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Strategic flexibility (SF) has become increasingly important for firms because of the fast changes in the external environment. In line with the practical importance of SF, an emerging research field has developed around it that has attempted to understand the nature of SF and the key relationships. The aim of this study is to unveil the semantic structure of the recent literature on SF and to suggest new promising areas for future research.

The authors conduct a systematic literature review with a bibliographic analysis technique, which allows authors to identify the main recent streams in the literature, as well as offer reflections and suggestions for future research.

The authors uncover three main emerging areas in the research on SF, namely SF as a dynamic capability, the role of knowledge management for SF and the relationship between a firm SF and the external environment. The authors put forward three avenues for future research on SF: Avenue 1. SF, business model innovation (BMI) and other dynamic capabilities (DC), Avenue 2. Digital technologies and SF/organizational agility and Avenue 3. SF and sustainability. Articles included in the special issue entitled “A strategic perspective on flexibility, agility and adaptability in the digital era” contribute to Avenue 2, thus paving the way for filling some of the identified gaps regarding the relationship between SF and digitalization.

To the best of authors’ knowledge, this is the first literature review on SF that uses a bibliometric approach to draw conclusions on the findings in the literature. The review contributes to the theoretical understanding of SF by illustrating and explicating core topics that have persisted over time, as well as by presenting three main avenues for further developing authors’ knowledge around SF.

This survey explores the application of real options theory to the field of health economics. The integration of options theory offers a valuable framework to address these challenges, providing insights into healthcare investments, policy analysis and patient care pathways.

This research employs the real options theory, a financial concept, to delve into health economics challenges. Through a systematic approach, three distinct models rooted in this theory are crafted and analyzed. Firstly, the study examines the value of investing in emerging health technology, factoring in future advantages, associated costs and unpredictability. The second model is patient-centric, evaluating the choice between immediate treatment switch and waiting for more clarity, while also weighing the associated risks. Lastly, the research assesses pandemic-related government policies, emphasizing the importance of delaying decisions in the face of uncertainties, thereby promoting data-driven policymaking.

Three different real options models are presented in this study to illustrate their applicability and value in aiding decision-makers. (1) The first evaluates investments in new technology, analyzing future benefits, discount rates and benefit volatility to determine investment value. (2) In the second model, a patient has the option of switching treatments now or waiting for more information before optimally switching treatments. However, waiting has its risks, such as disease progression. By modeling the potential benefits and risks of both options, and factoring in the time value, this model aids doctors and patients in making informed decisions based on a quantified assessment of potential outcomes. (3) The third model concerns pandemic policy: governments can end or prolong lockdowns. While awaiting more data on the virus might lead to economic and societal strain, the model emphasizes the economic value of deferring decisions under uncertainty.

This research provides a quantified perspective on various decisions in healthcare, from investments in new technology to treatment choices for patients to government decisions regarding pandemics. By applying real options theory, stakeholders can make more evidence-driven decisions.

Decisions about patient care pathways and pandemic policies have direct societal implications. For instance, choices regarding the prolongation or ending of lockdowns can lead to economic and societal strain.

The originality of this study lies in its application of real options theory, a concept from finance, to the realm of health economics, offering novel insights and analytical tools for decision-makers in the healthcare sector.

This paper aims to systematically review and synthesize existing research on learning-driven strategic renewal and examines the findings to elucidate the dimensions, antecedents, mechanisms and consequences associated with learning-driven strategic renewal, thereby addressing gaps in the existing literature.

This research covers learning-driven strategic renewal from 1992 to 2022, using hybrid snowball sampling techniques and Boolean searches on the Scopus and Web of Science databases to extract 49 papers.

This review proposes an organizing framework for learning-driven strategic renewal, building upon existing literature. The framework identifies various dimensions of the process, including antecedents, mechanisms and consequences. The antecedents are categorized into individual, organizational and external factors. The mechanisms for learning-driven strategic renewal were explored within the context of Crossan’s established 4I framework, which serves as a lens for emphasizing the balance between exploratory and exploitative learning. Within this framework, intuiting, interpreting, integrating and institutionalizing are the four “Is” that guide the renewal process. These mechanisms require a robust system to enforce the prescribed processes effectively, thereby contributing to long-term firm performance and sustainability.

Despite using search terms similar to those in existing literature on strategic renewal, the scope and depth of this study may be limited. Further research may benefit from bibliometric screening or more refined inclusion criteria.

While there has been extensive research into both organizational learning and strategic renewal, no coherent framework links them. This study fills this gap by building a framework that identifies connections between these two concepts, providing valuable insights that may be used to foster successful strategic renewal efforts. The review offers valuable knowledge and understanding of the subject matter, serving as useful guidance for effectively driving renewal initiatives within organizations.

