Competences of Rural Women Entrepreneurs and Their Quality of Life
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
The article is structured and presented clearly. In the resume the authors present concisely the subject. The introduction, including the study's framework and literature review, is extensive and gives the necessary information on the study background.
The methodology is explained and presented openly – it was made a pilot study on a similar region to thirty women entrepreneurs. The tests and analyses made, validated the questionnaires used, which made it acceptable for this research. This shows a deep research within the field in study and a great interest on the subject.
The study is very interesting and analyses a crucial area and populations – personal and professional skills of women entrepreneurs and their life quality.
The conclusions are important and relevant both to women entrepreneurs (suggesting long-life training in ICT and problem-solving skills) and also to government agencies.
The language used is clear, adequate, and the text is well written and structured.
Author Response
Response to Reviewer 1 Comments
Thank you for your letter and for the reviewer 1 comments concerning our manuscript entitled “Competences of Rural Women Entrepreneurs and their Quality of Life”. Those comments are all valuable and very helpful for revising and improving our paper, as well as the important guiding significance to our researches. We have studied comments carefully and have made correction which we hope meet with approval. Revised portion are marked in red in the paper. The manuscript has been revised as per the comments given by the reviewer, and our responses to all the comments are as follows:
Point 1: English language and style are fine/minor spell check required
Response 1: Thank you for your valuable comments. I rechecked the spelling of this manuscript.
Once again, thank you very much for your comments and suggestions.
Author Response File: 
Author Response.docx
Reviewer 2 Report
Dear authors, thank you for the interesting paper, although I have some comments:
1. Methods:
a) I am not sure whether using a standardised questionnaire is the best tool for the present analysis. Several items in the questionnaire seem to be multidimensional, and might be understood differently by different respondents, for example the term "creative" used in the the section "innovative and creative thinking skills". Qualitative survey instruments like selected in-depth interviews could have helped to prevent multidimensionality and misinterpretation.
b) Moreover you should explain, why (or if) you think religious experts can help to find business solutions, certain acts of worship will help business to prosper, that alms etc. will bring double returns in business etc… Maybe that the spiritual issues you mention contribute to the level of quality of life of the respondents, but where you see the link between religious beliefs and practices and entrepreneurial competency should be made a bit clearer.
c) The readers do not get any information about the age and educational level of the respondents, of the kind and size of businesses they are in etc. However, these may be important independent variables which might have a relevant impact on the level of life competencies etc.
2. Formal issues:
Citing references in the text by simply using their respective number [x] in the reference list should be avoided.
line 79: "lower" instead of Low;
line 96: "have" instead of has;
line 183: comment by one of the authors (in Malay and English) should be deleted;
Author Response
Response to Reviewer 2 Comments
Thank you for your letter and for the reviewer 2 comments concerning our manuscript entitled “Competences of Rural Women Entrepreneurs and their Quality of Life”. Those comments are all valuable and very helpful for revising and improving our paper, as well as the important guiding significance to our researches. We have studied comments carefully and have made correction which we hope meet with approval. Revised portion are marked in red in the paper. The manuscript has been revised as per the comments given by the reviewer, and our responses to all the comments are as follows:
Point 1: Moderate English changes required.
Response 1: Thank you so much for your valuable suggestion. We tried our best to improve the manuscript and made some changes in the manuscript.
Point 2: Is the content succinctly described and contextualized with respect to previous and present theoretical background and empirical research (if applicable) on the topic? (Can be improved)
Response 2: We are grateful for the suggestion. To be more clear and in accordance with the reviewer concerns, we have improved the theoretical background information and empirical studies.
Point 3: Are the research design, questions, hypotheses and methods clearly stated? (Must be improved)
Response 3: Thank you so much for your comments. The mistake is corrected in the revised version.
Point 4: Are the arguments and discussion of findings coherent, balanced and compelling? (Must be improved)
Response 4: Thank you for your comments. The arguments and discussion of findings have been added according to the reviewer’s recommendations.
Point 5: For empirical research, are the results clearly presented? (Must be improved)
Response 5: Thank you for your comments. The empirical research has been improved.
Point 6: Is the article adequately referenced? (Can be improved)
Response 6: Thank you so much for your valuable suggestion. We have added it in the revised manuscript.
Point 7: Are the conclusions thoroughly supported by the results presented in the article or referenced in secondary literature? (Can be improved)
Response 7: Thank you so much for your comments. We have improved the conclusion discussion.
