Small Business and the Supply Chain: The Influence of Social Intelligence on Relationship Resilience

Abstract

The need for SME owner/managers to engage in building and maintaining collaborative business relationships is paramount for their success and the resilience of these relationships can be viewed as a crucial factor in successful supply chain management for SMEs. The present study investigates the relationship between the social intelligence of the SME owner/manager and relationship resilience between firms with which they do business. The objective of this study is to explore the relationship between four components of social intelligence (situational awareness, situational response, cognitive empathy, and social skills) of small to medium sized business owners/managers on the resilience of their supply chain relationships. A survey was conducted, and responses gathered from small business owner/managers and the data was analyzed using structural equation modeling. The study provided evidence that the four components of social intelligence are positively associated with relationship resilience.