The impact of business intelligence and digital supply chain capabilities on sustainable supply chain performance in Jordanian industrial companies: the mediating role of operational efficiency

Abstract

The growing pressure of industrial companies to improve their sustainability performance increased the necessity of digital-oriented transformation of the supply chain. The proposed research considers the role of business intelligence and digital supply chain capabilities in sustainable supply chain performance in the presence of operational efficiency as a mediator variable in the framework of Jordanian industrial companies. Based on the resource-based view and the dynamic capabilities theory, the quantitative research design was conducted with the cross-sectional survey. The data of 345 managers and employees with supervisor-levels of work in Jordanian industrial companies were gathered and analyzed with the help of the partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM). The empirical findings indicate that the business intelligence and digital supply chain capabilities have positive impacts of significant magnitude on the operational efficiency and sustainable supply chain performance. In turn, the impact of operational efficiency is shown to be the most positive on sustainable supply chain performance as it indicates its key role in fulfilling economic, environmental, and social outcomes. Moreover, the mediation analysis proves that operational efficiency is one of the mediators of the relations between both digital capabilities and sustainable supply chain performance, which means that digital technologies facilitate sustainability in both direct and indirect ways, through the enhancement of internal operations. The results offer a practical demonstration of the fact that digital transformation efforts are beneficial in terms of increasing sustainability when properly combined with effective working procedures. This study explains how digital capabilities improve sustainable supply chain performance and provides practical implications for aligning digitalization with sustainability goals.