeria

Organisational performance is of high importance and occupies a central position among other goals and remains a compensation for sustainable and competitive sales volume. Consumer goods manufacturing industry in Nigeria are experiencing decline in sales volume due to poor entrepreneurial orientation. This study examined the interaction between entrepreneurial orientation components and sales volume of selected quoted consumer goods manufacturing companies in Nigeria. The study adopted cross sectional survey design. The population of the study was 1,551. Total enumeration was used to sample the entire population. A structured questionnaire was used for data collection. The Cronbach’s alpha ranges between 0.721 and 0.892. The response rate was 90.5%. Data were analysed using descriptive and inferential statistics. Findings revealed that innovativeness (β = 0.334, t = 4.970, p = 0.000), competitive aggressiveness (β = 0.221, t = 3.715, p = 0.000) and risk taking (β = 0.136, t = 2.044, p = 0.042) have positive and significant effects on sales volume of the selected quoted consumer goods companies in Nigeria. However, proactiveness (β = 0.129, t = 1.733, p = 0.000) and planning flexibility (β = 0.075, t = 1.378, p = 0.169) have a positive but insignificant effect on sales volume of selected quoted consumer goods companies in Nigeria. The study concluded that entrepreneurial orientation (innovativeness, competitive aggressiveness, proactiveness, risk-taking and planning flexibility) had significant effect on sales volume of selected quoted consumer goods companies in Nigeria and recommended that managers should be more aggressive in exploiting opportunities to increase sales volume. Keywords: Entrepreneurial orientation, Sales volume, Consumer goods companies, Nigeria. DOI: 10.7176/JRDM/80-03 Publication date: November 30th 202

Entrepreneurial Orientation, Economic Factors and Performance of Selected Quoted Consumer Goods Manufacturing Companies in Nigeria: A Combined Effect

Performance does take central position in terms of business considering its role in assisting organisations to accomplishing goals and achieving successes. Consumer goods manufacturing industry in Nigeria are experiencing decline in performance these days due to poor entrepreneurial orientation and poor management of economic policies. This study examined entrepreneurial orientation, economic factors and performance of selected quoted consumer goods companies in Nigeria. Cross sectional survey design was employed and the population of the study was 1,551 of twelve (12) quoted consumer goods manufacturing companies in Nigeria. A structured questionnaire was used for data collection. The Cronbach’s alpha ranges between 0.721 and 0.892. The response rate was 90.5%. Data were analyzed using descriptive and inferential statistics. The results revealed that entrepreneurial orientation (β = 0.420, t = 7.288, p = 0.000) and economic factors (β = 0.671, t = 11.098, p = 0.000) have positive and significant effects on performance of the selected quoted consumer goods companies in Nigeria. This implies that entrepreneurial orientation and economic factor are significant predictors of performance of selected quoted consumer goods companies in the study area. The study concluded that entrepreneurial orientation and economic factors had significant effects on performance of selected consumer goods companies in Nigeria and recommended that managers of selected consumer goods companies should be strategic and proactive enough to improve on performance of consumer goods manufacturing companies in Nigeria. Keywords: Entrepreneurial orientation, Economic factors, Consumer goods companies, Nigeria. DOI: 10.7176/EJBM/13-22-03 Publication date: November 30th 202

The Relationship between Knowledge and Attitude about Vulva Hygiene with the Incidence of Vaginal Discharge

Background. Fluor albus is a common condition that often occurs in women, where vaginal discharge is a form of discharge from the vagina but not blood. Although it is often considered normal, vaginal discharge can be a serious problem and a clinical manifestation of various types of diseases. In Indonesia, 75% of women have experienced vaginal discharge. Based on the data we got at the Kutai health center itself, 256 cases of vaginal discharge affected teenage women. Objectives. This study is to describe the relationship between knowledge and attitudes about vulva hygiene with incidence of leucorrhea in Kutai, Tangerang Community Health Center. Methods. Quantitative with descriptive correlational method with cross-sectional approach. The sample of this research is a female adolescent between 18-20 years with total of respondents are 79 female adolescents with using the total sampling technique. The instrument used is a questionnaire. The analytical method used is univariate and bivariate. Results. Based on knowledge, there are 33 respondents (41.8%) have a good level and 47 respondents (59.5%) classified as having an adequate attitude of vulva hygiene, but 71 respondents (89.9%) had experienced pathological vaginal discharge (abnormal).  Statistic test regarding the relationship between the level of knowledge and attitudes of female adolescents about vulva hygiene with vaginal discharge shows results p-value: 0.057 > 0.05 for knowledge and p-value: 0.089> 0.05 for attitude so there is no relationship between the level of knowledge and attitudes of female adolescent about vulva hygiene with vaginal discharge. Conclusion. Expected for Community Health Center, especially in Kutai, Tangerang can build a program that focuses on providing counseling and education about health reproduction for female adolescents so that the incidence of pathological vaginal discharge can be reduce

Training and Development Practices and Employees’ Performance in Selected Manufacturing Companies in Nigeria

Managing workforce diversity in manufacturing organisations has been a problem all over the world including Nigeria. Manufacturing organisations in Nigeria continue to experience occasional drop in performance due to employees’ apathy and non-challant attitudes as a result of high level of dissatisfaction caused by inadequate attention to training and development practices. This study assessed the relationships between training and development practices and employees’ performance in selected manufacturing companies in Nigeria. A cross sectional survey research design was employed, and out of the 1,568 copies of questionnaire that were administered proportionally in the selected manufacturing companies, 1,153 copies were retrieved and found useful. Data were analysed using descriptive statistics and the hypotheses were tested using Analysis of Variance (ANOVA). The results of the findings show f-statistics of 223.717 and so, there is a significant relationship between training and development practices and employees’ performance among Nigerians working in the selected manufacturing companies. Also, f-statistics of 244.391 shows a significant relationship between training and development practices and employees’ performance among other nationals in the selected MNCs. The study concluded that there are significant relationships between training and development practices and employees’ performance in selected manufacturing MNCs in Nigeria

Correction to: The IL-23p19/EBI3 heterodimeric cytokine termed IL-39 remains a theoretical cytokine in man.

