Cultural intelligence and managerial relational performance: a resource advantage perspective

Purpose – Since managerial rationality is often bounded; managers use their cognitive capabilities and social interaction to manage their operational cultural and environmental differences. Drawing on the resource-advantage theory, we theorize that import manager’s cultural intelligence (CQ) is an intangible but valuable human capital capable of diminishing the effect of their foreign counterpart’s psychic distance and ultimately, their relational performance. Design/methodology/approach – Our measure of CQ in this study comprises metacognitive and motivational CQs to examine the relations between metacognitive and motivational CQs on psychic distance and its ultimate effect on relational performance. Survey data collected from 228 Nigerian automobile import managers were analyzed using Structural Equation Modelling (SEM) to examine the relationship among the study variables. Findings – Our study revealed that metacognitive CQ reduces the effect of psychic distance in the exchange relationship. Moreover, in the presence of a low-level psychic distance, relational performance increases. This finding confirms the intervening role of CQ on performance relationship. The study offers insights into the under-researched area of CQ in international business research. It highlights the role of CQ and its influence on psychic distance in the success or failure of relational exchanges in the international market. Originality/value – We present the concept of CQ as human capital that has the potential to improve managerial relational performance. We go further to advance the potential significance and relevance of CQ in improving international buyer-seller exchanges