The impact of market orientation on small firm performance: a configurational approach

PurposeIn this study, the authors examine the influence of market orientation on small firms' performance. The authors theorize that the association between market orientation and small firm performance provides an incomplete picture in a competitive environment. The application of configuration approach which involves simultaneous consideration of market orientation, strategic flexibility and competition intensity is crucial to examine driver of firm performance.Design/methodology/approachThe sample of the research study consists of 272 small firms from an emerging economy, India. Ordinary least squares regression has been used to investigate the hypothesized relationships.FindingsThe authors noted that the three-way interaction between market orientation, strategic flexibility and competition intensity elucidates variance in small firm performance over and above a contingency model and a direct relationship.Research limitations/implicationsThe findings contribute to the existing literature by exhibiting the effect of market orientation on firm performance. The configuration model suggests that small firms can outperform competitors in a lower competitive environment if they have high market orientation and high strategic flexibility investment. To leverage market opportunities and achieve better firm performance, small firms’ owners should analyze the usefulness of current capabilities in a changing competitive environment concurrently and align market orientation to those conditions.Originality/valueThe strategic management and marketing literature suggests that relationship between market orientation and performance is ambiguous. The findings offer insights to managers regarding the appropriate use of strategic flexibility in leveraging the benefits of market orientation in a highly competitive environment. Furthermore, by collecting data from the context of an emerging economy, India, the authors attempt to strengthen the applicability of market orientation in different contexts.

Emotional Intelligence (EI)

This chapter evaluates EI research, introduces the concept of engaged interaction, and explains how leaders can use EI for self-improvement. Goleman describes EI as a manager's ability to recognize the emotions in self and others. The manager then uses this information to make improvements in self-management and relationships with others. EI leads people to gain awareness by recognizing personal emotions and the emotions of others. This creates an emotional state of consciousness where people use the information skillfully and intelligently in deliberate, purposeful decision-making activities. The concept of engaged interaction is achieved when all parties participate in flexible, full-range communication, making sure to listen, hear, and understand. This open and flexible communication must continue until interaction and shared understanding are achieved. Leaders can combine EI, engaged interaction, and strategic flexibility to improve operations and team building.

Strategizing three forms of growth

Purpose This paper aims to review the latest management developments across the globe and pinpoint practical implications from cutting-edge research and case studies. Design/methodology/approach This briefing is prepared by an independent writer who adds their own impartial comments and places the articles in context. Findings This research paper concentrates on the relationship between company growth and digitalization, as measured in six growth companies in Finland. Growth was compartmentalized into three phases: pre-factors of growth, growth as a process, and growth as an outcome. Maintaining strategic flexibility powerfully facilitates digitalization. The companies generally integrated digitalization into the processes they built, creating a product and service platform from which they could reliably scale. Leaders in digital product-driven companies are encouraged by the study's authors to invest in and promote a culture of continual learning, so that their teams don't lose their instinct to keep innovating to achieve competitive advantages. Originality/value The briefing saves busy executives, strategists and researchers hours of reading time by selecting only the very best, most pertinent information and presenting it in a condensed and easy-to-digest format.

Tackling organizational innovativeness through strategic orientation: strategic alignment and moderating role of strategic flexibility

PurposeThe purpose of the research was to examine the effect of strategic orientation on organizational innovativeness of small and medium enterprises (SMEs). Moreover, in order to highlight the constructive role of strategic orientation, the study also observes the intervening role of strategic alignment and moderating role of strategic flexibility.Design/methodology/approachData were collected from 209 owner/managers of SMEs through self-administered questionnaires. Descriptive statistics, correlation and hierarchical regression were used for testing the study hypotheses.FindingsResults revealed that strategic orientation is positively related to SMEs innovativeness. Strategic alignment mediates between the strategic orientation and innovativeness link. Furthermore, the findings also established that the association between strategic orientation and strategic alignment is stronger when SMEs are strategically flexible.Originality/valueOrganizational innovativeness is of vital importance for SMEs strength, especially in the context of developing economies. Although researchers have acknowledged several antecedents of SMEs innovativeness, however, it is still unclear how strategic orientation influences organizational innovativeness. Moreover, the study focuses on another important element of strategic alignment through the integration of goals and strategies to achieve innovativeness.

Financial Performance Under the Influence of the Coronavirus Disease 2019: Effects of Strategic Flexibility and Environmental Dynamics in Big Data Capability

This study draws on the dynamic capabilities view and the firm’s big data capability (BDC) in the new economic environment. It constructs an adjusted intermediary model to study the mechanism of BDC, strategic flexibility, and environmental dynamic affecting financial performance. We find that strategic flexibility plays an intermediary role in the “Converse-U” relationship between BDC and financial performance. Environmental dynamics adjust the relationship between BDC and financial performance positively and smooth the “Converse-U” relationship. The findings suggest building and managing BDC, combining BDC with the management process, and achieving continuous financial performance improvement in a dynamic environment. The paper also puts forward the nonlinear hypothesis, discusses the “Converse-U” relationship between BDC and enterprise financial performance in the Chinese context of digital economy explosion and growth, and considers the intermediary mechanism of strategic flexibility and the regulatory effect of environmental dynamics.

Regional security cooperation against hegemonic threats: Theory and evidence from France and West Germany (1945–65)

Why do some regional powers collectively threatened by a potential hegemon eagerly cooperate to ensure their security, while others appear reluctant to do so? I argue that robust security cooperation at the regional level is less likely when an unbalanced distribution of power exists between the prospective security partners. In such situations, regional security cooperation tends to be stunted by foot-dragging and obstructionism on the part of materially inferior states wary of facilitating the strategic expansion of neighbours with larger endowments of power resources, anticipating that much of the coalition's gains in military capabilities are likely to be achieved through an expansion of the materially superior neighbour's force levels and strategic flexibility. Evidence drawn from primary material and the latest historiography of France's postwar foreign policy towards West Germany provides considerable support for this argument. My findings offer important correctives to standard accounts of the origins of Western European security cooperation and suggest the need to rethink the difficulties the United States has encountered in promoting cooperation among local allies in key global regions.

Impact of dynamic capacities on the performance of food and beverage enterprises in Lagos, Nigeria

This study examined the impact of dynamic capacities on the performance of food and beverage enterprises in Lagos, Nigeria. The following sub-variables (strategic decision-making capacity, product innovation capacity, strategic flexibility, competitive intensity, technological turbulence, and technological capability) were employed to represent the variable of dynamic capacity. Also, the following sub-variables (sales growth, enterprise survival, enterprise efficiency, and competitive advantage) were employed to represent the variable of enterprise performance. Primary data was used to achieve descriptive and inferential statistics, and the statistics is estimated by the PLS-SEM method which was calibrated on Lisrel 8.70 software. This study found that product innovation, competitive intensity and technological turbulence, technological capability and competitive intensity, and strategic flexibility are critical sub-variables in determining the robustness of dynamic capacities, as they adequately improve increasing sales growth, survival, and sustenance of enterprise into the unforeseeable future, efficiency of enterprise, and competitive advantage of food and beverage manufacturing enterprises, respectively, particularly in this trying period that is evidenced with technological change and competition, among others.