Abstract: This paper proposes a construct that relates three previously published models: leadership style, e-leadership skills, and innovation in digital marketing, as a model that reveals how their interrelationships depend on the gender of the manager, in order to achieve the improvement of small and medium enterprises within their digital marketing sector. To this end, documentary research was carried out to determine how gender responds to the aforementioned construct. Among the results, it stands out that there are noticeable differences between the way in which the gender of managers obeys different leadership styles, electronic leadership skills and digital marketing innovation for small and medium enterprises. It is concluded that female executives have greater transformational leadership, are more directed at the business intelligence of small and medium enterprises and the performance of the innovation model, compared to their male counterparts.
Keywords: e-leadership skillse-leadership skills,digital marketing innovationdigital marketing innovation,SMESME,gendergender.
Resumen: Este trabajo propone un constructo que relaciona tres modelos previamente publicados: estilo de liderazgo, habilidades de liderazgo electrónico e innovación en mercadotecnia digital, como un modelo que revela la manera en que las interrelaciones de estos dependen del género del gerente, a fin de lograr la mejora de la pequeña y mediana empresa dentro de su sector de mercadotecnia digital. Para ello, se hizo una investigación documental que sirviera para determinar cómo el género responde al constructo mencionado. Entre los resultados destaca que hay diferencias notorias entre la forma en que el género de los gerentes obedece a diferentes estilos de liderazgo, las habilidades de liderazgo electrónico y la innovación de mercadotecnia digital para las pequeñas y medianas empresas. Se concluye que las mujeres directivas tienen mayor liderazgo transformacional, están más dirigidas a la inteligencia empresarial de las pequeñas y medianas empresas y al rendimiento del modelo de innovación, en comparación con sus contrapartes masculinas.
Palabras clave: estilos de liderazgo, e-liderazgo, innovación en mercadotecnia digital, PYME, género.
Artículos
How is related the digital marketing innovation and e-leadership in smes. Towards a gender study
Cómo se relaciona la innovación en la mercadotecnia digital y el e-liderazgo en las PYMES. Hacia un estudio de género
Received: 09 September 2017
Revised document received: 05 June 2018
Accepted: 05 September 2018
The Leadership, electronic leadership and digital marketing innovation are three important concepts for the XXI century current SMEs, but does exist significant differences about their relationships based on the gender of the CEO? This study is aimed to determine such differences to contribute to both, basic and applied knowledge. It is not a matter of saying if one or the other style is better or worse but rather, establishing their differences in order to raise awareness of the scope and limitations of the CEOs’ practices according to their gender and make complements in future studies.
There are a lot studies published about leadership styles (transformational, transactional, avoidant/passive) and gender (Eagly & Blair, 1990; Johnsson & Powell, 1994; Burke & Collins, 2001; Ali et al., 2014; Patel & Buiting, 2013; Gino & Wood. 2015, Górska, 2016; Radu et al. 2016; Sule et al. 2017) and how is very acknowledged the effectiveness of transformational leadership, for instance to innovate (Eagly & Johanssen-Schmidt, 2001; Wennberg et al., 2013; Al-Husseini & Elbetagi, 2014; Tajasom, et al., 2015; Lee & Pollitzer, 2016; Alsos et al., 2017; Gipson et al., 2017; Teymournejad & Elghaei, 2017; UN, 2017; Zhang et al., 2018; Hui et al., 2018). This has been proved in a number of settings and in many countries around the world with different models measuring the leadership like Multi-Factor Leadership Questionnaire (MLQ5X, Bass & Avolio, 2006), the Leadership dimensions questionnaire: test manual (Higgs & Dulewicz, 2015) or solving conflicts (Wen-Long & Chun-Yi, 2013; Okyere, 2018). In fact, the transformational leadership style is considered more aligned with the female than the male gender style (Eagly & Johanssen-Schmidt, 2001; Patel & Buiting, 2013; Mackowski (2015); Stemple et al. 2015).
The opposite of this, are the scarce works about leadership and gender, associated with information and communication technologies (ICT), that is evolving to a new concept: the e-leadership.
