The small businesses’ responsible entrepreneurship and their stakeholder engagement through digital media

Abstract

This research explored the small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) owner-managers’ attitudes toward digital media and stakeholder engagement. Its research methodology integrated measures from the technological acceptance model, the pace of technological innovation and corporate social responsibility (CSR), to better understand their rationale for using technology to communicate about commercial, ethical and social responsibility issues. A factor analysis indicated that the respondents were perceiving the usefulness of digital media to engage with marketplace stakeholders. Whilst, a stepwise regression analysis reported positive and significant relationships between the pace of technological innovation and the owner-managers’ perceived usefulness of digital media for communication purposes. The results also revealed that young owner-managers from the larger enterprises were more likely to utilize digital media than their smaller counterparts. This contribution implies that small and micro businesses are increasingly using digital media to improve their stakeholder engagement. This study indicates that the pace of technological innovation, the SMEs’ perceived ease of use of digital media, as well as their commercial responsibility were significant antecedents for the SMEs’ online communication.