Point 8: Method: a) I am not sure whether using a standardised questionnaire is the best tool for the present analysis. Several items in the questionnaire seem to be multidimensional, and might be understood differently by different respondents, for example the term "creative" used in the the section "innovative and creative thinking skills". Qualitative survey instruments like selected in-depth interviews could have helped to prevent multidimensionality and misinterpretation.
Response 8: Thank you for your comments. In general, innovation and creativity are fundamental to entrepreneurial theory and activity. For your information, the questionnaire we used to measure as an example of creative terms was derived from a well-established instrument by Suradi (2017). In this instrument, creative items are placed under the innovation skills sub-construct that measures entrepreneurial skills (Line no. 267).
Point 9: Method: b) Moreover you should explain, why (or if) you think religious experts can help to find business solutions, certain acts of worship will help business to prosper, that alms etc. will bring double returns in business etc… Maybe that the spiritual issues you mention contribute to the level of quality of life of the respondents, but where you see the link between religious beliefs and practices and entrepreneurial competency should be made a bit clearer.
Response 9: Thank you for the suggestion. We have added this point according to the suggestions (Lines no. 341-346).
Point 10: Method: c) The readers do not get any information about the age and educational level of the respondents, of the kind and size of businesses they are in etc. However, these may be important independent variables which might have a relevant impact on the level of life competencies etc.
Response 10: Thank you for your comments. We completely agree with your idea. However, we will include demographic information as a limitation of the study to maintain the confidentiality of respondents ’personal information (Lines no. 414-422). We will also include this demographic information in future research (Lines no. 423-427).
Point 11: Formal issues: Citing references in the text by simply using their respective number [x] in the reference list should be avoided. Line 79: "lower" instead of Low;
Response 11: Reference citations in the text using the number [x] have been replaced with the correct reference (Line no. 229).
Line no.84: The word "low" has been replaced with “lower” (Despite the benefits of entrepreneurship, women entrepreneurs have a lower …)
Point 12: Formal issue: Line 96: "have" instead of has.
Response 12: Line no. 102, The word “has” has been replaced with “have” (Internet usage skills comprise important ICT skills that have …)
Point 13: Formal issue: Line 183: comment by one of the authors (in Malay and English) should be deleted.
Response 13: Line no. 189: comments in Malay have been deleted.
Once again, thank you very much for your comments and suggestions.
Author Response File: Author Response.docx
Reviewer 3 Report
The reviewed paper concentrates on relationship between life competencies and quality of life of rural women entrepreneurs in specific Malaysian context. The research problem is important, however not novel and not original in a great extent. The research model (framework) is very trivial and research hypothesis is obvious. In my opinion there is a huge potential for such a research topic to deeper considerations on relationships between life competencies and quality of life including specific mediators, moderators and/or control variables, which is not explored in reviewed paper. However, I try to find this paper interesting especially because research problem is well and properly justified in relation to specific Malaysian rural context. To enhance scientific and cognitive value of the paper I recommend the following improvements:
1) On p. 3 (lines 116-119) Authors state that “We apply Maslow’s hierarchy of needs (…) to form an assumption through research hypotheses”. However only one hypothesis is formulated.
2) On p. 3 (lines 134-136) Authors state that “The fourth level needs (…) were measured based on the recognition or acknowledgement employees…”. However, not employees but entrepreneurs took part in the research.
3) It would be valuable to expand H1 by providing assumption on direction of relationship between life competencies and quality of life (positive/negative relationship).
4) In the theoretical framework (Fig. 1) the arrow visualizes the impact of life competencies on quality of life however, in H1 and in further analysis (incl. Pearson correlation coefficient calculations) relationship between these variables is considered. Relationship is not an impact and represents mutual interdependence between variables. The Authors indicate it properly in analytical part on p.13 (line 353): “These findings indicate that life competencies and quality of life are interdependent”. Therefore in theoretical framework mutual relationship should be indicated: the arrow should point in both directions.
5) In the methodology part brief characteristics of respondents should be presented (e.g. age, education level, period of running the company). If possible brief information about companies run by respondents would also be valuable.
6) In the findings & discussion part direct and clear answers to RQ1 and RQ2 should be presented.