The e-leadership is the “key to using new digital technologies for innovation and transformation, managed in a relevant organizational context and embedded in the business strategy” (EUROCOM, 2015) considered as well as the “accomplishment of a goal through the direction of human resources” (EUROCOM, 2012). It is “the new emerging context for examining leadership… it is defined as a social influence process mediated by advanced information technologies to produce a change in attitudes, feelings, thinking, behavior, and performance with individuals, groups, and/or organizations” (Avolio et al., 2001). The e-leadership is considered in the digital era, for: “managers, entrepreneurs, and business executives must have e-competences to grow, export and be connected to the global digital markets. In a digital economy, e-leadership skills are essential. Effective e-leaders are capable of leading teams and managing technology systems in ways that achieve both local and global demands” (EUROCOM, 2012). To achieve effectiveness in the use of information and communication technologies (ICT) (Qureshi, 2013; Del Valle, 2014) and in the e-leadership (EUROCOM, 2015) is necessary to develop three important skills, such as: strategic leadership, business savvy and digital savvy based on the e-leadership digital skills for the small and media sized enterprises (SMES) for the chief executive office (CEO) (ELDSME by EUROCOM, 2015) to apply, in our case to the digital marketing sector.
In a literature review for e-leadership made it by DasGupta (2011), he studied around seventy-seven journal articles and the term gender, only appeared in the works of: Bryant (et al., 2009) and D‘Souza and Colarelli (2010). So, the importance to determine the leadership style, the e-leadership skills and how are both manifested, according to the manager’s gender.
According OECD (2005) innovation is: “the implementation of a new or significantly improved product (good or service), or process, a new marketing method, or a new organizational method in business practices, workplace organization or external relations”. Regarding the marketing innovation: “is the implementation of a new marketing method involving significant changes in product design or packaging, product placement, product promotion or pricing”. As you see, digital marketing is itself, an innovation with several and innovative tools, for instance: planning and building a website, planning the content, blogging, paying the advertisement, the social networking, emailing, making video, making the web analytics, etc. considered in the digital marketing innovation model (DMIM) by Mejía-Trejo (2017).
All mentioned above, representing a great opportunity to be explored and offer a field of study of how the relationships among: leadership style, e-leadership skills and the digital marketing innovation are dependent to the manager’s gender for improving their SMEs digital marketing sector.
In the sense of those e-leadership skills in the real world of the marketing sector necessities and as an opportunity to apply all the concepts mentioned above, we can say that the SMEs play an important role within the emergent economies just like Mexico (EUROCOM, 2015). For instance, according INADEM (2016), in Jalisco (a state of México), the size occupied personnel of the SMEs representing the 24.6% (see table 1) and they have the 2.4% as economic unit participation.
The 8 786/366 107 SMEs as economic units in Jalisco, Mexico are distributed in 20 activity areas (IIEGJ, 2017), and they require the implementation of digital marketing innovation activities through the leadership skills (EUROCOM, 2012). In this sense, the web portal Millones de Voces (2017), reports a sector of digital marketing agencies with more than 200/8 786 SMEs firms located at Guadalajara, Jalisco, Mexico. All of them have been working under e-infrastructure, saving costs of operations and all of them require to be aligned with the goals posed by their CEOs.
So far, one remarkable note is that, most of the studies are generalized with the gender issue. Thus, we proposed the following research question: Regarding the leadership style and e-leadership skills on digital marketing innovation for SMEs, how are their relationships dependent by the manager’s gender?
To solve the research question, this work proposes to use three known previously published models, such as: the multi-factor leadership questionnaire (MLQ5X by Bass & Avolio, 2006) the e-leadership digital skills for the SMEs (ELDSME, EUROCOM, 2015) and the digital marketing innovation Model (DMIM by Mejía-Trejo, 2017).
This research is divided into the explanation of: rationale of the study; methodology; the literature review; results; discussion; limitations; conclusion and future studies.
The research is important for the development of the SMEs digital marketing practices, due to the leadership style, e-leadership skills under manager’s gender, might be all a different influence, over the digital marketing innovation. This represents the opportunity to disclose what stages of digital marketing innovation are willing to be developed, either with transformational, transactional leadership, or passive/avoidant style and how the e-leadership skills (strategic leadership, business savvy and digital savvy) are interacting according the manager’s gender, for the improvement of the digital marketing agencies SMEs sector, So, the subject of study are the digital marketing agencies SMEs represented in 100 CEOs (50 male/50 female), requiring to know how their leadership styles, the e-leadership skills are interacting by manager’s gender, for the improvement of their own SMEs sector.
