Microfinance institutions that use credit scoring increase the productivity of their loan officers, thus leading to an increase in the number of borrowers, higher growth in the number of loans, and expanding financial inclusion and developmental opportunities.

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Purpose -There exists limited research directly highlighting the relationship between value preference and its association with people's expectations from the workplace. Studying personal value preference is important because a substantial body of research indicates that a specific pattern of value orientations predicts world views, and, hence, it may predict behavior in the workplace. Based on the above-mentioned assumptions, the present study aims to explore the impact of value preferences on the meaning of workplace, across MBA-and non-MBA graduates and Indian and non-Indian graduates. It is proposed that value preferences will have a significant impact on meaning of workplace and values preferences are likely to differ across national culture. Design/methodology/approach -The paper draws on qualitative research, a pilot study and survey research design. Data were gathered from a sample of 312 graduates, consisting of 231 management students and 81 non-management students. Of these 245 are Indians and 67 non-Indians studying in India, the USA, and the UK. Findings -Results of exploratory factor analysis helped the authors to derive ten significant factors from the meaning of workplace scale and four factors from the values scale. Results of stepwise multiple regression analysis have shown significant positive impact of value preference on the choice of preferred workplace. More specifically, higher progressive orientation has been found to positively influence the intrapreneurship factor of meaning of workplace factor. Values of personal growth, self-fulfillment, and community development have explained a large amount of variances in work-life balance and physical ambience.Research limitations/implications -The literature on workplace design and the meaning of workplace is limited and a comprehensive list of variables of psychological climate is not available. Thus, extensive future research needs to be carried out in this direction. Knowing the employer's perspective about the evaluations of the workplace attributes may provide a different perspective of the meaning of workplace. Finally, this study could be expanded by using qualitative interviews along with quantitative techniques to get more in-depth data and probe further in the factors that the graduates take into consideration while rating the extent of desirability of different environmental attributes. Originality/value -This paper is important in that knowledge about the values of potential employees can be used to make sure that the organization recruits employees whose perceptions match the psychological environment existing in the company. Furthermore, organizations can use such information to design work environments in such a way that they meet the expectations of newer generations of workers. The study reveals cross-cultural differences between perceptions and values. These are particularly important in the case of multinational corporations, which consider the impact of cultural and societal values while designing work environments and process...

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Microfinance is a new credit segment that can benefit greatly from the advantages the credit scoring technique can offer. In the developing countries even the professionals are not familiar with the technique of credit scoring and many microfinance institutions that serve millions of borrowers do not consider using it. Since the credit scoring technique did not evolve fast enough to meet the needs of microfinance, its adoption by microfinance institutions is slow and resembles more a historic recurrence rather than a new historical stage. We outline a conceptual framework of credit scoring that enables the use of this technique in micro lending, avoiding the pitfalls of the past.

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This article reviews the organizational values, recruitment, and reward policies of Brazilian samba schools and Indian dabbawalas to illustrate how their fi t to local cultures results in greater productivity, engagement, and low turnover. American-style management has spread worldwide, yet in emerging market countries such as India and Brazil, multinationals often struggle to motivate and engage their employees. The companies' top ranks in these countries are usually dominated by English-speaking, university-educated elites who are comfortable with Western management techniques. But these managers can be, as the Comprador class was in seventeenth-century China, strangers in their own land, implementing management techniques that feel foreign and inappropriate to their employees.The result is often low productivity, absenteeism, and unhappiness. However, there are organizations in both India and Brazil that achieve staggeringly high productivity and consistently strong engagement PRACTITIONER ARTICLE