Article
The Mediating Role of Innovation Capability on the Relationship
between Strategic Agility and Organizational Performance
Ibrahim Rashed AlTaweel
1
and Sulieman Ibraheem Al-Hawary
2,
*
Citation: AlTaweel, I.R.; Al-Hawary,
S.I. The Mediating Role of Innovation
Capability on the Relationship
between Strategic Agility and
Organizational Performance.
Sustainability 2021, 13, 7564. https://
doi.org/10.3390/su13147564
Academic Editors: Christian
Vandenberghe and Donato Morea
Received: 21 April 2021
Accepted: 24 June 2021
Published: 6 July 2021
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4.0/).
1
Department of Business Administration, Faculty of Business School, Qussim University, P.O. Box 6502,
Al Russ 51452, Saudi Arabia; toiel@qu.edu.sa
2
Department of Business Administration, Faculty of Economics and Administrative Sciences,
Al al-Bayt University, P.O. Box 130040, Mafraq 25113, Jordan
* Correspondence: dr_sliman@yahoo.com
Abstract:
The changes in the business environment and the increase in competition have led or-
ganizations to focus greatly on improving their organizational performance in order to achieve a
sustainable competitive advantage by relying on keeping pace with these changes and developing
their innovation capability to meet their customers’ desires. Therefore, this research paper aims
to explore the relationship between strategic agility and organizational performance through the
mediating role of innovation capability. The research population consisted of senior managers
in industrial corporations, and the sample comprised 224 senior managers. Structural equation
modeling (SEM) was used as a statistical method for testing hypotheses. The results showed that
there is a significant influence of strategic agility on organizational performance and innovation
capability. Furthermore, innovation capability plays a mediating role in improving the relationship
between strategic agility and organizational performance. Accordingly, a set of recommendations are
provided to corporations’ senior managers for supporting the organizational activities that lead to the
creation of new products and services that are appropriate to the general context of the development
of customer desires, realizing the importance of the corporation acquiring flexible re-sources that
can be reallocated to meet the changes in the business environment, and adopting modern business
models based on stimulating collaborative work and adopting creative ideas.
Keywords: strategic agility; innovation capability; organizational performance; corporations
1. Introduction
Organizations strive to improve their performance. To this end, numerous means
have been suggested, such as maximizing market share, profits, and customer outcomes
like satisfaction [
1
]. In fact, organizational performance as a multidimensional construct
is open to be influenced by various exogenous constructs, such as leadership style [
2
],
the organization’s strategic choice [
3
], technological assets [
4
], and strategic agility [
5
,
6
].
According to
Qalati et al. (2021)
, organizational performance is a function of organizational,
environmental, and technological factors [
7
]. On the other hand, it was observed that
the relationship between some variables and organizational performance is mediated by
other variables such as innovation capability [
8
], organizational innovation [
4
], and social
media [
7
]. However, one of the most critical factors hindering organizational performance
is a turbulent business environment [
6
]. Such an environment is characterized by high
levels of change and uncertainty [9].
For organizations to survive and grow in turbulent and competitive business environ-
ments, adaptation to change should be a first priority [
10
–
12
]. One essential method that
organizations should adopt is strategic agility [
13
,
14
]. Agility refers to the core abilities
that organizations show to cope with dynamic business environments; these abilities allow
an organization to sense, adapt, and respond to such environments [
15
]. Strategically,
agile organizations are sensitive to market changes and available opportunities, able to
Sustainability 2021, 13, 7564. https://doi.org/10.3390/su13147564 https://www.mdpi.com/journal/sustainability
