Social media perceptions, readiness and usage in fostering sustainable growth of micro and small enterprises in Uganda

Abstract

PurposeThe purpose of this study is to investigate the influence of social media, perception, readiness and usage on sustainable growth of micro and small enterprises (MSEs) in Uganda.Design/methodology/approachThis study is cross-sectional and adopted a mixed method approach. Data was gathered through a questionnaire survey of 212 business owner–managers that are members of the Uganda Small Scale Industries Association (USSIA) and engaging 8 business managers in the in-depth interviews to support and strengthen the quantitative results. Data analysis was done using statistical package for social sciences (SPSS.24) and Atlas ti.8.FindingsThe study reveals that social media perception, readiness and usage positively influence sustainable growth of MSEs in Uganda. However, the insufficient soft and technical skills, lack of devices such as computers and smartphones and the high cost of Internet data undermine the usage of social media by business owner–managers for sustainable growth of their businesses.Practical implicationsThe findings demonstrate what policymakers, social media operators and business owner–managers need to do to enhance integration of social media platforms and channels into the operations of MSEs in Uganda.Originality/valueThis study adds to existing literature on social media technology in MSEs with evidence from Uganda. The study results are likely to foster usage of social media as policymakers and social media providers will come up with appropriate strategies to unlock the social media potential of the business owner–managers for sustainable business growth in Uganda.

Social capital and sustainable growth of full-service restaurants in the global south: testing the mediating role of dynamic capabilities

“…However, this effort calls for government intervention to support small restaurants that are financially constrained. This rhymes well with the recommendation of Sendawula et al. (2022) in their study of the sustainable growth of micro and small enterprises using evidence from Uganda.…”

“…Extant literature on sustainable growth has focused on innovative practices and regulation (Islam and Abd-Wahab, 2021); perceptions, readiness and usage of social media (Sendawula et al, 2022); culture and innovative competitive advantage (Nimfa et al, 2021a); firm and entrepreneur characteristics (Diabate et al, 2019); experience and performance (Peng et al, 2020) and digital financial inclusion (Yang and Zhang, 2020). However, less focus has been given to social capital (Gannon and Roberts, 2020) and dynamic capabilities (Teece, 2018) in explicating sustainable growth.…”

“…In addition, the mediating role of dynamic capabilities has received less attention in extant literature. Moreover, there seems to be no study that has specifically focused on full-service restaurants whose characteristics may differ from those of the general small and medium enterprises (SMEs) as envisaged in Sendawula et al (2022) investigation. Against that backdrop, this study bridges gaps in existing studies by testing the mediating role of dynamic capabilities in the association between social capital and sustainable growth using evidence of full-service restaurants from the global south.…”

“…In addition, the mediating role of dynamic capabilities has received less attention in extant literature. Moreover, there seems to be no study that has specifically focused on full-service restaurants whose characteristics may differ from those of the general small and medium enterprises (SMEs) as envisaged in Sendawula et al. (2022) investigation.…”

Entrepreneurship skills: do all dimensions of skills matter for sustainable business start-up?

“…Engagement with extant literature on sustainable business growth indicates that scholars have mainly focused on strategic innovation practices and regulations (Islam and Wahab, 2021), Social media perceptions, readiness and usage (Sendawula et al, 2022;Constantinescu et al, 2019), operations decision-making (Schwab et al, 2017), social media marketing and leadership support (Chatterjee et al, 2021), environmental and eco-innovation orientation (Ben Amara and Chen, 2020), yet little is known about the contribution of entrepreneurship in catalyzing sustainable business growth. For scholars who have interrogated entrepreneurship skills, the emphasis has been on entrepreneurship education, intention and mind-sets (Hanandeh et al, 2021) training, action-regulatory factors, opportunity identification, entrepreneurial action (Gielnik et al, 2015); perceived social norms and psychological capital (Ephrem et al, 2019); mentoring, self-efficacy, gender and entrepreneurial outcome (Baluku et al, 2020); autonomy, mentorship and entrepreneurial intentions (Baluku et al, 2019);and training and subsidies (Brixiov a, Ncube and Bicaba, 2015) with less attention on exploring which of the entrepreneurship skills that is management, technical, entrepreneurial and personal maturity skills matter most in catalyzing sustainable business start-up of the youths using evidence from Uganda.…”