In various countries worldwide, there is an intense contemporary interest in technology as a pioneer of progress and development. Meanwhile, it is understood that many projects are ongoing, which involve integrated uses of technology with the aim of eliminating problems caused by aging populations and deprivation in developed countries. “Made in China 2025”, “UK Industry 2025”, “Industry 4.0”, and “Society 5.0” are some of the projects that come to mind first [1]. These developments have led to the emergence of digital leadership, a novel leadership approach. Digital leaders are expected to transform organizations innovatively and adapt them to contemporary conditions, as well as to increase their performance by managing organizations effectively throughout the process [2]. Research conducted with employees to direct the process in question indicated a high level of belief (77%) that change can be made in organizations through new leaders [3], which was also supported by a report prepared by the European Union stating that there was a need for 40,000 to 50,000 digital leaders every year from 2015 until 2020 ^[4][5][4,5]. Countries with a strategic perspective allocate significant financial resources to digital transformation. Over USD 380 billion is thought to have been allocated for digital transformation in the Asia Pacific Region alone in 2019; this figure increases day by day. It is expected that more than 65% of the Asia Pacific Gross Domestic Product (GDP) will become digitalized due to the USD 1.2 trillion invested in digital transformation between 2020 and 2023 [6].

2. Digital Leadership

Digital leadership first emerged as a leadership approach aiming to follow and implement changes due to technological developments that have arisen with Industry 4.0 ^[2][7][2,8]. A digital leader is expected to be someone who is visionary, sympathetic, agile, a risk-taker, and always open to collaboration ^[8][18]. In this regard, digital leaders are expected to create an effective organizational culture by developing social capital. Social Capital Theory, used to eliminate and explain the instability and social problems that arise especially in the industrializing West, appears to be an important tool in terms of explaining digital leadership. The understanding that social capital should be regarded not only as an element of success achieved by the individual work and effort of a person but also as the success of an entire organization contributes to the subject in this respect ^[9][19]. This situation, integrated with the understanding of cognitive social capital, is also affected by Social Impact Theory because it creates social impact and gives direction to the relationships within the organization. The stated theories suggest that a digital leader will socially influence the people around him, emphasizing his importance in increasing or decreasing the performance of the organization ^[10][20]. Digital leadership refers to the ability of leaders to manage digital-age organizations effectively ^[11][21]. In addition to good business skills, digital leaders need to possess good practical knowledge, practical problem-solving ability, and the ability to use and teach digital tools ^[12][22] due to the fact that digital leadership aims to understand the effect of technology on business operations and thus manage innovation. Digital leadership involves developing and utilizing technology in order to drive growth and success ^[13][23]. Briefly, digital leadership involves adopting and implementing the adaptation of technological developments as a leadership approach with the use of modern technological elements ^[14][24]. This behavior of the digital leader can be stated to be within the scope of Resource-Based View Theory in terms of ensuring sustainable competitive advantage ^[15][25]. Dynamic Capability Theory states that the value of all resources of the organization, such as human resources, capital, and production ability, is more than the value of the resources alone. A suitable leader is required for the synergy that is expected to be created within the organization ^[16][26]. A digital leader has a clear vision in terms of how to use technology so as to improve the organization. In this regard, a strategy is created by the leader to achieve this vision ^[15][25]. In order to create a good strategy, digital leaders are expected to have the competence to manage the change process and to have a critical understanding. In accordance with the needs of the organization for change, it is required to take strategic steps regarding new business models, understanding of customer relations, solutions for employees, operational improvements, and financial conditions ^[8][18]. In this respect, a digital leader is defined as a person who can show two-way innovative behavior on how to manage the same organization digitally as well as leading the digital transformation of an organization ^[17][27]. A digital leader is expected to collaborate with employees and communicate across multiple channels effectively ^[18][28]. In accordance with the digital age, leaders must be able to use media tools effectively, make quick decisions, take preventive measures against destructive situations, and possess technical skills ^[8][18]. Making the most appropriate decision thanks to big data by maintaining communication with customers uninterruptedly is an important element expected from the digital leader as well ^[19][29]. With the help of uninterrupted communication, technological innovations, and innovative behaviors, a digital leader is expected to increase the job performance of the organization ^{[6][19][20][21][22][23]}[6,29,30,31,32,33].

