Building Digital Resilience: How Smart Dynamic Capabilities Drive Transformation Performance in Turbulent Technological Landscapes

Abstract

Despite substantial investments in digital technologies, many organizations struggle to convert these investments into successful digital transformation outcomes. Drawing on the Dynamic Capability View, this study examines how smart dynamic capabilities—comprising digital platform capabilities and big data analytics capabilities—enable organizations to develop digital resilience that enhances digital transformation performance. The study also investigates the moderating role of technological disruption intensity in shaping this relationship. A quantitative research design was employed using a questionnaire survey administered to employees in pharmaceutical firms in Pakistan. A total of 301 valid responses were collected and analyzed using Structural Equation Modeling to test the proposed relationships among smart dynamic capabilities, digital resilience, technological disruption intensity, and digital transformation performance. The empirical results indicate that digital platforms and big data analytics capabilities positively influence digital transformation performance, with digital resilience as a mediating factor. The findings also reveal that technological disruption intensity negatively moderates the relationship between digital resilience and digital transformation performance, suggesting that excessive technological turbulence may weaken the positive impact of resilience on transformation outcomes. This study contributes to the digital transformation literature by extending the Dynamic Capability View by introducing smart dynamic capabilities as key drivers of digital resilience and transformation performance. It further provides new insights into how technological disruption conditions influence the effectiveness of resilience strategies in turbulent technological environments.