Creativity enables sustainable development: Supplier engagement as a boundary condition for the positive effect on green innovation

Despite the increasing awareness of business and academic research toward creative thinking, the investigation of its uptake by industry is still limited. Supplier engagement attracts considerable interest as a means to improve green innovation. Previous research studies in an inter-firm relationship have addressed the impact of green innovation on sustainability performance. While some studies have concluded that creative thinking can lead to sustainable performance outcomes, others have questioned the positive influence of creative thinking on innovation. This study takes a top-up perspective on ways to stimulate creative thinking with supplier engagement. Relying on the social capital theory and its wider contextualization in relation with the creativity, the authors argue that supplier engagement levers for driving green innovation and facilitates the sustainable development. We aim to advance understanding of the role of creativity, along with how and why creativity is important for the development of green innovation practices for a sustainable future. This study provides a more finegrained perspective by developing a theoretical model. Contributions from this study include research propositions to help explain and predict why and how firm resources become more important when combined with the creative thinking. Creative thinking is a fast-growing topic among the global community for the way that it enables sustainable development initiatives. Creativity boosts environmental, social and economic performance by enabling the development of green products and processes. Creative thinking has become an important tool driving green innovation within organizations and plays a critical role in enhancing sustainability performance. This study provides novel insights into how to organize creative abilities for sustainable development and provide actionable research direction and policy implications for both practitioners and academicians.