Toward a Sustainable Society: The Role of Environmental Knowledge, Knowledge Capability, Sustainable Innovation, and Innovation Orientation on Product Innovation

Contemporary stakeholders persist in pressuring firms toward environmental stewardship, dynamic organizations demonstrate high-level capability and strategically respond to market evolutions and aligned operations toward sustainability. The study aimed at investigating the connection between environmental knowledge and awareness and products/service innovation, the mediating roles of knowledge process capability-application dimension and sustainable innovation and the moderating effect of innovation orientation. Through questionnaire, empirical data was collected from 354 bank employees operating in Western Nigeria whose bank made the list of the most sustainable bank in Nigeria in 2024 sustainability ranking. SPSS and SmartPLS was used for data analysis and testing of hypotheses. The findings showed a significant positive association between environmental knowledge and awareness and products/service innovation, additionally, knowledge process capability-application and sustainable innovation significantly mediate the relationship between environmental knowledge and awareness and products/service innovation, while innovation orientation negatively moderate between environmental knowledge and awareness and knowledge process capability-application. However, innovation orientation did not moderate the relationship between sustainable innovation and product/service innovation. The study underscore the importance of knowledge management strategy, firm innovation orientation toward sustainability stewardship in service organizations and provide valuable theoretical insights for management scholars. An integrated dynamic capability and absorptive capacity theories underpinned the study.