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In recent years, non-financial reporting has become a global practice used by businesses almost all over the world. Its dynamic development can be also recently observed in Poland, which is reflected in the growing number of corporate social responsibility (CSR) reports published voluntarily by enterprises. Their scope includes non-financial results obtained within the environmental, social and economic area and informs about the risk associated with the initiatives undertaken by companies. Although the data contained in CSR reports are informative to stakeholders and are used in the decision-making process, there is a certain concern that they may lack reliability (compare with Dal Maso et al., 2020). It is not out of the question that companies, while promoting their activities, will disclose only selected, usually positive, aspects of their operations. Therefore, it appears reasonable to subject the disclosures presented in CSR reports to an audit, which, in this context, means an independent and objective verification of the non-financial information contained in the report, and their attestation (confirmation) in terms of reliability.

Investment incentives are a widely used tool of economic policy employed not only in the Czech Republic (CR) but also in other European economies. Given the ambiguous perception established by the review of the literature on investment incentives and the effects that supported investment brings to the economy, this article aims to evaluate the issue of investment incentives in the CR with the use of a time series regression analysis (1998–2019) in order to answer two main research questions: Do investment incentives attract investment into economically weaker regions? Do investments supported by incentives lead to the economic prosperity of these regions? The inspiration for the article comes from a comprehensive study focused on investment incentives in the CR (Schwarz et al., 2007). The experts’ views on investment incentives are ambiguous – some perceive them positively, others criticize them and consider them undesirable.

During recent decades, with the rise of worldwide competition and globalization, the noteworthiness of recruiting and retaining qualified employees has become an important factor in the success of the education industry (Gong et al., 2018). In other words, managing human resources plays a crucial role in increasing the sustainable competitive advantages of a higher education institute. Such a role is more profound in the education industry due to the direct effect of human resources, which consist of academics, on customers, who are students. Although recruiting highly talented academics is a challenging issue for human resource managers, retaining them within the organization, in the long term, requires high efforts and intention as well. It is quite clear that progress in science and technology improves the human being’s quality of life. Developing knowledge is the main purpose of the higher education system, which will be fulfilled by educating capable scientists. Academics and scholars are responsible for accomplishing this main goal of the higher education systém in universities. Iran is one of the countries which plays an active role in contributing to universal knowledge and technology (Naderi & Safarzade, 2014).

Tax havens are both a controversial and thrilling area of research. Since the last financial crisis there has been a dramatic increase of research interest in this area. The most frequently researched areas in relation to tax havens can be divided into positive: for example, attracting more foreign direct investments (FDI), or potentially increased financial performance and productivity, and negative: for example, aggressive tax planning, money laundering or machinations in public procurements. The last decade’s research results suggest the value of a focus on negative outcomes: aggressive tax planning, related profit-shifting techniques, and the consequences of having anonymous ultimate beneficial owners (UBO). In the Slovak business environment, research on tax havens has been long neglected. In contrast to other jurisdictions, there are no academic studies that might inform improvements in tax legislation, or provide support for the Financial Administration of the Slovak Republic.

Teachers’ training is one of the critical and sustainable development goals in technical education & vocational training (TVET) to promote employability and up-gradation of expertise and skills to increase industrydriven education practices and competencies to up-to-date quality of training and education provision (Kennedy et al., 2021). However, the competency-based training & assessment (CBT&A) approach for improvement of teacher training is based on CBT&A curricula on requisite skills. The competency-based training & assessment (CBT&A) approach allows vocational education teachers to regulate updated resources and learning requirements better and efficient manner (Ahmed & Sayed, 2021). Professional development and continuous training of the teachers are vital for the implementation of competency-based training & assessment (CBT&A) delivery in Pakistan (Ahmed & Sayed, 2021).

Importantly, accounting is the mirror of all business activities undertaken by enterprises. Financial statements constitute an important source for decision-making by a wide range of internal and external users. The basic concept of accounting reports, which should provide reliable information for users, is the provision of a true and fair view of the situation and structure of assets, financing sources thereof, the structure of the equity capital and the enterprise’s financial state. Needless to say, accounting requires highly qualified expertise from its processors. The relevant accounting frameworks of the Czech accounting standards, Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (US GAAP) and International Financial Reporting Standards (IAS/IFRS) allow for a selection of accounting methods, assessments and estimates of certain accounting phenomena and processes. This approach is further supported by frequent changes of and amendments to accounting standards.

The financial crisis is a manifestation of excessive debt, the so-called balance sheet recession (Krugman, 2014). A typical feature of a balance sheet recession is that the business objectives of most companies have been changed from profit maximization to debt minimization due to increased liabilities, and the decline in credit demand prolonged the recession. The continued accumulation of excessive debt burdens as well as an abrupt drop of debt scale may increase the probability of a financial crisis (Cecchetti et al., 2011; Khoo et al., 2017; Jarmuzek & Rozenov, 2019). The countries like Japan, the United States, the United Kingdom, Spain and Ireland experienced severe debt expansion during the crisis (Koo, 2011). Koo (2015) believes that the global economic recession in 2008 is essentially the same as the Japanese economic recession that began in the early 1990s. These phenomena motivated academics and policymakers to examine the cause and policy mitigation of excessive debt.

Currently, at a time greatly impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic affecting not only tourism but also other areas of business, there is demand for modern and effective trends of increasing profitability and cost-effectiveness, especially considering the fact that revenues in tourism have dropped worldwide by 74%. There is a noticeable pressure on cost reduction throughout society at this time. According to Sangeetha and Rebecca (2020), the green approach can, over the long term, reduce business operating costs while increasing the added value in society. Tourism represents 10% of global GDP and is also responsible for 5% of global CO2 emissions, of which 1% is attributed to accommodation facilities. Accommodation facilities, particularly hotels, are the key element of tourism (Khatter et al., 2021). In this respect, sustainable hotel strategies are primarily intended for maintaining and improving the socio-economic and environmental balance of our planet (Migale et al., 2019).

TPeople and especially talented individuals are of remarkable interest for many academics in research (Collings et al., 2019; Meyers et al., 2013; Krishnan & Scullion, 2017). The reason is very simple. Human resources are the most valuable resource a company should have. People are movers of each company and create added value. A high commitment human resources strategy leads to a firm competitive advantage (Collins, 2020). Employees play an important role in forming a competitive advantage for the organization. The role of the employees has become pronounced and significant, and it is no longer conventional. They are responsible for the strategic planning and development of the organization (Chakraborty & Biswas, 2019). Nowadays, firms operate in an environment which is characterized by many political, economic, social, and technological changes (Wee & Taylor, 2018).These changes force companies to transform themselves to gain greater prosperity or to survive (Ocasio et al., 2017; Riviere et al., 2017).

This empirical study deals with the short-term prediction of stock prices on the Czech stock market. Stock movements have been of interest to traders for a long time. Using a wide range of analytical methods, it tries to satisfactorily clarify past and present changes in stock prices. Based on these findings, it attempts to predict the future development of stock prices. Early forecasting allows traders to make capital gains. It is necessary to mention that according to Efficient Market Hypothesis (EMH), stock prices are unpredictable and markets are efficient. This means that the market responds immediately to any new information. This information cannot be predicted, it is randomly sent to the market and therefore the change in the exchange rate is random and the exchange rates perform a so-called ʻrandom walk’. In efficient markets the above-average profits cannot be achieved and according to this theory, other approaches are dysfunctional.