Agile mindset and digital innovation: creative centrality, fintech usage, financial literacy, and the “not-invented-here” syndrome

Purpose Many family-owned small businesses (F-OSBs) struggled to digitalize their operations and achieve digital innovation performance during the COVID-19 pandemic, leading to significant hardships and setbacks. In this paper, we investigate how an agile mindset in descendant entrepreneurs promotes digital innovation performance in F-OSBs through the mediating role of creative centrality and fintech usage. We also examine how financial literacy moderates the link between an agile mindset and the innovative behaviors of creative centrality and fintech usage; and how the “not-invented-here” syndrome (NIHS) moderates the association between creative centrality and fintech usage, ultimately impacting digital innovation performance in F-OSBs. Design/methodology/approach Primary data from 226 predecessors and descendant entrepreneurs of F-OSBs were analyzed using partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM). Findings The findings revealed that creative centrality and fintech usage mediate the relationship between the agile mindset of descendant entrepreneurs and digital innovation performance in F-OSBs. Financial literacy does not moderate the relationship between an agile mindset and creative centrality but moderates the relationship between an agile mindset and fintech usage. The presence of NIHS in the predecessor entrepreneur moderates the relationship between innovative behavior (fintech usage and creative centrality) and digital innovation performance. Research limitations/implications This study has several limitations that provide opportunities for future research. First, this study used cross-sectional data, which limits the ability to establish causal relationships between variables. Second, the use of PLS-SEM in this study may introduce issues such as random sampling errors, model specification errors, and other statistical limitations. Third, although this study took proactive initiatives to tackle the subjective biases in the financial literacy and creative centrality scales, future research should employ scales that lean more towards objective evaluation measurement. Fourth, this study focused on F-OSBs in the retail industry, hence future research could explore the applicability of these findings to other industries or types of business. Practical implications Overall, the practical implications of this study highlight the importance of fostering an agile mindset, promoting financial literacy, addressing the obstacles caused by the NIHS, and encouraging creative behaviors alongside the use of digital technologies in F-OSBs. Implementing these practical suggestions could lead to improved digital innovation performance in F-OSBs. Social implications This study examines the moderating role of descendant entrepreneurs’ financial literacy in the relationship between their agile mindset and their creative centrality and fintech usage. This interaction between financial literacy and an agile mindset provides a more nuanced understanding of how these factors work together to stimulate creative centrality and fintech usage to maximize the impact of digital innovation in F-OSBs. Originality/value Based on the knowledge-based view theory, this study takes a novel approach by investigating how creative centrality and fintech usage mediate between agile mindsets, digital innovative performance, and the boundary conditions of financial literacy and the NIHS.