The original article can be found online

Plucked hair follicles from patients with chronic discoid lupus erythematosus show a disease-specific molecular signature

Objective: When faced with clinical symptoms of scarring alopecia—the standard diagnostic pathway involves a scalp biopsy which is an invasive and expensive procedure. This project aimed to assess if plucked hair follicles (HFs) containing living epithelial cells can offer a non-invasive approach to diagnosing inflammatory scalp lesions. Methods: Lesional and non-lesional HFs were extracted from the scalp of patients with chronic discoid lupus erythematosus (CDLE), psoriasis and healthy controls. RNA was isolated from plucked anagen HFs and microarray, as well as quantitative real-time PCR was performed. Results: Here, we report that gene expression analysis of only a small number of HF plucked from lesional areas of the scalp is sufficient to differentiate CDLE from psoriasis lesions or healthy HF. The expression profile from CDLE HFs coincides with published profiles of CDLE from skin biopsy. Genes that were highly expressed in lesional CDLE corresponded to well-known histopathological diagnostic features of CDLE and included those related to apoptotic cell death, the interferon signature, complement components and CD8+ T-cell immune responses. Conclusions: We therefore propose that information obtained from this non-invasive approach are sufficient to diagnose scalp lupus erythematosus. Once validated in routine clinical settings and compared with other scarring alopecias, this rapid and non-invasive approach will have great potential for paving the way for future diagnosis of inflammatory scalp lesions

TNF-α Regulates Human Plasmacytoid Dendritic Cells by Suppressing IFN-α Production and Enhancing T Cell Activation

Human plasmacytoid dendritic cells (pDCs) play a vital role in modulating immune responses. They can produce massive amounts of type I IFNs in response to nucleic acids via TLRs, but they are also known to possess weak Ag-presenting properties inducing CD4+ T cell activation. Previous studies showed a cross-regulation between TNF-α and IFN-α, but many questions remain about the effect of TNF-α in regulating human pDCs. In this study, we showed that TNF-α significantly inhibited the secretion of IFN-α and TNF-α of TLR-stimulated pDCs. Instead, exogenous TNF-α promoted pDC maturation by upregulating costimulatory molecules and chemokine receptors such as CD80, CD86, HLA-DR, and CCR7. Additionally, RNA sequencing analysis showed that TNF-α inhibited IFN-α and TNF-α production by downregulating IRF7 and NF-κB pathways, while it promoted Ag processing and presentation pathways as well as T cell activation and differentiation. Indeed, TNF-α–treated pDCs induced in vitro higher CD4+ T cell proliferation and activation, enhancing the production of Th1 and Th17 cytokines. In conclusion, TNF-α favors pDC maturation by switching their main role as IFN-α–producing cells to a more conventional dendritic cell phenotype. The functional status of pDCs might therefore be strongly influenced by their overall inflammatory environment, and TNF-α might regulate IFN-α–mediated aspects of a range of autoimmune and inflammatory diseases

Antimicrobial peptide LL-37 facilitates intracellular uptake of RNA aptamer Apt 21-2 without inducing an inflammatory or interferon response

RNA aptamers are synthetic single stranded RNA oligonucleotides that function analogously to antibodies. Recently, they have shown promise for use in treating inflammatory skin disease as, unlike antibody-based biologics, they are able to enter the skin following topical administration. However, it is important to understand the inflammatory milieu into which aptamers are delivered, as numerous immune-modulating mediators will be present at abnormal levels. LL-37 is an important immune-modifying protein upregulated in several inflammatory skin conditions, including psoriasis, rosacea and eczema. This inflammatory antimicrobial peptide is known to complex nucleic acids and induce both inflammatory and interferon responses from keratinocytes. Given the attractive notion of using RNA aptamers in topical medication and the prevalence of LL-37 in these inflammatory skin conditions, we examined the effect LL-37 had on the efficacy and safety of the anti-IL-17A RNA aptamer, Apt 21-2. LL-37 was demonstrated to complex with the RNA aptamer by electrophoretic mobility shift and filter binding assays. In contrast to free Apt 21-2, LL-37-complexed Apt 21-2 was observed to efficiently enter both keratinocytes and fibroblasts by confocal microscopy. Despite internalisation of LL-37-complexed aptamers, measurement of inflammatory mediators and interferon stimulated genes showed LL-37-complexed Apt 21-2 remained immunologically inert in keratinocytes, fibroblasts, and peripheral blood mononuclear cells including infiltrating dendritic cells and monocytes. The findings of this study suggest RNA aptamers delivered into an inflammatory milieu rich in LL-37 may become complexed and subsequently internalised by surrounding cells in the skin. Whilst the results of this study indicate delivery of RNA aptamers into tissue rich in LL-37 should not cause an unwarranted inflammatory of interferon response, these results have significant implications for the efficacy of aptamers with regards to extracellular vs intracellular targets that should be taken into consideration when developing treatment strategies utilising RNA aptamers in inflamed tissue