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As a contribution to the social ties and dynamic capabilities literature, the purpose of this study is to examine the boundary role of the industrial factors (competitive intensity, dependence on suppliers and demand uncertainty) on the relationship between small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) social ties (business ties and political ties) and firm performance.

Data were collected from 1,077 SME top-level managers in Turkiye. The proposed model is analyzed using partial least squares (PLS) path modeling in SmartPLS 4.0 software.

The results elucidate how demand uncertainty serve to moderate the influence exerted by both business and political ties upon the performance of SMEs. However, the moderating effects of competitive intensity and dependence on suppliers, although initially hypothesized, were not found to have a significant impact on the relationships.

The relevance of social ties of SMEs may depend on the industrial factor. Although both political and business ties are effective on the customer side, these ties may become irrelevant when it comes to competition and supplier relations. In competitive SME settings, where businesses are vying for similar markets, the effectiveness of ties might be questionable. In such cases, SMEs might invest in building in-house capabilities and competencies, rather than relying on their relational networks.

This study contributes to the understanding of how relational networks, which are considered as dynamic managerial capabilities, impact SMEs performance. It also fills an important gap by testing the boundary role of industrial factors on this relationship. The empirical data is collected from the Turkish context, which is also an original aspect of the study, considering most of the social ties literature has a limited focus on a few contexts. The results also indicate new areas for discussion and exploration, indicating potential avenues for further research.

This paper aims to explore the effect of government support (short work allowances – SWA) on SME employees' job performance and employee motivation perceptions, during the COVID-19 pandemic in Turkey.

Survey data were collected from 2,781 employees working in SMEs registered to Small and Medium Enterprises Development Organization (SMEDO) in Turkey. The relationships were assessed through structural equation modeling with bootstrap estimation.

The results support the proposed framework illustrating the positive effect of government support on employees' perceived motivation and job performance. Findings indicate that employee motivation has exhibited a mediating effect between government support and job performance. Another important finding is that, contrary to the classical understanding of Herzberg's two-factor theory, SWA system was able to perform as a motivating factor during the pandemic by meeting the hygiene needs.

Since this is a cross-sectional research study, causal inferences cannot be derived from the research results.

There is a lack of empirical study on SME employees' perceptions on the government support during the pandemic, especially on the perspectives of emerging economies are infrequent. Turkey's case is unique in terms of providing insights on how perceived employee motivation is increased by the government supports (SWA) in Turkey, and how this motivation mediates the job performance perceptions. Besides, the impacts of government support are mostly studied at the firm or macro-levels, this study's unit of analysis is at individual level. Regarding the criticism from the motivation perspective of two-factor theory, COVID-19 context and its impact on the motivation needs have not been elaborated before. This article starts new discussions on how crisis contexts influence individual motivator factors.

Based on the dynamic capability theory, the purpose of this study is to examine the mediating role of the adaptive capability of small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) on the relationship between business ties and firm performance. This study also investigates the moderating role of technological turbulence in those relationships.

Data were collected from 1,265 SME managers in Turkey. Partial least squares analysis, a variance-based structural equation modelling, was applied to examine a mediated moderation model.

The results support the proposed framework illustrating that business ties are positively related to adaptive capability and firm performance. Moreover, adaptive capability mediates the relationship between business ties and firm performance. The results also indicate that the indirect effect of business ties on firm performance through adaptive capability was moderated by technological turbulence.

SMEs in emerging economies need to enhance their business ties and invest in their adaptive capabilities to increase their performances. This relation becomes more strategic under technologically turbulent environments.

By introducing empirical data from the Turkish emerging context, this paper contributes to our understanding of how SMEs’ relational networks contribute to firm performance. From the dynamic capability perspective, it shows how SMEs use their adaptive capabilities to environmental challenges. It also fills an important gap by showing that environmental uncertainties (specifically technological turbulence) moderate the adaptive capability’s mediating impact on the relationship between business ties and firm performance. The results also provide potential future directions for dynamic capabilities research in emerging contexts.

The purpose of this article is to examine the impact of digital technology (specifically mobile applications) use on employees' perceptions of motivation at work (MW) and job performance (JP).

Survey data were collected from 4,089 employees working in small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) registered to Small and Medium Enterprises Development Organization (SMEDO) in Turkey. The relationships were assessed through structural equation modeling with bootstrap estimation.

The results support the proposed framework illustrating the positive effect of perceived usefulness (PU) and perceived ease of use (PEOU) of mobile applications on employees' perceived JP. Findings indicate that MW has exhibited a mediating effect between both PU and JP and PEOU and JP.

