Digital leadership from the perspective of dynamic capabilities: the effect on sustainable performance and resilience through agility

This study investigates how perceived digital leadership is associated with perceived employee sustainable performance and perceived organizational resilience through perceived organizational agility. Grounded in Dynamic Capabilities Theory and industrial/organizational psychology, it proposes that perceived digitally competent leaders are associated with employees' collective psychological perceptions–-perceived agility–-which in turn is associated with strategic adaptability, thereby providing support for the Dynamic Capabilities framework at the level of employees' shared perceptions. Data were collected from 312 public and private sector employees in Turkiye. Structural equation modeling and bootstrapping were used to examine direct and indirect effects; confirmatory factor analysis was used to assess validity and reliability. Perceived digital leadership is positively and significantly associated with perceived organizational agility, perceived organizational resilience, and perceived employee sustainable performance. Perceived organizational agility significantly mediates the relationship between perceived digital leadership and both perceived resilience and perceived sustainable performance, suggesting that perceived digital leadership is associated with the organization's perceived ability to reconfigure internal processes in response to environmental change. This study investigates perceived organizational agility as a mediator between perceived digital leadership and both perceived organizational resilience and perceived employee sustainable performance. Grounded in Dynamic Capabilities Theory, it indicates that perceived digital leadership is associated with long-term competitiveness through its association with perceived agility as a dynamic capability. The study suggests that perceived digital leadership is associated with organizational outcomes through employees' shared perceptions of agility.