To solve the research question, it shall be necessary to involve the three mentioned models in a solid construct: The MLQ5X and ELDSME models as independent factors and DMIM as dependent factor, and to pose the following specific questions (SQ):
SQ1: Which are the variables and factors involved in the final construct? SQ2: What is the design of a tool capable to measure the relationship among variables and factors? SQ3: How are the main relationships among the variables of MLQ5X-ELDSME-DMIM construct, regarding the manager´s gender?
Applying the equation of finite and known population (8 786 economic units) the sample size is approach 100 (96). So, the subject of study are digital marketing agencies SMEs represented in 100 CEOs (50 male/50 female), requiring to know how their leadership styles, the e-leadership skills are interacting by manager’s gender, for the improvement of their own SME.
We shall describe the three models mentioned above, as basis of this research: MLQ5X, Multifactor-Leadership Questionnaire Model (Bass & Avolio, 2006); ELDSME, e-Leadership Digital Skills for the SMEs Model (EUROCOM, 2015), and DMIM, Digital Marketing Innovation Model (Mejía-Trejo, 2017).
Leadership, According to DRALE (2017), means: 1. m. lead. 2. m. Status of superiority which is a company, a product or an industry, within its scope. Today, we have recognized the advantage represented transformational leadership in innovation processes, due to the work of Avolio & Bass (2004). Sample’s report (2007), for example, has the following profile of transformational leader: “creating greater alignment around strategic visions and missions, their behavioral factors are associated with increased sales, transformational leadership explains between 45% and 60% levels of organizational performance; create greater unit cohesion, commitment and lower turnover, predicted higher levels of innovation in teams of R&D products, transformational leaders create safer working environments” and the female managers are found to exhibit a transformational leadership style, whereby, entails characteristics such as inspirational motivation, intellectual stimulation and individualized consideration and is suggested to benefit the innovation (Ritter-Hayashi et al., 2016).
Hence, we suggested to identify according the manager gender, the level of transformational and transactional leadership qualities of the leaders of the SME organization using the tool known as the Multifactor Leadership Questionnaire (MLQ5X).
This questionnaire has 4 variables that identifies the style of leadership currently is practicing into the SME by the CEO (Transformational/Transactional/Passive-Avoidant Behavior and Outcomes of Leadership style) with 12 dimensions and 45 indicators.(See Figure 1, and Appendix)
Hence, we proposed the hypothesis 1: The Leadership Style practiced by the females SME- CEOs digital marketing agencies is more Transformational than Transactional or Passive-Avoidant style.
According EUROCOM (2012): “The demand appears to be significant for e-leaders. Of the approximately 255 000 vacancies for the EU-27 in 2012, we find 76 000 vacancies for ICT management and business architecture skills. Furthermore, the gap is disproportionately affecting small and medium-size enterprise: 70% of vacancies can be found in SMEs which demand ICT skills in much greater numbers than large enterprises”. Furthermore, is considered of crucial importance for companies and industry to reach the excellence in their business operation, being the key in the use of the new digital technologies for innovation and transformation, including the organizational context and deeply embedded in the business strategy. In this sense, the e-Leadership has to be described with several special skills required of an individual to initiate and achieve digital innovation. In other words, e-leadership is: “a key ingredient to foster Europe’s competitiveness and innovation potential” (EUROCOM, 2015). The model is described since the skills represented in the following three variables:
Strategic Leadership (STL): Lead inter-disciplinary staff, and influence stakeholders across boundaries (functional, geographic).
Business Savvy (BSY): Innovate business and operating models, delivering value to organizations.
Digital Savvy (DSY): Envision and drive change for business performance, exploiting digital technology trends as innovation opportunities.
The questionnaire identifies what the e-leadership CEO skills are currently appearing in the SME (see figure 1, and appendix).
Hence, we proposed the hypothesis 2: The e-leadership skills practiced by the females SME-CEOs digital marketing agencies are more of Strategic Leadership Skill than Business Savvy or Digital Savvy type.
