This paper aims to investigate the impact of executives’ ethical commitment and corporate governance on the Islamic banks’ performance in the Saudi context. The sample of this study consists of Saudi Islamic banks over the period 2012–2020. The financial data were extracted from the Saudi stock exchange (Tadawul). While the behavioral data, particularly the executives’ ethical commitment, is measured through the ethical commitment index. In the econometric analysis, a generalized least square regression method (GLS) is applied to two different sub-models with different dependent variables (return on assets and return on equity). Empirical results suggest that board size and board independence have a significant impact on bank performance. The ethical commitment of executives contributes positively and significantly to the performance of Islamic banks in terms of return on assets. However, there is no statistical evidence of the effect of ethical commitment on Islamic banks’ returns on equity. Therefore, boards of directors of Islamic banks should include expert independent directors to promote best governance practices and enhance executives’ commitment. Larger boards can improve their credit ratings and access to resources. AcknowledgmentThis study was funded by Deanship of Scientific Research at Princess Nourah bint Abdulrahman University (Grant No. 39/S/243).

This paper shows empirically the impact of organizational and behavioral determinants on the CEO's investment horizon choice, using artificial intelligence explanatory methods. We apply our approach to 100 Saudi firms. We test the effect of three organizational determinants: ownership concentration, board independence, and CEO remuneration system; and three behavioral determinants: myopia, the locus of control and commitment, on the CEO's investment horizon choice. The study’s key finding is that executives' commitment bias is the most important variable in terms of modal value that affects firms' long-term investment choice. We also find a positive and significant relationship between myopia and long-term investment choice, whereas the lowliest determinant of the horizon choice is the locus of control. More generally, these results show that CEOs who are likely to be the most myopic may display long-term behavior with the existence of high cognitive involvement.

PurposeThis study aims to examine the predictors of the managers’ work performance under the risk-as-feelings hypothesis during the Covid-19 pandemic in four European countries. Specifically, it aims to investigate the impact of risk-related job stressors and behavioral and emotional reactivities on non-managers and managers performance in risky circumstances.Design/methodology/approachThe author assessed simultaneously the effects of occupational health risk perception and the resulting feelings and emotional state such irritability and commitment change, the effects of income and others organizational and personal variables as performance stressors. The author used a sample of 652 employees divided on two groups (71% non-managers and 23% managers). Data are obtained from the dataset in Prochazka et al., (2020) collected using online survey delivered to employees employed in their companies for a minimum of five months in the period between Mai and June 2020.FindingsThe results confirm the risk-as-feelings hypothesis and show significant effect of occupational health risk perception and associated emotional responses (irritability and commitment) on the work performance for non-managers’ group. However, for managers’ group the main determinant of work performance is the organizational commitment as explained by the job-demands-resources-model (JDRM).Originality/valueThe originality of this study is to employ the risk-as-feelings hypothesis (Loewenstein et al., 2001) in a management research question such as job performance predictors. Thus, this study contributes to the literature on job performance in two significant ways. First, it examines the risk-related job’s stressors as determinants of managers and non-managers performance under the risk-as-feelings hypothesis. Second, it tests the importance of functional differences as an approach to better investigate the framework of the JDRM (Bakker and Demerouti, 2017).

This article investigates the impact of the chief executive officer’s (CEO’s) power on research and development (R&D) expenditures in Saudi Arabia. Mainly, it studies the influence of CEOs’ power (ownership power, structural power and expert power) on their risk-taking behaviour. Empirically, we used a panel model with data from a sample of 60 Saudi firms listed from 2016 to 2019. We developed five models to examine both the direct and moderating effects of the power indicators on R&D expenditures using OLS regression. Findings demonstrate that Saudi firms promoting insider CEOs with short tenure and no ownership are more innovative. These results have great implications for researchers and investors to understand what kind of power they should consider when selecting leaders to carry out innovation plans and thus ensure long-term firm growth.