Antecedents and influence of strategic agility on organizational performance of private higher education institutions in Malaysia

ABSTRACT

Strategic agility is seen as a crucial necessity for organizations to achieve superior organizational performance. However, it is uncommon to find a research framework that explains the relationship of strategic agility with its antecedents and organizational performance, especially in the private higher education sector of Malaysia. As such, it is important to examine the antecedents of strategic agility so that the right resources and capabilities can be developed and deployed to impact organizational performance positively. This study validated the relationships found in the framework. One hundred and fifty-five private higher education institutions (HEIs) in Malaysia participated in the online survey which yielded a 41.33 per cent response rate. Data analysed revealed strategic agility is indeed central in the conceptualized relationships. Moreover, technologies, organizational capabilities, and people are proven to be strong antecedents of strategic agility. This study emphasizes that private HEIs essentially need strategic agility to realize superior organizational performance for future business sustainability.

KEYWORDS:

• Antecedents
• strategic agility
• organizational performance
• higher education sector in Malaysia
• private higher education institutions
• partial least squares structural equation modelling (PLS-SEM)

Acknowledgements

The authors are most grateful to the research participants for their support in this study.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.