Organizational resilience and internal branding: investigating the effects triggered by self-service technology

Abstract

The majority of studies on internal brand equity examine its various dimensions and relationships between them. While prior research specifies organizational practices relevant for successful internal branding, the insights about the impact of essential organizational factors on internal brand equity are still limited. This study focuses on organizational resilience that is vital for the existence of organizations not only during a crisis, but also during everyday operations. The main purpose of this study is to investigate the impact of organizational resilience on internal brand equity considering the effects triggered by self-service technology (SST) in retailing. Since retailing had been significantly transformed by technological innovations over the past decade, we explore the effects of employees’ perceptions about performance of SST. The results of a survey conducted among retail employees in Sweden demonstrate that organizational resilience and employees’ perceptions about technological innovations are critical for enhancing internal brand equity, which includes brand orientation, internal brand knowledge, internal brand involvement, and internal brand commitment.