Strategic Orientation as a Mediator Between Environmental Dimensions and Performance: A Study of Brazilian Hotels

Abstract

This study analyzes the relationships between the dimensions of organizational environment dynamism, complexity and munificence and firm performance and mediating effect of strategic orientation. Data were collected by surveying 170 managers of Brazilian hotels and analyzed using structural equation modeling. The results revealed a positive relationship between entrepreneurial strategic orientation and performance and a negative relationship between conservative strategic orientation and performance. Environmental munificence had a direct and positive impact on performance. Environmental dynamism did not have an impact on performance, but did affect both conservative and entrepreneurial strategic orientations; environmental complexity had a negative effect on entrepreneurial orientation, also with no direct impact on performance. In turn, strategic orientation mediated the relationships between dynamism and performance and between complexity and performance, but did not mediate between munificence and performance. It can be concluded that complex environments reduce the impetus for enterprising approaches, decreasing performance, and that if the reaction to a perception of dynamism is an increase in entrepreneurship, then performance also increases.