The Impact of the CEO Characteristics on Firm Digitalisation in SMEs

This quantitative research dives into exploring the relationship between CEO (chief executive officer) personal characteristics and the level of firm’s digitalisation within the context of small and medium enterprises (SMEs) operating in Russia. In recent years, the development of digital technologies in a greater extent tends to promote increasing digitalisation in business. However, the role of CEO personal characteristics in such a tendency is still poorly explored particularly in SMEs context. Data for this study was collected through development of questionnaire and conducting surveys among a diverse sample of SMEs across various industries in Russia. The variable of interest is composed accounting for 17 possible types of digitalisation manifestations used in businesses. Applying methods such as preliminary testing, correlation and regression analysis, this study examines the extent to which CEO attributes including age, gender, experience in the digital sphere and in CEO position, education, CEO confidence, impact the digitalisation level of SMEs. Positive relationship was obtained between companies’ digitalisation level and the following factors: gender, experience in the digital sphere, postgraduate and masters’ education. Negative one is received for experience in CEO position while also age is found to have non-linear relationship with digitalisation level. The findings of this research contribute to both academic literature on the topic and practical implications for SME management, simplifying decision-making and strategic alignment check for digital oriented companies.