7) On p. 13 (lines 342-347) Authors state that “These data show that ICT and problem-solving skills are less correlated with rural women entrepreneurs’ quality of life. This implies that fundamental adult skills, including ICT and problem-solving skills, need to be improved to enable rural women entrepreneurs to survive, compete, and become champions among the local population. These findings are consistent with the those of previous studies showing that rural women entrepreneurs’ ICT and problem-solving skills are still very low”. These conclusions are not consistent with the results obtained. Fundamental adult skills level of respondents is high (m = 4.47), which is confirmed by the Authors on p. 6 (line 269): “These constructs have a high mean value of 4.467 (SD 0.45)…”. The fact of low correlation between variables does not mean that fundamental adult skills level is low. It only means that fundamental adult skills do not support quality of life (perhaps these competences are used by respondents to obtain other types of benefits). Therefore it is necessary to reformulate the conclusions of the study taking into account the reality of the research results.
8) In the implications and conclusions part, limitations of the research should be indicated and discussed.
In the final conclusion I assess the reviewed paper positively and recommend it for publication in the “Sustainability” journal, after improvements taking into account the recommendations made above.
Author Response
Response to Reviewer 3 Comments
Thank you for the reviewer comments concerning our manuscript entitled “Competences of Rural Women Entrepreneurs and their Quality of Life”. Those comments are all valuable and very helpful for revising and improving our paper, as well as the important guiding significance to our researches. We have studied comments carefully and have made correction which we hope meet with approval. Revised portion are marked in red in the paper. The manuscript has been revised as per the comments given by the reviewer, and our responses to all the comments are as follows:
Point 1: Moderate English changes required
Response 1: Thank you so much for your valuable suggestion. We tried our best to improve the manuscript and made some changes in the manuscript.
Point 2: Is the content succinctly described and contextualized with respect to previous and present theoretical background and empirical research (if applicable) on the topic? (Can be improved)
Response 2: We are grateful for the suggestion. To be more clear and in accordance with the reviewer concerns, we have improved the theoretical background information and empirical studies.
Point 3: Are the research design, questions, hypotheses and methods clearly stated? (Must be improved)
Response 3: Thank you so much for your comments. The mistake is corrected in the revised version.
Point 4: Are the arguments and discussion of findings coherent, balanced and compelling? (Must be improved)
Response 4: Thank you for your comments. The arguments and discussion of findings have been added according to the details of the reviewer’s recommendations.
Point 5: For empirical research, are the results clearly presented? (Must be improved)
Response 5: Thank you for your comments. The empirical research has been improved.
Point 6: Are the conclusions thoroughly supported by the results presented in the article or referenced in secondary literature? (Must be improved)
Response 6: Thank you so much for your valuable suggestion. We have added it in the revised manuscript.
Point 7: On p. 3 (lines 116-119) Authors state that “We apply Maslow’s hierarchy of needs (…) to form an assumption through research hypotheses”. However only one hypothesis is formulated.
Response 7: We apologize for the misspelling of the research hypothesis (extending theory argument to form an assumption through research hypothesis), Line no.124.
Point 8: On p. 3 (lines 134-136) Authors state that “The fourth level needs (…) were measured based on the recognition or acknowledgement employees…”. However, not employees but entrepreneurs took part in the research.
Response 8: Thank you for the suggestion. This was revised according to the comment with better understanding. Please refer to Line no. 137. (At the former level, all employees, particularly rural women entrepreneurs, experiencing a sense of belonging do play a certain role in the organisation).
Point 9: It would be valuable to expand H1 by providing assumption on direction of relationship between life competencies and quality of life (positive/negative relationship).
Response 9: Thank you for the suggestion. We have added H1 with positive relationship between life competencies and quality of life (Line no.173 ).
Point 10: In the theoretical framework (Fig. 1) the arrow visualizes the impact of life competencies on quality of life however, in H1 and in further analysis (incl. Pearson correlation coefficient calculations) relationship between these variables is considered. Relationship is not an impact and represents mutual interdependence between variables. The Authors indicate it properly in analytical part on p.13 (line 353): “These findings indicate that life competencies and quality of life are interdependent”. Therefore in theoretical framework mutual relationship should be indicated: the arrow should point in both directions.
Response 10: Thank you for your comments. The framework showing the relationship between life competencies and quality of life has been amendment which places the arrow point in both directions. Line no. 176.
