Performance and entrepreneurial orientation in small firms: the moderating effects of strategy, structure, human resource policies and information systems

This chapter examines the impact of Entrepreneurial Orientation (EO) on performance in small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) by focusing on the relationship between innovation and entrepreneurial activity. Both the entrepreneurship and strategy literatures suggest that an EO improves firms’ performance, but the empirical results are mixed. Our empirical study of a sample of SMEs competing in the Spanish chemical industry shows that a main-effect analysis provides an incomplete explanation of performance. Instead, we use a multidimensional conceptualization of entrepreneurial orientation to show how strategy, organizational structure, and information systems interact with EO levels to affect performance.