Improving the agility of employees through enterprise social media: The mediating role of psychological conditions

•This study provides a comprehensive understanding of whether and how ESM usage is positively associated with agility performance.•This study applies Kahn’s framework to investigate the mediating effects of psychological conditions.•This study contributes to the ESM literature by incorporating Kahn’s framework to address psychological conditions to realize the value of ESM. Enterprise social media (ESM) is an emerging platform that can help employees handle uncertainties. This study examines whether and how ESM usage is positively associated with agility performance (i.e., proactivity, adaptability, and resilience). Drawing on Kahn’s framework, this study investigates the mediating effects of psychological conditions (i.e., psychological meaningfulness, psychological availability, and psychological safety). Through data collected from 167 employees who adopted ESM in the workplace, the current research validates most of the proposed hypotheses on mediating effects. It specifically validates the following claims: (1) psychological availability mediates the relationships between ESM usage and the three dimensions of agility performance; (2) psychological meaningfulness mediates the link between ESM usage and proactivity; and (3) the associations of ESM usage with proactivity and adaptability are significantly mediated by psychological safety. This study contributes to extant ESM literature through incorporating Kahn’s framework in investigating the role of ESM and suggesting that managers enhance employees’ psychological conditions in order to realize the value of ESM.