The Role of Strategic Leadership in Building Sustainable Competitive Advantage in the Academic Environment

A Study on the Impact of Sustainable Leadership and Core Competencies on Sustainable Competitive Advantage in the Information Technology (IT) Sector

The study is focused on assessing the impact of sustainable leadership and core competencies on sustainable competitive advantage in the information technology sector. The data are sourced from primary and secondary data. The primary data are sourced from IT sector employees. The secondary information is sourced from earlier publications related to sustainable leadership, sustainable competitive advantage, and core competencies. The primary data were collected through the field survey method, although some were collected via an online mode. The sample size was 297. The study used a simple stratified random sampling technique. The study results described a significant effect of sustainable leadership on sustainable competitive advantage. Sustainable leadership improves the prospects of associations in terms of their creation, constant advancement, sustained competitive edge, and long-term success. Sustainable leadership is a wellspring of gaining the upper hand for associations. Sustainable leadership benefits associations, development, consistent improvement, a supported upper hand, and long haul achievement. The study also found that the core competencies significantly influence the competitive advantage. The discoveries of the current study have significant ramifications for customers, top administration, and policymakers. The practitioners of IT companies are urged to cultivate an inventive and open correspondence climate in their associations dependent on existing logical discoveries. Likewise, they could utilize the current outcomes as a benchmark for gradually expanding their qualities and limits, which may prompt better natural productivity.

The Business Model of Sustainable Competitive Advantage through Strategic Leadership Capabilities and Knowledge Management Processes to Overcome COVID-19 Pandemic

In recent decades, particularly during the outbreak of COVID-19, businesses organizations have focused on knowledge management processes in order to attain a sustainable competitive advantage by creating human and social capital as strategic leadership capabilities. This paper aims to develop an integrated conceptual and theoretical framework that connects strategic leadership capabilities, knowledge management processes, and sustainable competitive advantage for the public and private organizations within the service industry. The model approach has been used to build a theoretical framework that predicts the relationships between the variables. To support the link between them, a systematic literature review of traditional and contemporary theoretical and empirical research studies is conducted. Through the combination of the related literature, propositions are established. This conceptual research is primarily comprised of a model and assertions concerning strategic leadership capabilities, knowledge management processes, and sustainable competitive advantage. The outcomes of this study reflect that strategic leadership capabilities can accomplish sustainable competitive advantage. They also have the greatest potential to impact sustainable competitive advantage via engaging the knowledge management processes. Particularly, there are significant implications of this study. Regarding the theoretical implication, it contributes to the resource-based view, knowledge-based view, and knowledge creation theory in supporting strategic leadership capabilities, knowledge management processes, and sustainable competitive advantage. To the practical implication, the study linked the concepts of research variables for public and private enterprises within the service industry. It can also enable strategic leaders and businesses owners to participate in real-time opportunities and determine threats for achieving a sustainable competitive advantage in light of the COVID-19 pandemic. This is a preliminary study of the sustainable competitive advantage literature that includes the concept of strategic leadership as a knowledge management processes enabler for achieving a sustainable competitive advantage. Until now, there has not been any work like it in the literature, save in the qualitative style.

The Effect of Strategic Human Resource and Knowledge Management on Sustainable Competitive Advantages at Jordanian Universities: The Mediating Role of Organizational Innovation

The higher education sector faces considerable competition around the world. Accordingly, universities need to make more efforts to increase their competitive advantages. This study aimed to empirically investigate the effect of organizational innovation (OI), knowledge management (KM), and strategic human resource management (SHRM), with a dependent variable of sustainable competitive advantages (SCAs), at Jordanian Universities. For this aim, a specially designed questionnaire has been distributed to study a convenience sample of 400 academic and administrative staff at Jordanian private and public universities, to obtain the required quantitative data. The study’s hypotheses were verified by Baron and Kenny’s mediation regression approach using the software Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS). The results of the study demonstrate that there is a significant positive relationship between the following pairs of variables: KM and SCA; SHRM and SCA; SHRM and OI; KM and OI; and OI and SCA, whereas OI was found to have a partial and indirect significant mediation impact on the direct relationship between KM and SHRM and universities (organizations) gaining SCAs. Finally, it was concluded that more attention needs to be paid to the OI aspect in organizations and to integrate it with KM and SHRM in a way that promotes SCAs. In addition, we propose that similar studies should be conducted in industries other than education or the education sector in different countries in a way that obtains generalized and representative results.

The Impact of Strategic Human Resource Management Practices on Competitive Advantage Sustainability: The Mediation of Human Capital Development and Employee Commitment

Academic institutions like other business organizations strive to achieve, maintain, and sustain their competitive advantages. In this study, we examined the influence of the “strategic human resources management (HRM) practices” on the achievement of “competitive advantages” that will be sustainable, with an evaluation of the mediating role of “human capital” development, and the commitment of employees in an academic environment. Six hundred questionnaires were randomly distributed to the employees of selected universities in Erbil City of Iraq. Structural equation modeling (SEM) techniques were employed for the analysis with the use of Smart Partial Least Square PLS. Findings from our study revealed a linear and positive influence of the strategic HRM on the sustainability of “competitive advantages”; strategic HRM was also found to positively influence human capital development and the commitment of employees to the institutions; the influence of both human capital development and employees’ commitment were found to have a partial mediation in the strategic HRM practices and sustainable competitive advantage (SCA) relationship. Finally, theoretical and management implications were suggested.