According the OECD (2005) innovation is defined as a: “implementation of a new or significantly improved product (good or service), or process, a new marketing method, or a new organisational method in business practices, workplace organisation or external relations and it involves the innovation of: product, service, marketing, process and organization” and, is not limited to the male gender. Several authors suggest the empowerment of the female innovation, for instance Ritter-Hayashi (et al., 2016): “We suggest that the level of women’s economic opportunity in the country, within which firms operate, moderates the effect of gender diversity on a firms’ likelihood to innovate”. Akulava (2015) affirms: “The results suggest that the propensity to innovate is higher among companies with a presence of a female owner… the results show that having a female as the only, or one of the, owner(s) increases the propensity of going into uncertainty and implementation of a new good/service by 4.5% in the CIS (Commonwealth of Independent States) region and 6.7% in the non- CIS block”. It is a remarkable fact that this finding contradicts the literature on gender differences in the willingness to take on risk that mostly demonstrates that women, on average, are more risk-averse than men (IFC, 2014). Other studies, complement the skills of female managers when they claim: “the women entrepreneurs tended to focus their innovation efforts on business organization rather than on products and processes, more so than their male counterparts. They were also more likely to have cohesive and collaborative management structures… females seemed to be more active than their male counterparts in using ICT tools including the social media networking to market products and services”, furthermore: “fewer women business obtained patents compared with their men business owners” UNCTAD (2013), despite several external barriers, for female managers, such as: insufficient access to capital, limited access to new markets and ICT s, cultural constraints, lack of capacity-building, access to education. etc.
However, “women scores less than men, when assessing the level of innovation of their own business” (EUROCOM, 2008). Thus, is very important to promote female entrepreneurship and, in particular, seeking to support women innovators/inventors who wish to become entrepreneurs.
Regarding the digital marketing matter, this is itself an innovation, defining it through the DMIM as: “a process to design the strategy and tactics in a planned implementation, selecting a set of digital marketing tools. These should be based on mission-vision, the market segmentation, goal settings and value proposition of the firm, with the performance monitoring and the profitability of the digital campaign design, in a permanent way” (Mejía-Trejo, 2017, Mejía-Trejo et al., 2016. See table 2). In this latest definition, we consider that exist several issues to be disclosed and aligned when the female manager is involved.
Hence, we proposed the hypothesis 3: The DMIM variable most practiced by the females SME-CEOs digital marketing agencies is more of Strategic Planning for business, than Market or Model Performance.
Therefore, the final MLQ5X-ELDSME-DMIM construct ex ante, is showed in Figure 1.
Thus, we answered the SQ1: “Which are the variables and factors involved in the final construct?”
The final questionnaire identifies what elements are considered by the SME-CEOs digital marketing agencies (see figure 1, and appendix).
Thus, we answered the SQ2: “Which is the final questionnaire?”
The final questionnaire proposed (shown in the Appendix) containing the 10 variables of MLQX, ELDSME and DMIM construct including the Gender variable (GEN, coded as: 0 female/1 male), applied as a pilot to 24 SME-CEO digital marketing agencies (12 female /12 male both, each one from Mexico City and Monterrey City, México), for data error correction, and verification of: normal distribution, linearity, homoscedasticity and multicollinearity conditions, as a basis to proceed with the following tests. Approved all the above, we proceeded to do the confidence test through the Alpha Cronbach’s obtaining .848 (high confidence).
After this, we proceeded to apply this final questionnaire as a survey to 100 SME-CEOs (50 female/50 male) as digital marketing agencies located at Guadalajara, Mexico, during January to April 2017.
As Hair (et al., 1999) recommending, we practiced Multiple Discriminant Analysis Method for mutually events. It is a technique that allows us to classify individuals into groups determined by a categorical variable (nonparametric predictor variable), taking into account certain metric variables of the interval type. In our case, the gender variable (GEN) is nonparametric and is the basis of the groups and it depends on independent parametric variables or predictors (TRFL, TRSL, PSL, OLS, STL, DSY, BSY, MAR, SPN, MPE) main components of MLQ5X-ELDSME-DMIM construct, and mutually exclusives. Thus, we obtained several important tables with the following descriptions:
Table 3 shows the differences between the explanatory variables and, although its visualization is of limited utility, reveals that the youngest gender group is the female group for approximately 7 years than the male group. Observe for instance, the female gender case, the highest and lowest levels, represented in Strategic Planning (4.212) and Model Performance (2.900), and the male gender case with Business Savvy (4.222) and Model Performance (3.626). But the following studies shall confirm what variables have a highest influence by GEN (see table 3).
