Strategic Agility and Product Development in Emerging Markets: The Role of Employee Resilience and Self-Efficacy as Microfoundations

While strategic agility is increasingly acknowledged as a critical source of innovation and product development performance (PDP), little attention has been paid to the microindividual capabilities that translate strategic agility into greater PDP. In this article, we examine the mediating roles of employee resilience and self-efficacy as key dynamic microlevel (individual) capabilities that connect firms’ strategic agility to their PDP in the emerging market of Türkiye. We draw on dynamic capabilities theory, adopt a microfoundations approach, and run a multilevel analysis using data from 758 managers working in 185 firms to test our hypotheses. We draw on the microfoundations of PDP and provide important insights into how individual capabilities enable attaining higher PDP in emerging markets. In particular, the findings suggest that strategic agility is positively associated with PDP. Also, the impact of strategic agility on PDP—both examined at the organizational level—is conveyed through individual-level capabilities of employee resilience and self-efficacy. Our study makes significant theoretical contributions to innovation and product development, operations management, and strategic agility research and draws managerial implications.