Sustaining Thai SMEs through perceived benefits and happiness

摘要

Purpose - This paper aims to examine the relationship between stakeholders' perceived benefits and happiness of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) that follow Thai's corporate sustainability practices, called sufficiency economy, and their impact on stakeholder-company relationship quality and firm performance outcomes. Design/methodology/approach - Derived from the literature, a structural model, expressing the relationship between stakeholders' perceived benefits and happiness of SMEs and their impact' on stakeholder-company relationship quality and firm performance outcomes, was developed. A questionnaire survey was conducted with 636 stakeholders from sufficiency economy SMEs in Thailand. Structural equation modeling was used to test the model. Findings - Results indicate that utilitarian benefits, and hedonic and eudaimonic happiness impact enhanced stakeholder-company relationship quality with the firm to varying degrees. Different levels of relationship quality also impact perceived corporate reputation and perceived brand equity differently. Originality/value - This study is among the first that identifies the positive impact of happiness on corporate sustainability performance.