Any pandemic disorganizes the life of wider society. One of the manifestations of social activity is religious life. Despite progressing secularization, both religion, churches, and denominational associations have an impact on individual ethical choices and business decisions. This is true especially in Poland, where over 90 percent of the citizens declare affiliation with some religion, mostly Christian. The purpose of the present article is to demonstrate what activities are undertaken by churches in Poland at the time of the COVID-19 pandemic, and what differences there are in their organization of religious life. In order to achieve the set goal, qualitative methods were implemented in the research. As part of the qualitative paradigm, in-depth individual interviews were used, involving individuals responsible for organizing religious life at the parish or congregation level. The interviewees were clergymen from the most important denominations, ranging from Catholic and Orthodox to broadly understood Protestant denominations. The paper contains a review of relevant literature. It presents the results and discussion of qualitative research, and it also indicates the research limitations. The study reveals that individual churches have limited (Catholic and Orthodox) or totally suspended (Protestants) their religious life in the actual community-based dimension. The decisions made by the clergymen, regardless of their personal views, resulted from the assumed ecclesiology and tradition. While changing the organization of religious life, the churches maintained contact with the believers in various ways, using modern technologies and access to public media in this regard. Although the churches are not changing their doctrinal positions, they declare different forms of cooperation.

The aim of the article is to analyse the phenomenon of nepotism, its effects in small and medium enterprises in Poland and Ukraine and their negative impact on social capital. Systematization literary sources and approaches for solving the problem of nepotism indicate that it is quite a common phenomenon in central and east European countries. Nepotism caused a lot of negative impact on organizations. It means, that in the organization, where nepotism is common employees have less motivation, job satisfaction. Their commitment to the organization is lower. They are also less efficient due to the selection of less capable candidates for the job or position. According to literature, on the other hand, nepotism could sometimes have a positive impact on family-owned companies. The article contains a review of the literature on social capital, nepotism and its effects, followed by an analysis of the results of quantitative research aimed at expanding knowledge about the problem of nepotism, determining its scope in Polish and Ukrainian enterprises, as well as its evaluation. The methodological tool of the research was a survey. Questionnaires were distributed to 691 working part-time students of private universities in Poland. The research was conducted from February to May 2019. The paper presents the results of an empirical analysis which showed that both nepotism and closely related cronyism are common phenomena in Poland and Ukraine. It should be pointed out that they are more common in Ukraine. Both phenomena have a negative impact on satisfaction, motivation and work, commitment and trust among employees. One of the important effects of favouring people in the workplace is also reduced the social capital of the company. The results of the research can be useful for managers. Social capital is one of the important elements significant for the development of a company, and nepotism affects it negatively. The conducted research can be used as an aid in creating and reorganizing transparent processes related to the employment of staff and effective personnel management in the organization.

Nepotism and cronyism are forms of favoritism towards certain people in the workplace. For this reason, they constitute a problem for organization managers, ethicists and psychologists. Identifying the impact of COVID-19 pandemic on the increase of nepotism and cronyism may provide a basis for organizations to assess their extent and to take possible measures to prevent their negative effects. At the same time, the research presented in the article may provide a basis for further research work related to nepotism and cronyism at the times of other threats, different from the pandemic. The aim of the article is to examine the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on growing acceptance for nepotism and cronyism in Polish enterprises. Qualitative and quantitative methods have been included in the conducted research. Qualitative study aimed at improving knowledge of nepotism and cronyism and the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on these phenomena, followed by a quantitative study conducted in order to verify the information obtained in the qualitative study. This research has demonstrated that Nepotism and cronyism in the workplace, are phenomenon that are basically evaluated negatively. They adversely influences social and economic development, but the impact of COVID-19 pandemic on nepotism and cronyism is not significant.

Nepotism, just like any other form of favouratism in the workplace, is a phenomenon that is basically evaluated negatively. It adversely influences social and economic development and it has not been considered in relation to the membership of a given Christian denomination. This article reviews the literature on nepotism and takes into account the religious perspective on nepotism while the research part focuses on the analysis of nepotism taking into consideration both Catholic and Protestant perspectives. Thus, the article falls within the discussion initiated by Max Weber, who found that religious membership had an influence on economic development because business leaders, capital owners, and a highly qualified workforce and well-trained enterprise employees were, by and large, Protestants. The article is aimed at analyzing the effects of nepotism and evaluating this phenomenon from the perspective of the abovementioned Christian denominations. Qualitative and quantitative methods were included in the conducted research. As far as the qualitative method is concerned, an individual in-depth interview, conducted with two Catholic and two Protestant clerics, was applied. Within the second stage, i.e., the quantitative surveys, information received in the interviews was verified and the way of understanding and accepting the phenomenon of nepotism depending on the religious membership was learnt. This research demonstrated that Protestants regard the phenomenon of nepotism as negative more frequently than Catholics and the phenomenon is more common among Catholics than Protestants.

The issue of the use of marketing tools by religious organisations is a research problem because for moral reasons, churches declare that they do not use marketing communication explicitly. In religious circles, marketing tends to be associated with unethical practices, especially public relations, which in practice can be associated with propaganda. A careful analysis of the activities carried out by churches shows that many marketing communication methods and tools are used by religious organisations. To be successful, companies must identify the basic elements determining customer satisfaction and meet them more effectively than their competitors. At the same time, it is not about one-off transactions, but about building long-term relationships. This model is also slowly finding acceptance in religious circles, despite arguments that satisfying individual needs will be at the expense of church doctrine or will result in long-standing church traditions being abandoned and replaced by pop-cultural attitudes. The article discusses the specificity of building the brand image of the Catholic Church in Poland and the use of modern marketing tools in this process. It also presents the results of the authors’ research, which leads to the final conclusions verifying the research hypotheses set out in the research methodology. The article aims to initiate a wider discussion on the controversial topic of implementing commercial marketing tools into the image management processes of the Catholic Church. The conducted research results indicate the need for a change in the perception of the Catholic Church in Poland of the communication processes leading to the building and strengthening of its image. A major challenge for the Catholic Church in Poland seems to be changing the attitudes of non-believers towards the Catholic Church.