1. The Social Resource-Based View (SRBV)
The Resource-Based View (RBV) contends that a firm’s competitive advantage lies in effectively leveraging valuable, rare, and difficult-to-imitate resources (Barney, 1991; Lado et al., 1992; Tate & Balls, 2018). Organizations carve out unique market positions by strategically developing these resources. Under a organization’s control, resources are tactically utilized to generate competitiveness and achieve organizational goals and missions (Barney & Clark, 2007). Researchers have attempted to categorize resources, such as tangible, intangible, and capabilities (Barney, 1991; Yarbrough & Power, 2006). Tangible resources are property-based, including physical, financial, and capital assets (Yarbrough & Power, 2006). Intangible resources include an organization’s knowledge, intellectual property, relationships, leadership, and reputation (Smith, 2008). Capabilities refer to an organization’s ability to coordinate resources to accomplish its goals, such as culture, teamwork, and trust (Yarbrough & Power, 2006). Thus, performance is a function of obtaining and deploying these unique assets to create organizational sustainability (Short et al., 2002). However, the RBV overlooks the dynamic evolution of social and environmental conditions, forcing organizations to broaden their skill sets and adjust their tactics to remain adaptable (Lee et al., 2023).
Beyond this gap, the Social Resource-Based View (SRBV) proposes that social, environmental, or institutional elements can limit organizations from obtaining the necessary resources and capabilities to accomplish sustainable advantages (Hart, 1995; Tate & Bals, 2018). The SRBV highlights the importance of organizations considering social and institutional factors to navigate these external dynamics and enhance economic and social values. This strategic approach can lead to a positive impact on their long-term performance and organizational sustainability. SRBV is relevant to understanding a hospital’s performance improvement since social and institutional conditions surround healthcare organizations. Implementing the logic of a resource-based view in challenging and turbulent healthcare environments appears to be a legitimate strategy (Burton & Rycroft-Malone, 2015; Ferlie et al., 2015; Kosiol et al., 2023). Therefore, this study draws on the SRBV as a theoretical lens to investigate how organizational and social resources are associated with hospital performance improvement.
Furthermore, this study identifies patient engagement through PFACs as a strategic resource, incorporating the SRBV framework. The extended Resource-Based Approach presents an avenue to examine how diverse stakeholders, notably patients, contribute to creating valuable knowledge assets for hospitals. Although current conceptualizations of evidence pay attention to patient feedback, the personal and collective wisdom that emerges from knowledge or experience constructions via patients over time can provide a knowledge resource that is generally not collated (Burton & Rycroft-Malone, 2015). Thus, this study focuses on how the PFACs can be pivotal in determining hospital performance, offering hospitals critical resources to gain organizational sustainability.