Point 11: In the methodology part brief characteristics of respondents should be presented (e.g. age, education level, period of running the company). If possible brief information about companies run by respondents would also be valuable.
Response 11: Thank you so much for your comments. We have added this information in methodology section (Lines no. 263-266).
Point 12: In the findings & discussion part direct and clear answers to RQ1 and RQ2 should be presented.
Response 12: Thank you so much for your comments. We have added recent past literature to strengthen the findings of this study (Lines no. 294; 355).
Point 13: On p. 13 (lines 342-347) Authors state that “These data show that ICT and problem-solving skills are less correlated with rural women entrepreneurs’ quality of life. This implies that fundamental adult skills, including ICT and problem-solving skills, need to be improved to enable rural women entrepreneurs to survive, compete, and become champions among the local population. These findings are consistent with the those of previous studies showing that rural women entrepreneurs’ ICT and problem-solving skills are still very low”. These conclusions are not consistent with the results obtained. Fundamental adult skills level of respondents is high (m = 4.47), which is confirmed by the Authors on p. 6 (line269): “These constructs have a high mean value of 4.467 (SD0.45)…”. The fact of low correlation between variables does not mean that fundamental adult skills level is low. It only means that fundamental adult skills do not support quality of life (perhaps these competences are used by respondents to obtain other types of benefits). Therefore it is necessary to reformulate the conclusions of the study taking into account the reality of the research results.
Response 13: Thank you for the suggestion. We have re-written this part according to the reviewer’s comments (Line no.312-313, 323-325). Line no. 377 indicates that fundamental adult skills do not support quality of life among rural women entrepreneurs.
Point 14: In the implications and conclusions part, limitations of the research should be indicated and discussed.
Response 14: We are grateful for the suggestion. To be more clear and in accordance with the reviewer concerns, we have added a brief description of limitation (Lines no. 414-427).
Once again, thank you very much for your comments and suggestions.
Author Response File: Author Response.docx
Reviewer 4 Report
Thank you for submitting your paper. The article provides an interesting analysis of the relationship between rural women entrepreneurs’ competence and their quality of life.
Comments on individual parts:
· The article would benefit from changing a bit the title. It seems not precise enough. I would suggest the following title “Competences of rural women entrepreneurs and their quality of life”
· The abstract is not precise enough. The abstract should be improved by referring to a clear objective, methods, implications and contribution (without details of figures)
· The keywords are precise enough.
· The Introduction highlights the research problem and defines the research gaps. However, the introduction should provide not only a research background and research objective but also a brief indication of the methods used and a brief description of the content of each section of the paper (in the last paragraph). I also propose to delete the titles of the subsections in the Introduction, namely subsections 1.1 and 1.2.
· The literature review presents important highlights on the state of the art, however, the major topics might receive more attention and explanation by utilizing more literature from the leading journals.
· The use of research methods is adequate. However, the choice of the sampling, the choice of analysis methods as well as the fulfilment of the criteria of validity and the reliability of this study should be better justified.
· The result section includes an interesting data analysis. The key findings can be considered significant and important. However, the result section should include not only data presentation but also a better interpretation of the findings obtained. The key findings presented in the tables should be better explained and justified considering more details. The critical assessment of the results will improve the quality of the analysis. Moreover, tables 3 to 5 should be optimized or moved to an annex as they are too long.
· The conclusion section includes an overview of the key research results. However, despite a synthetic overview of the key research results and different implications, this section should also contain a discussion. To increase the significance of the research results, the authors should also present recommendations for practice or/and theory, specify research limitations, and indicate potential directions for further research.
Academic language is overall correct, but proofreading of text, style and abbreviations is recommended.
Author Response
Response to Reviewer 4 Comments
Thank you for the reviewer comments concerning our manuscript entitled “Competences of Rural Women Entrepreneurs and their Quality of Life”. Those comments are all valuable and very helpful for revising and improving our paper, as well as the important guiding significance to our researches. We have studied comments carefully and have made correction which we hope meet with approval. Revised portion are marked in red in the paper. The manuscript has been revised as per the comments given by the reviewer, and our responses to all the comments are as follows:
Point 1: Moderate English changes required
Response 1: Thank you so much for the suggestion. We tried our best to improve the manuscript and made some changes in the manuscript.