The purpose of this study is to conduct a systematic literature review of the adoption of immersive marketing technology (IMT) in terms of strategic planning of its adoption, resource requirements and its implications and challenges.

This study categorizes and contextualizes qualitative approaches to evaluate the literature, with Scopus databases serving as the primary source of 90 selected articles in the areas of information technology, business and marketing strands. Theme analysis was carried out using thematic techniques and grounded approach principles to facilitate thematic coding and generate theme analysis.

The analysis was supported by the three concepts of business flexibility, agility and adaptability, which were drawn as a strategy for IMT adoption. The findings presented three main themes: proactive flexibility, responsive agility and reactive adaptability that enable business owner–managers to craft a strategy for IMT adoption.

The novel contribution of this study is the inclusion of key implications related to IMT as a starting point of the next level of innovative marketing for all academics, practitioners and business owner–managers.

Today’s marketplace has witnessed intense competitive pressures and high levels of uncertainty and disruption. Therefore, supply chains require agility to obtain a sustainable competitive advantage and cope with uncertainties as well as disruptions. Although a wide range of studies exists on supply chain agility (SCA) from the perspective of antecedents or consequences, there is little research on the investigation of enablers of SCA and their relations among them. Furthermore, the literature has investigated proactive and reactive enablers for enhancing SCA, but most studies have not sufficiently framed their analysis of both aspects synchronically. This paper aims to find out the interrelationships among the proactive and reactive enablers for enhancing SCA.

An extensive literature review has been conducted to identify SCA enablers and a Delphi study has been performed to elucidate SCA enablers in the manufacturing industry in Turkey. Interpretive structural modeling (ISM) has been used to identify the contextual relationship among the SCA enablers, and the model has been validated based on Matriced Impact Croises Multiplication Appliquee a un Classement (MICMAC) analysis.

On theoretical and practical levels, the proposed ISM model in this study can help organizations analyze and interpret interrelationships among enablers of SCA. For managers, it can provide better insights and understanding of the facilitators of SCA to enhance the effectiveness of the supply chain and cope with uncertainties and turbulence. According to results, enhancing “supply and demand side competency”, “delivery speed” and “strategic sourcing” are the most significant enablers of SCA.

The study extends the existing literature related to the enablers of SCA by modeling the proactive and reactive enablers of SCA based on the Al Humdan et al. (2020) classification. Arranging the enablers of SCA in a hierarchy and classifying the enablers into different levels with the help of the ISM-MICMAC approach is an exclusive effort to achieve successful management of the supply chain.

A global crisis like that caused by the COVID-19 pandemic threatens the survival of any business, but especially of nascent entrepreneurs, due to their vulnerable situation. At this stage of entrepreneurship, information and communication technology capabilities (ICTCs) are critical skills that help entrepreneurs develop their new businesses, fostering economic adaptability to counteract adverse effects. This study advances knowledge of how nascent entrepreneurs react in an environment of global crisis.

The study analyzes a sample of 331 Spanish nascent entrepreneurs to determine the mediating effect of ICTCs on the relationship between the impact of a global crisis (e.g. COVID-19) and the firm’s strategic response.

The results suggest that crises influence adaptation and compensation strategies significantly and that ICTCs exert a total mediating effect on this relationship. The results do not, however, establish a clear relationship between the impact of the COVID-19 crisis and disengagement response, but rather a negative relationship, possibly influenced by government attempts to mitigate the pandemic’s economic consequences (economic aid to maintain the workforce, financial support for business model survival).

The COVID-19 crisis revealed ICT as a key technology for continuing business operations. This study analyzes how ICTCs affect nascent entrepreneurs’ strategies in crisis environments. Our analysis is important because these entrepreneurs have invested resources in their new project. We must determine their strategic response to crisis environments: adaptation, compensation or disengagement. The sample itself, collected during the pandemic, provides unique insights into the impact of the crisis on nascent business decisions.

像2019冠狀病毒病大流行等的全球危機一旦發生，各工商企業能否繼續生存必會受到威脅和影響。這影響以剛開始發展的創業者為甚，因為他們處於脆弱的處境。在這個創業階段，創業者必須擁有資訊與通訊科技能力，才能發展他們的新業務，他們亦需培養經濟上的適應能力，以能抵銷各種不利的影響。本研究擬就剛開始發展的創業者在全球危機發生時應如何應對進行探討，以增進我們對這課題的知識。

本研究分析一個涵蓋331名西班牙新生創業者的樣本，來鑒定資訊與通訊科技能力對全球危機 (如2019冠狀病毒病) 帶來的影響與企業戰略應對之間的關聯所起的中介效應。