Table 4 provides findings about which explanatory variables will be useful in the discriminant function, based on the following rules of interpretation: lower lambda= higher significant (Sig.); higher lambda= lower significant (Sig.); higher f= higher significant (Sig.); lower f= lower significant (Sig.). Observe that age variable is the most significant (see table 4).
We selected the analysis by stepwise method, so, table 5, shows a list of the most significant variables, in which it is observed that a significant difference is created, after the third variable was entered. The p value is < 0.005 and all are significant (see table 5).
Table 6 shows the variables included in each step. The tolerance measures the degree of independence of the explanatory variables (in other words, they must be not similar). A tolerance of 0.7-1 is ideal. Less than 0.69 creates problems. The variables shown are the most important for the prediction of the discriminant function (see table 6).
Table 7 shows the measurement of the relationship between the predictor variable and the group elements. Higher the eigenvalue value, the more variance the function explains in the dependent nonparametric variable GEN, and is proven with the canonical high rated correlation value (.842) (see table 7).
Table 8 tell us how well our prediction model fits to be statistically significant (see the Sig.<0.001) (see table 8).
The table 9 is showing what variables are the most discriminant, among the two groups of the dependent non parametric variable GEN (0 female/ 1 male), considering the dependent metric variable with the highest absolute value (Hair et al., 1999), showed through the independent parametric variable Business Savvy (.971) (see table 9).
The table 10 shows in order, what independent parametric variable has a highest absolute value, and this, high correlation with the dependent non parametric variable GEN. In this case, is Model performance (.329). There are variables not mentioned in the stepwise method (see table 10).
Table 11 reports the degree of confidence in model predictions. In our case, of the 50 respondents who are female, in the cross-validated model, it was correctly predicted 47 of them, so their accuracy is 94%. For the other 50 that are male, 82% was predicted. Therefore, the model is accurate in 88% of cases. As you observe, the higher percentage value is on the female part, so, the explanation of the variables, corresponds to the female predicted group (see table 11).
Finally, table 12 shows the data of Coefficients used to make a projection of the model (see table 12).
According table 12, the discriminant function equation for female predicted group, is:
Z = 3.077 (age)+3.985 (model performance)+3.325 (transformational leadership)+6.851 (business savvy)-10.235
The male predicted group, is:
Z = 2.176 (age)+2.165 (model performance)-2.186 (transformational leadership)-4.234(Business Savvy)-5.267
The function with higher score, would be a part of the predicted group. Thus, we answered the SQ3: how are the main relationships among the variables of MLQ5X-ELDSME-DMIM construct, regarding the manager’s gender? Finally, the research question: regarding the leadership style and e-leadership skills on digital marketing innovation for SMEs, how are their relationships dependent by the manager’s gender? It is answered according the last three specific questions that allows affirm: Finally, the research question: Regarding the leadership style and e-leadership skills on digital marketing innovation for SMEs, how are their relationships dependent by the manager’s gender? It is answered according the last three results to the specific questions, that allows us affirm: The female manager’s gender showed a more transformational leadership style, with e-leadership skill more aimed to business savvy and more aimed to model performance in their digital marketing innovation model, being in average, seven years youngest than the male manager gender.
Regarding the table 11, about the highest value in cross-validated count corresponds to the female part (94.0) with at least 88% grouped cases correctly classified, we are able to affirm about the dependent nonparametric variable female GEN (gender), the following issues:
For the MLQ5X factor, the leadership style most correlated variable, with highest absolute value is the independent parametric variable Transformational Leadership (.329, see Table 10) (observe: Transactional Leadership (.119), Passive/Avoidant Leadership (.117).