Point 2: Is the content succinctly described and contextualized with respect to previous and present theoretical background and empirical research (if applicable) on the topic? (Can be improved)
Response 2: We are grateful for the suggestion. To be more clear, we have improved the theoretical background information and empirical studies.
Point 3: Are all the cited references relevant to the research? (Can be improved)
Response 3: Thank you so much for your comments. The mistake is corrected in the revised version.
Point 4: Are the research design, questions, hypotheses and methods clearly stated? (Can be improved)
Response 4: Thank you so much for your comments. Yes, correction is made in the revised manuscript.
Point 5: Are the arguments and discussion of findings coherent, balanced and compelling? (Can be improved)
Response 5: Thank you so much for your suggestion. The arguments and discussion of findings have been added according to the details of the reviewer’s recommendations.
Point 6: For empirical research, are the results clearly presented? (Can be improved)
Response 6: Thank you for your comments. The empirical research has been improved.
Point 7: Is the article adequately referenced? (Can be improved)
Response 7: Thank you for your comments. We have improved the recent references.
Point 8: Are the conclusions thoroughly supported by the results presented in the article or referenced in secondary literature? (Must be improved)
Response 8: Thank you for your comment. Yes, conclusion section thoroughly supported by the results presented in the article or referenced in secondary literature (Lines no. 217).
Point 9: The article would benefit from changing a bit the title. It seems not precise enough. I would suggest the following title “Competences of rural women entrepreneurs and their quality of life”
Response 9: Thank you for your precious suggestion. We have changed the title accordingly.
Point 10: The abstract is not precise enough. The abstract should be improved by referring to a clear objective, methods,implications and contribution (without details of figures)
Response 10: Thank you for your comments. Abstract section is thoroughly revised considering your valuable suggestion (Lines no. 13-28).
Point 11: The keywords are precise enough.
Response 11: Thank you very much for your comment.
Point 12: The Introduction highlights the research problem and defines the research gaps. However, the introduction should provide not only a research background and research objective but also a brief indication of the methods used and a brief description of the content of each section of the paper (in the last paragraph). I also propose to delete the titles of the subsections in the Introduction, namely subsections 1.1 and 1.2.
Response 12: Thank you for your comments. We have added methods used and a brief description of the content (Lines no. 180-185). However, we would like to apologize, we had to retain subsections 1.1 and 1.2 as our intention was to justify the issues and problems becoming clearer.
Point 13: The literature review presents important highlights on the state of the art, however, the major topics might receive more attention and explanation by utilizing more literature from the leading journals.
Response 13: Thank you for your comments. Now we have added more literature from leading journals (for examples- Lines no. 333; 357).
Point 14: The use of research methods is adequate. However, the choice of the sampling, the choice of analysis methods as well as the fulfilment of the criteria of validity and the reliability of this study should be better justified.
Response 14: Thank you for your comments. The mistake is corrected in the revised version (Lines no. 267-280).
Point 15: The result section includes an interesting data analysis. The key findings can be considered significant and important. However, the result section should include not only data presentation but also a better interpretation of the findings obtained. The key findings presented in the tables should be better explained and justified considering more details. The critical assessment of the results will improve the quality of the analysis. Moreover, tables 3 to 5 should be optimized or moved to an annex as they are too long.
Response 15: Thank you for your suggestion. Yes, corrections were made in the revised manuscript (Findings section). Table 3 to 5 have been moved to the Appendix A section (Lines no. 448-454).
Point 16: The conclusion section includes an overview of the key research results. However, despite a synthetic overview of the key research results and different implications, this section should also contain a discussion. To increase the significance of the research results, the authors should also present recommendations for practice or/and theory, specify research limitations, and indicate potential directions for further research.
Response 16: Thank you for your suggestion. We have added information regarding recommendation for practice or/and theory, specify research limitations, and indicate potential directions for further research (Lines no. 393-427).
Point 17: Academic language is overall correct, but proofreading of text, style and abbreviations is recommended.
Response 17: Thank you for your comment. As mentioned above, we have revised proofreading of text, style and abbreviations.
Once again, thank you very much for your comments and suggestions.
Author Response File: Author Response.docx
Round 2
Reviewer 2 Report
thank you for the revision and for clarifying some open questions and good luck for your upcoming projects!
Reviewer 3 Report
The Authors made significant changes to the reviewed paper including all recommendations from the first round review. Therefore I assess the reviewed paper positively and recommend it for publication in the “Sustainability” journal.
