Economic performance in Spanish sports clubs: entrepreneurial orientation of professional and non-professional teams analysed through fsQCA

Abstract

Sports clubs play an important role in the creation of social value, however, despite the scarcity of studies, analysing the associative sports environment from an economic perspective has an undeniable relevance. The entrepreneurial orientation (EO) has been largely related to the economic performance of the organisation, however, this study has found a difference in sports clubs related to their legal and organisational structure. The analysed sample is composed of 13 non-professional sports clubs and 13 professional sports clubs, using the fsQCA methodology. According to the results obtained, EO has an influence on the economic performance (EP) of sports clubs, with proactivity being the most important dimension and innovation the least important. Being a professional sports club is present in the results for high levels of EP and amateur sports clubs are present in the results for low levels of EP.