Saeed Badghish

Purpose: This study builds on the natural resource-based view of dynamic capability to explore whether, how and when green dynamic capabilities (GDCs) contribute to green competitive advantage (GCA). Specifically, it investigates the role of marketing innovation capability (MIC) as a mediator and the effect of environmental attitudes (EA) as a moderator in this relationship. Design/methodology/approach: A quantitative design and deductive approach were employed using a three-wave time-lagged dataset collected from 218 managers and their subordinates to examine hypothesized relationships using IBM SPSS 28.0 and the PROCESS macro. Findings: The empirical findings revealed that MIC mediates the positive relationship between GDCs and GCA. Furthermore, the results indicate that the mediating effect was stronger when EA was high than when it was low. Originality/value: This study makes valuable contributions to the literature by providing empirical evidence of the interplay between GDCs, MIC and EA in shaping a firm’s GCA. These findings have significant implications for practitioners and policymakers in the hospitality and tourism industry, emphasizing the importance of developing GDCs and fostering EA to achieve superior performance through sustainable practices.

Purpose: With technological progress, retail companies must understand how to make virtual channels and environments more interactive to enhance user engagement. In this study, we apply the stimulus-organism-response (SOR) paradigm and the Customer Engagement Theory to investigate the impact of various types of customer engagement on the connection amid interactivity and continuous metaverse-empowered marketing channel usage. Design/methodology/approach: The analysis was conducted using PLS-SEM on data collected via a representative sampling approach from 300 respondents on prolific online (the UK was fed as the country with the sample representing people with AR/VR gear). Findings: It has been found that cognitive, emotional and social engagement positively and significantly mediates the relation between the variables studied. Personalization had a significantly negative moderating influence on the association between cognitive engagement and continuous use. Originality/value: Besides extending existing research in the area of metaverse-empowered channels, the study’s findings provide important guidelines for retail companies to enhance customer engagement in virtual environments effectively.

Purpose: The research on intellectual capital focuses on the role of innovative technologies in organizational systems, particularly in knowledge generation and learning processes. This study addresses the third stage of intellectual capital research, emphasizing how innovative technologies like generative AI (Gen AI) applications can enhance learning experiences, individual talents and personalized learning. Based on the WEST model, this study examines the relationship between attitude, competency, experience, Gen AI integration and managers’ creative involvement. Additionally, it investigates the direct and mediating roles of Gen AI integration and managers’ creative involvement in improving learning effectiveness.Design/methodology/approach: A cross-sectional survey of managers from organizations operating in diverse sectors of Saudi Arabia was conducted using a web-administered structured questionnaire. PLS-based structural equation modeling was employed to assess the hypothesized relationships.Findings: The results revealed that the manager’s Gen AI experience, competency, attitude and access positively affect its integration. However, only Gen AI competence and attitudes demonstrated the same positive impact on managers’ creative involvement. Furthermore, Gen AI integration and creative involvement positively and significantly impact learning effectiveness. The study also uncovered the positive mediation of Gen AI integration in enabling all four antecedents to enhance learning effectiveness. However, the mediation of creative involvement was corroborated only for the Gen AI attitudes and competence.Originality/value: This study examines how integrating innovative technologies, such as generative AI, enhances the learning experience, develops individual talents and personalizes learning in workplace contexts at the managerial level. By providing new insights into the dynamics of generative AI integration in workplace settings, it significantly contributes to the generative AI literature.

Purpose: This study examines how green dynamic capabilities (GDC) and ethical leadership (EL) influence a firm’s green sustained competitive advantage (GSCA) by focusing on the mediating role of green marketing strategy (GMS) within the natural resource-based view (NRBV) from the perspective of dynamic capabilities.Design/methodology/approach: The conceptual model is tested using multi-source and three-wave time-lagged data from 213 managers and their subordinates in the Saudi Arabian hospitality and tourism industry.Findings: The empirical findings confirm that GDC and EL have a positive and statistically significant impact on GMS and GSCA. In addition, the results suggest that GMS partially mediates the links between GDC and GSCA as well as between EL and GSCA.Originality/value: This is an original study that examines GDC, EL, GMS and GSCA in a single model. This study demonstrates how GDC and EL lead to high levels of GSCA through the mediation of GMS.

Purpose: This study examines the dynamic capability and resource-based view theories in the context of the tourism and hospitality industry, examining how the green dynamic capabilities of firms interact with green marketing strategies to influence their level of green competitive advantage under the boundary condition of the green organizational culture of Saudi Arabia’s tourism and hospitality sector.Design/methodology/approach: Using multi-sourced and three-wave time-lagged data from 136 managers and their subordinates within the Saudi Arabian tourism industry to test the hypotheses.Findings: The results reveal that all hypotheses were accepted, affirming the direct, mediating, moderating and moderated mediating associations among green dynamic capabilities, green marketing strategies, green organizational culture and green competitive advantage.Originality/value: This study offers valuable insights for practitioners and policymakers seeking to enhance the sustainability performance and competitive advantage of firms in the ever-evolving tourism sector.

The primary purpose of this study was to investigate and present a theoretical model that identifies the most influential factors affecting the adoption of artificial intelligence (AI) by SMEs to achieve sustainable business performance in Saudi Arabia by integrating the Technology–Organization–Environment (TOE) framework. The authors utilized a quantitative method, using a survey instrument for this research. Data for this research were collected from managers working in six different sectors. Subsequently, based on company size, firms were divided into two groups, allowing multi-group analysis of small and medium-sized businesses to explore group differences. Hence, firm size played a moderating role in the conceptualized model. Data analysis was performed on SmartPLS 3, and the results suggest that dimensions of the TOE framework, such as relative advantage, compatibility, sustainable human capital, market and customer demand, and government support, play a significant role in the adoption of AI. Moreover, this study found a significant influence of AI on SMEs’ operational and economic performance. The multi-group analysis (MGA) results reveal significant group differences, with a medium-sized firm strengthening the relationship between relative advantage and AI adoption compared to small-size firms. The findings lead to practical implications for companies on how to increase the adoption of AI to help SMEs embrace their technological challenges in KSA and obtain sustainable business performance to contribute to the economy.

With tremendous technological advancements, traditional retailing has progressively been transformed into an omnichannel retail environment. While making an appeal to the behavioral reasoning theory, this paper explicates consumers’ (hedonic and utilitarian) value expectations and behavioral reasoning patterns as key antecedents of the maturing of their webrooming intentions in omnichannel environments. Performing PLS-based structural equation modeling on survey data obtained from 470 consumers, it has been found that both the (perceived) value and behavioral reasoning patterns of the consumers exhibit significant direct and indirect effects on building favorable attitudes toward webrooming that eventually lead to the culmination of pro-webrooming intentions. Besides expanding our understanding of the phenomena of interest, this study offers useful insights to marketers/retailers on how to boost pro-webrooming attitudes, intentions, and behaviors by ensuring a superior alignment with (utilitarian and hedonic) value perceptions and pro- and counter-webrooming reasoning patterns of the consumers.