The insurance sector is one of the most important sectors for financial services in the world, and it accompany all other economic activities and contributes to support and maintain stability. The study aims to find out the significant impact of claim settlement on sales of insurance policies of leading top five insurance companies in the Sultanate of Oman. They are National Life and General Insurance Company, Dhofar Insurance Company, AL Madina Takaful Company, Oman United Insurance Company, and AL Ahlia Insurance Company. The study is based on the data collected from annual report and it shows that there is strong positive correlation between claim settlement as and sales of insurance policies of the leading insurance companies except for Al Ahli Company. The study reveal that the companies continue to grow due to its prompt claim settlement, highest insurance premium collections and highest number of policies sold.

The objective of this study was to investigate the effects of workforce diversity on employee performance in a selected Higher Educational Institutional Sultanate of Oman. A cross-sectional research design was used. A random sample of 198 was chosen by dividing employees into homogeneous strata of academic and non-academic employees. The results showed a positive and significant relationship between independent variable gender diversity and dependent variable employee performance. The result also showed positive but insignificant relationship between independent variables age, experience and education diversity and the dependent variable employee performance. Higher Educational Institutions should introduce diversity management programs to improve the effectiveness of workforce diversity towards employee performance. The objective of this study was to investigate the effects of workforce diversity on employee performance in a selected Higher Educational Institutional Sultanate of Oman. A cross-sectional research design was used. A random sample of 198 was chosen by dividing employees into homogeneous strata of academic and non-academic employees. The results showed a positive and significant relationship between independent variable gender diversity and dependent variable employee performance. The result also showed positive but insignificant relationship between independent variables age, experience and education diversity and the dependent variable employee performance. Higher Educational Institutions should introduce diversity management programs to improve the effectiveness of workforce diversity towards employee performance.

The study is a fundamental analysis of the leading telecom companies in the Sultanate of Oman. Even though Oman telecom market is believed to have room for and growth for the two major telecom companies i.e. Omantel and Ooredoo the companies reported declining profits recently due to higher royalties and tax rates. The study was undertaken to analyze the financial strength of these two leading telecom companies by using the Altman’s Z score model. Annual reports of two telecom companies were collected for a period of six years form 2015 till 2020. The results show that the independent variables viz; working capital, retained earnings, EBIT and total sales do not have a significant impact on the dependent variable total assets for both the companies, meanwhile the market value of equity has strong negative correlation and has a significant impact on the total liabilities of Ooredoo and Omantel. The financial health of Ooredoo is better than Omantel Company. The Z score is an effective tool to demonstrate credit worthiness to bankers and soundness of business model to investors. Even though Ooredoo has better financial strength than Omantel, both the companies must go ahead with innovative steps to attract customers, improve sale and cash flow and thereby strengthen its financial soundness.

Human resource is an asset of any organization. The rapid trend of changes and social issues in managing the workforce have forced organizations to look for innovative ways of enhancing the job satisfaction of employees resulting in better productivity. Among these innovative approaches include the provision of Flexible Working Arrangements (FWAs). The purpose of this exploratory research was to investigate the effects of FWAs, i.e., flexible worktime, compressed workweek, workplace flexibility and functional flexibility on job satisfaction from the perspective of Bank employees in Nizwa, Oman. Such a study is relevant as it examines how the implementation of innovative ways of enhancing job satisfaction such as provision of Flexible Work Arrangements can impact job satisfaction and can go a long way to reduce stress and enhance the employee productivity. Based on the results, the study aims to come up with recommendations on how to improve the satisfaction and employee performance levels so as to improve the efficiency of the bank. Since it is a case study, the population of the study consist of 130 Bank Muscat branch employees in Nizwa; out of which 98% responses were collected. A primary data collection method was implemented using a structured questionnaire. For achieving the objectives of the study, both descriptive and inferential analysis were conducted. Apart from the descriptive statistics, the Chi-square test, to test the association of demographic factors on the type of FWA preferred, the correlation and Multiple Regression analysis to study the relationship and impact of FWAs on job satisfaction are used. The results show that except for child care and dependent adult care needs of the employees, the other demographic variables are not significantly associated with the type of flexible work arrangements preferred by the employees. The study reveals that there is significant positive effect of workplace flexibility (r = 0.409, β = 0.413, p = 0.001) and functional flexibility (r = 0.429, β = 0.431, p = 0.000) on job satisfaction. This means that increase in the workplace flexibility and functional flexibility enhances job satisfaction of the bank employees. The study reveals that 34.7% of the variance in job satisfaction is explained by the four independent variables studied. Nevertheless, this study found out that there is no significant relationship of flexible worktime and compressed workweek on job satisfaction (r = 0.190 and p = 0.065). The research concludes with recommendations on improving the provision of Flexible Work Arrangements so as to enhance job satisfaction and improve productivity. Therefore, since the provision of FWAs is at nascent stage, further studies on the effect of Flexible Work Arrangements covering more variables that were not put into consideration in this study from the employees’ context are highly recommended. The study is expected to provide scope for further researches in the field covering more institutions across the Sultanate.