TY - JOUR T1 - E-Leadership in Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises in the Developing World JF - Technology Innovation Management Review Y1 - 2019 A1 - Maksim Belitski A1 - Bain Liversage KW - commercialization KW - developing country KW - digital technology KW - e-leadership KW - small- and medium-sized enterprises KW - SMEs AB - Small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) play an important role in the economies of many developing countries. A critical challenge faced by SME leaders, as digitization continues, is how to adopt digital technologies to create value and enable faster product commercialization. There is a paucity of empirical research examining how e-leadership in SMEs drives technology and new product commercialization processes in the developing world. In this study, we have broadened the notion of what constitutes e-leadership, from the perspective of how advanced information technologies affect the leadership dynamic and the appropriation of advanced information technologies. Although there have been several studies on leading technologies in developed countries, we focus on developing an e-leadership framework for SMEs in developing economies. Using this framework and five selection criteria, we conducted 11 interviews with a sample of successful SMEs selected from a pool of 2,240 firms in the city of Johannesburg, South Africa. We conclude by highlighting the five key findings of this study, which explain how SMEs can develop effective e-leadership to foster commercialization and improve firm performance. PB - Talent First Network CY - Ottawa VL - 9 UR - https://timreview.ca/article/1212 IS - 1 U1 - University of Reading Maksim Belitski is an Associate Professor in the Henley Business School at the University of Reading, United Kingdom. He holds a PhD in Applied Economics from the University of Leicester, UK, and a PhD in Economics from the University of Milan, Italy. He is a Trusted Researcher of the Secure Data Service, UK Data Archive and Virtual Micro-data Lab, Office of National Statistics, UK. His research interests lie in the area of entrepreneurship, innovation, and regional economics, with a focus on entrepreneurship as a spillover of knowledge and creativity. He is an editor of the Small Business Economics Journal. U2 - Smartcom Bain Liversage is the CEO at Smartcom in Johannesburg, South Africa. His research focuses on businesses and the people in business, in particular, what makes people make choices, grow, and fail. Bain has over 10 years of experience as an executive manager and CEO in the ICT sector as well as in strategy, finance, operations, human resources, and networking. He manages a variety of sales teams and individuals, including a broad range of executive decision-making activities related to technology adoption. He gained his MBA from Henley Business School in Johannesburg, South Africa. ER -