3. Intrapreneurship Intention

Entrepreneurship was first used conceptually by Cantillon ^[24][34], who mentioned three important elements in shaping the economic structure and defined these elements as economic agents by listing them as capital owners, entrepreneurs, and employees ^[25][35]. An entrepreneur, defined by Cantillon as an economic agent, is one who possesses a high tolerance for uncertainty, can display active and innovative behavior, can take the necessary financial risks to develop new projects, and can make commercial commitments ^[26][36]. Entrepreneurship requires creating an organization that has not existed before or restructuring an existing organization with a different perspective. In their definition of entrepreneurship, Green and Cohen ^[27][37] list the main factors of entrepreneurship as being creative, seizing the opportunity, taking risks, displaying demand for growth, and being profit-oriented. In the context of the economic added value formed, entrepreneurs play an important role in shaping social dynamics and realizing the structural change needed as well as providing employment, welfare, and a demand-oriented supply ^[28][38]. From this perspective, it is possible to state that entrepreneurship pioneers digital leadership and innovation in terms of achieving change and spreading innovation. Entrepreneurship refers to the independent establishment of a new business, and it has also existed as the emergence of new entrepreneurs within the organization, especially since the 1980s. It is known that the method called intrapreneurship, which creates new production models and opportunities with its views and ideas within the organization, has a great effect, especially on production performance ^[29][39]. Obtaining foresight in terms of developing the limited resources at hand and using them as a strategic competitive element constitutes an opinion on the effectiveness of this theory ^[30][31][9,40].

4. Innovative Behavior

Innovation is stated to be a holistic management process that includes elements such as ideas, technology, manufacturing, and marketing for a new product or production process ^[32][41]. Hoecht and Trott ^[33][42] describe the concept of innovation as the sum of theoretical concepts, technical invention, and commercial effect. It is defined by Drucker as innovation-oriented activities that are carried out with the aim of developing the organizational activities to be accomplished and the products and services to be produced in line with certain purposes, emphasizing that innovation is a prerequisite for organizations so as to maintain their existence ^[34][43]. According to Drucker, organizations that fail to achieve innovation will lag behind changes and will not be able to meet both their organizational and environmental needs, and as a result, they will not be able to maintain their existence and finally will disappear ^[35][44]. In general, organizations are expected to achieve meaningful economic value with the help of innovation. In fact, organizations intend to gain benefits such as increasing their profits, reducing their costs, and gaining competitive advantage with innovation. Furthermore, innovation is expected to create some non-material benefits for organizations ^[36][45]. Outputs with high organizational importance such as improvement in personal relationships, increase in performance, job satisfaction, personal development, etc., are some of these benefits ^[37][46]. Innovation is defined to be a complex process that is dominated by knowledge, requires thought leadership, is associated with the demand for change and transformation, and requires effective management ^[38][47], which reveals that the innovation process is related to leadership. In this respect, in the present world where digitalization is the focus of change, it is obvious that the concept of innovation must be advocated by digital leadership ^[30][39][40][9,48,49]. Innovative behavior is expected to emerge as a result of the incentive environment that is created by the leader. In accordance with Social Impact Theory, the leader’s innovative support is expected to turn into a behavior, which can emerge positively or negatively depending on the leader’s style [5].

5. Job Performance

Job performance refers to how well an employee fulfills the duties and responsibilities that are assigned to him at the workplace ^[41][50]. In other words, the concept of job performance is defined as a measure of how effectively the employee accomplishes his job responsibilities and achieves his goals and objectives ^[42][51]. Job performance typically involves performance evaluations made by supervisors or managers, which can influence various organizational outcomes including productivity, job satisfaction, and turnover ^[5][43][44][5,52,53]. By understanding the factors that have an impact on job performance and using effective performance evaluation methods, organizations can promote high levels of job performance among their employees ^[45][54]. In this regard, there are many theories available in the literature. For example, within the scope of Social Exchange Theory ^[46][12], it is suggested that positive behaviors exhibited by the leader toward employees will obtain positive feedback from employees within the framework of reciprocity theories. Hence, it is claimed that employees who perceive positive and good behavior of leaders toward themselves are motivated to work harder, which in turn increases the organization’s job performance ^[47][55]. Under present conditions, technology and information sharing are used commonly to measure job performance, which is triggered by the ease of obtaining information thanks to various software, especially in current digitalized conditions. Knowledge sharing refers to the exchange of information among employees with the aim of performing tasks in organizations. As a result of information exchange, the job performance of the organization is ensured to increase together with important gains such as the participation of employees in management, effective decision-making, a reduction in information loss, avoiding the repetition of mistakes, and encouraging innovation ^[48][56]. Therefore, information sharing has a profound impact on job performance. Within the scope of Social Capital Theory, organizational culture is influenced significantly by coordination, communication channels, and information sharing, which leads to better job performance ^[49][57]. From this point of view, it is expected to contribute positively to job performance [5].