研究結果似顯示，危機會顯著地影響企業的適應和賠償策略; 研究結果似乎也顯示，資訊與通訊科技能力會對這關聯 (全球危機所帶來的影響與企業戰略應對之間的關聯) 發揮極大的中介效應。但研究結果並沒有就2019冠狀病毒病危機的影響與脫離反應、建立明確的關聯。反之，研究結果似顯示兩者有一個負相關的關係，這可能是因為政府施行應對方法，以減輕大流行所帶來的經濟後果所致 (這些應對方法包括用以維持勞動力隊伍的經濟援助、和使商業模式能繼續生存的財政支援) 。

2019冠狀病毒病危機揭示了資訊與通訊科技是讓商業運作能繼續進行的關鍵技術。本研究分析資訊與通訊科技能力如何於危機發生時影響新生創業者的策略。我們的分析有其重要性，這是因為這些創業者把資源投入他們的新項目; 我們必須鑒定他們對危機所採取的戰略對策: 適應、賠償和脫離。取自大流行期間有關的樣本本身已能就危機如何影響新生創業者的商務決策、提供獨特的啟示。

This study aims to investigate and test the impact of competitive priorities, in terms of quality, speed, dependability, flexibility, cost and patient engagement, on patient satisfaction with healthcare services. It considers patients’ rather than managers’ points of view to collect responses about competitive priorities.

This research employed a cross-sectional survey design to analyze a sample of customers through an empirical study of 488 patients in Qatar’s healthcare service context.

The confirmatory factor analysis results show that competitive priorities and engagement positively and significantly impact patient satisfaction.

Researchers can use this methodology to explore the role of competitive priorities in different service contexts and sectors. The researchers conducted the study in Qatar; therefore, the results are not generalizable to all healthcare sectors. However, regardless of geographic location, the research approach can be used in healthcare.

Managers can employ the developed scales to diagnose competitive priorities and improve customer service experiences.

The paper is original as it suggests using competitive priorities as a measurement tool for predicting patient satisfaction compared to prior research that mostly measured competitive priorities based on internal perspectives (managers’ perspectives). Further, this paper is original because it depends on the external perspective (customers’ perspective) for the competitive priorities for measuring patient satisfaction.

Drawing upon resource dependence theory, this study aims to examine how a firm’s information technology (IT) capabilities (i.e. IT integration and IT reconfiguration) influence its responses to disruptions – bridging with a current supplier and buffering with an alternative supplier. We further examine how such relationships are moderated by the firm–supplier relative dependence (i.e. firm dependence advantage and supplier dependence advantage).

Based on data from 141 match-paired surveys of firms in China, we test our model.

Our study finds that IT integration positively influences bridging and IT reconfiguration positively influences buffering. Furthermore, our findings indicate that the positive impact of IT integration on bridging is negatively influenced by the firm’s dependence (FD) advantage but positively moderated by the supplier’s dependence advantage. By contrast, the positive impact of IT reconfiguration on buffering is negatively influenced by the FD advantage.

Our study provides a more nuanced insight into the effects of IT capabilities on disruption responses and a better understanding of the buyer–supplier dependence boundary conditions under which these effects vary.

Exploration and exploitation have long been documented as prominent approaches to business management and organizational adaptation to external environment. Maintaining balance between these activities is a key to survival and prosperity. However, there is little direct evidence of the effect of such combined usage of both approaches on firm performance in times of crisis, especially within small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). The purpose of this paper is to reveal the role of balanced ambidexterity in shaping firm performance during COVID-19 recession.

Based on a survey of 333 Russian SMEs, the authors test the proposed theoretical framework linking innovative ambidexterity to firm performance level and variability taking into account technological uncertainty.

The results show that innovative ambidexterity tends to increase level and decrease variability of performance outcomes, whereas technological uncertainty acts as a positive contingency for this impact.

The results provide an improved understanding of ambidexterity and organizational literatures by clarifying the contingent nature of the ambidexterity–firm performance relationship during COVID-19 recession.

Manufacturers increasingly resort to digital transformation to shape their competitiveness in the digital economy era, while supply chain (SC) collaborative innovation helps them cope with market uncertainties. However, whether and how digital transformation can facilitate SC collaborative innovation remain unclear. To address this gap, we aims to investigate the effects of digital transformation (strategy and capability) on SC collaborative (process and product) innovation and market performance.

We use partial least squares-structural equation modelling (PLS-SEM) with a sample of 210 Chinese manufacturers to investigate the effects of digital transformation (strategy and capability) on SC collaborative (process and product) innovation and market performance.

The results show that digital strategy and capability positively impact SC collaborative process and product innovation, which enhances market performance. In addition, SC collaborative innovation mediates the relationship between digital transformation and market performance.

This study contributes to the literature by identifying how digital transformation drives SC collaborative innovation towards improving market performance and providing practical guidance for enterprises in promoting digital transformation and SC collaborative innovation.