Leadership strategies for sustaining business success in the post-pandemic era

The COVID-19 pandemic disrupted how businesses functioned around the world (Donthu and Gustafsson, 2020). The pandemic was disastrous for those with limited resources and restricted finances (Shammi et al., 2020). At the same time, the crisis offered opportunities to those who were technologically ready to adapt to the new style of functioning (Zapata et al., 2024; Mark et al., 2022). The ability of technology-oriented firms flourished not only during, but also after the pandemic (Elavarasan et al., 2021). These businesses embraced new innovative business models that involved the adoption of technology for managing day-to-day operations, and for monitoring processes with faster communications (Agarwal et al., 2020; Shankar et al., 2021). Purpose of this special issue was to push the knowledge about the strategic approach adopted by companies during post-pandemic era to overcome the challenges and capture the opportunities by embracing the new technologically driven times.

The purpose of the special issue was achieved by contributions made by various authors who have expanded the boundary of our current knowledge. For example, Caraka et al. (2024) studied strategies used by companies to survive the vulnerability posed by the COVID-19 pandemic and found that technology adoption and digital literacy became an important tool for firms to address the challenges during pandemic. At the same time, Hara and Ishwita (2024) presented a robust analysis using institutional logic to help readers of this special issue understand how persuasion affected performance. The perspective of persuasion was further explored for this special issue by Hussain et al. (2024) as five personality dimensions of consumers and of celebrities. Furthermore, the research conducted by Ren and Xu (2024), again included in this special issue, substantiates the findings about performance by exploring the opportunities offered by pandemic to companies accept making workplace flexible with a purpose to improve the level of not only engagement of employees but also their retention and well-being.

Another research included in this special issue, is by Pratono and Maharani (2024) studied the role of agility on the resilience of a global supply chain during times like COVID-19 with their arguments embedded in the dynamic capability theory with the aim of improving long-term performance. The influence of trust in leadership in times such as COVID-19 studied by Ghayas et al. (2024) is also included in this special issue because it explains how trust in leadership mediates the relationship between emotional healing and continuance commitment. In continuation, Singh et al. (2024) researched how interactions affect authentic leadership with horizontal collectivism using survey data collected from both leaders and employees. Their analysis emphasises on authentic leadership because of its positive impact on feeling of collectiveness amongst employees. The study by Saeed (2024) supports this viewpoint by proposing moderating effect of relationships being mitigated employee engagement to explain how can companies mitigate the adverse impact of triggers like fear of COVID-19 on performance and effectiveness.

Adoption and innovation helped managers serve and nurture customers smoothly and successfully, thereby offering seamless experiences (Susian et al., 2023; AlShamsi et al., 2020). Furthermore, the survival of businesses during the COVID-19 pandemic was also dependent upon the sector and services or products offered (Islam and Fatema, 2023). The sectors that could serve their stakeholders remotely such as the finance and banking sectors, remained in good health, as their experiences of disruption were less severe in comparison to those who were required to serve in person, like the hospitality industry (Berry et al., 2020). Businesses from the in-person serving segment faced closures during the COVID-19 pandemic due to significant loss of revenue (Berry et al., 2020).