This article discusses the accelerating role of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic on SMEs' technology acceptance and the acceptance's positive impact on employees' motivation and performance. This article adds to the literature on SMEs by enabling researchers and practitioners to understand the issues in digital technologies acceptance by SME employees and contributes towards enriching the knowledge on technology acceptance perceptions' role in SMEs coping strategies during the COVID-19.

Internet shopping is becoming more prevalent and popular in Turkey, one of the fastest growing e-commerce markets in Eastern Europe. The growth of internet usage has focused academic attention on the factors that drive the adoption of internet shopping. The purpose of this study is to investigate how opinion leadership and open processing innovativeness influence internet shopping behavior through the mediating variable of domain-specific innovativeness.

The data for this study were collected via face-to-face contact with consumers in Eskisehir. A total of 275 usable responses were obtained.

The results reveal that opinion leadership induces positive internet shopping behavior through domain-specific innovativeness, whereas open processing innovativeness has no significant impact.

The study makes an important contribution by offering theoretical and managerial implications for internet marketers.

The purpose of this paper is to determine the difference between service quality dimensions of supermarkets and discount stores.

The paper focuses on service quality dimensions of customers in supermarkets and discount stores. The study has selected one store from each retailer type located in Eskisehir, Turkey and used the scale of the service quality of retail stores. The research has employed a face‐to‐face questionnaire for collecting data from customers on different days and at different hours of the week. A total of 891 questionnaires, 682 for supermarkets and 209 for discount stores, have been analysed.

Results indicate that the customers of the supermarket and the discount store differ in their perception of some service quality dimensions. While the supermarket customers perceive physical aspects and store policy dimensions at a higher level, the discount store's customers give more priority to interaction with personnel dimension.

Further qualitative studies can provide deeper insights about service quality dimensions of supermarkets and discount stores. The results are also a starting point for further academic research about the different retailer types.

The paper contributes to the understanding of behaviours and attitudes of supermarket and discount store customers. Retailers in Turkey will primarily benefit from the study.

The paper compares the customer perception of service quality dimensions of two different types of grocery retailers; a supermarket and a discount store.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the mediating role of innovation on the relationship between organizational culture and firm performance.

Data for the study were collected through a survey from 154 branches of ten prominent banks in Turkey and responses were analyzed to assess the relationships between organizational culture, firm performance and organizational innovation.

The findings reveal that in the banking sector, although organizational culture and innovation have a direct and positive effect on the firm performance dimensions, organizational culture was found to have an insignificant regression coefficient on the dimensions of firm performance in the presence of organizational innovations.

These findings provide useful insights for organizations, particularly in the banking industry, seeking to be competitive and responsive to environmental changes by successfully introducing innovations. Conclusions emphasize that mechanisms to encourage and foster an innovative culture in the organization are likely to facilitate the introduction, adoption and diffusion of innovations which, in turn, is likely to result in achievement of superior firm performance.

Organizational culture has been studied in the literature as one of the characteristics impacting the firm's performance. But there is a paucity of research which models and empirically studies the relationship between organizational culture and the firm performance. In addition, several researchers have studied organizational innovation as a driver of firm performance but fewer researchers have studied organizational innovations as being impacted by organizational culture. In this study, the paper examines the relationship between organizational culture and firm performance and the role of organizational innovation in this relationship. This research makes an important contribution to the existing literature by empirically examining the relationship between organizational culture, innovations and firm performance.

The purpose of this paper is to determine the relationship between consumer ethnocentrism and product attitudes, including country of origin, and to investigate whether ethnocentric tendencies and product attitudes vary by demographic variables.

Data for the study were collected through a face‐to‐face survey of consumers in Turkey. Of the 300 questionnaires distributed, 283 were accepted as usable for the study. Consumer ethnocentrism was measured by CETSCALE.

The findings show that shoppers with high levels of ethnocentricity are more likely to be less educated and to earn lower monthly income than those with low levels of ethnocentric tendency. As expected, those with low‐ethnocentricity levels perceive foreign products more favorably than their high‐ethnocentricity counterparts.

The study has two limitations. First, the research sample was located in only one Turkish city which is a clear constraint on the generalizibility of the results. Second, consumers were asked to evaluate the attributes of foreign‐origin products without reference to a specific product group.

These findings provide useful market intelligence for marketing strategists targeting Turkey, but must be generalized with caution.

This paper both supports and contributes to the existing literature by examining consumer ethnocentrism and country of origin together.