Entrepreneurial orientation and firm performance a study of large firms and small and medium enterprises in north India

Abstract

The Entrepreneurial Orientation (EO) and performance bear a relationship that is a subject of interest nowadays. The EO-Performance relation emphasizes on a core of aspects or strategies that revolves around new product development and innovation tendencies, risk taking inclinations, autonomous conduct, competitive aggressiveness, proactivity in decision making and execution, inclination for global markets, sustained internationalization drive and commitment to export markets. The research focuses on the analysis of the dimensions of Entrepreneurial Orientation across firm behavior in the Indian context. It identifies linkages between entrepreneurial capital and managerial efficiencies. The research also aims at the understanding of the relationships across the firm level competencies and the firmand#8223;s performance. It also emphasizes an examination of the differences in context of large and smaller firms and their respective extent of internationalization. The focus of current study is on four different clusters namely ITES, Bio-Pharmaceuticals, Apparels and Automobiles and this finds resonance in Northern India s geographic concentration of manufacturing and entrepreneurial patterns. The firm s entrepreneurial capital was observed to be a function of its human resources. The respective employee engagement across different firms was observed to lead to higher entrepreneurial capital and hence the firm based entrepreneurial orientation. The varying levels of constituent factors in Indian perspective show the poor or non-consistent engagement of human resources across responding SMEs and larger firms. It points to some levels of subordinate s unsatisfactory relationship with their middle level managers. The entrepreneurial competencies need to be rare, particular and valuable in order to sustain internationalization process as seen in the context of Indian SMEs and larger-enterprises. newline