We conclude as a first insight, that the MLQ5X (Avolio & Bass, 2004), determining the Transformational Leadership in this research is still valid despite the fact that the most of the relationships are supported for virtual means by the females SMEs CEO digital marketing agencies. Hence, the highest values on transformational leadership shall be support to solving conflicts (Wen-Long & Chun-Yi, 2013), a support to the innovation processes having high expectations on the alignment around strategic visions and missions, increasing at the same time: the levels of organizational performance and sales. This is a first insight of Transformational Leadership style supported by ICT, and is highly expected the foster of unit cohesion, the commitment and lower turnover, predicted higher levels of innovation in teams of R&D products, creating safer working environments (Sample, 2007). It is also expected great levels of intellectual stimulation, inspirational motivation and individualized consideration suggested to benefit the innovation (Ritter-Hayashi et al. 2016).
Thus, the hypothesis 1: The Leadership style practiced by the females SME- CEOs digital marketing agencies is more Transformational than Transactional or Passive-Avoidant style, is accepted.
For ELDSME factor, the e-leadership skill most discriminant variable, is the independent parametric variable Business Savvy (.971, see Table 9).
Thus the hypothesis 2: The e-leadership skills practiced by the females SME-CEOs digital marketing agencies is more of Strategic Leadership Skill than Business Savvy or Digital Savvy type, is rejected.
This issue is a first insight and is consistent if we observe the nature of the Transformational Leadership style and its relationship with the e-leadership skill Business Savvy, when it is aimed to: “innovate business and operating models, delivering value to organizations” EUROCOM (2015). This data would be used to guarantee the fill the 70% of vacancies in SMEs which demand ICT skills in much greater numbers than large enterprises (EUROCOM, 2012), through specific training and preparation to the females SME-CEOs digital marketing agencies.
For DMIM factor, the independent parametric variable most correlated is Model Performance (.329 see table 10).
Thus, the hypothesis 3: The DMIM variable most practiced by the females SME-CEOs digital marketing agencies is more of Strategic Planning for business, than Market or Model Performance, is rejected.
According to the main feature of Transformational Leadership about the innovation processes’ and the female innovation empowerment (Ritter-Hayashi et al., 2016; Akulava, 2015), might be increased offering to the females SME-CEOs digital marketing agencies an economic opportunity to thrive. This is a first contradictory insight, because this finding is opposite to the literature on gender differences in the willingness to take on risk that mostly demonstrates that women, on average, are more risk-averse than men (IFC, 2014). However, these results are evidence about the how the complimentary skills of female managers as entrepreneurs, are tended to focus their innovation efforts on business organization more so than their male counterparts (UNCTAD, 2013). If we analyze the DMIM (Mejía-Trejo, 2017) the efforts on business organization are supported on dimensions, such as: Planning (PLN), Performance (PER) and Profitability (PRO). Due that “women score less than men when assessing the level of innovation of their own business” (EUROCOM, 2008) is very important to promote female entrepreneurship and, in particular, seeking to support women innovators/inventors who wish to become entrepreneurs.
The equations for projections of each predicted group based on the mean variables (see Table 12)
Z = 3.077 (age)+3.985 (model performance)+3.325 (transformational leadership)+6.851 (business savvy)-10.235.
The male predicted group, would be:
Z = 2.176 (age)+2.165 (model performance)-2.186 (transformational leadership)-4.234 (business savvy)-5.267
The function with higher score, would be a part of the predicted group.
Our final conclusion is: The female manager’s gender showed a more transformational leadership style, with e-leadership skill more aimed to business savvy and more aimed to model performance in their digital marketing innovation model, being in average, seven years youngest than the male manager gender.
The first limitation is that the final questionnaire was applied to SMEs CEOs digital marketing agencies, and the results could be different with operative managers, customers and/or suppliers to analyze the results obtained.
The second limitation is the location of the survey which it involved only the Guadalajara city. For future studies, it is important to consider other regions of Mexico (and the rest of the word, as be possible).
The third limitation consisted in the sampled companies, for the SMEs CEOs as specialist of digital marketing were from 20 to 250 workers, excluding the companies from 1 to 10 workers, which represent an important quantity of the total digital marketing agencies SMEs. For future studies it could be interesting to involve suppliers and customers into the MLQ5X-ELDSME-DMIM construct.
Finally, we have the following conclusions:
Finally, it would be interesting to do an exploratory factor analysis, to reduce the original variables into the MLQ5X-ELDSME-DMIM construct, and a confirmatory factor analysis to search underlying relationships among the variables MLQ5X-ELDSME-DMIM through structural equations analysis, using techniques based on license software, such as: EQS, LISREL, AMOS.