Resource-based Perspective Research Articles

A Contingent Resource-Based Perspective on Corporate Social Responsibility and Competitive Advantage: A Focus on Transition Countries

Although many studies investigate the relationship between corporate social responsibility (CSR) and performance, they mainly explore the U.S. and Western developed countries and ignore other emerging economies and transition countries. However, the Contingent Resource-Based View (Contingent RBV) argues that the CSR-performance link varies across different business environments. Due to the absence of relevant research, little is known about the underlying mechanisms associated with the CSR-performance nexus in transition countries. Thus, the aim of this research is to investigate the moderating role of the business environment, namely dynamism, on the CSR-performance relationship in the banking sector of 21 transition countries for the period 2002 to 2014. We specifically chose the period of 2002-2014 as this best captured a mix of turbulent and stable transition countries. This study applied system GMM while exploring an unbalanced panel sample for 319 commercial banks and considering the dynamic nature of bank performance. Moreover, this approach allowed us to control the endogeneity problems successfully. The findings indicated that the direct association between CSR and performance was negative, but the opposite was confirmed when the link was moderated by Dynamism. Specifically, system GMM showed that Total CSR, Community involvement and Environment had a positive association with banks’ competitive advantage in a dynamic context. This study concluded by highlighting the theoretical and managerial implications.

Nexus among intellectual capital, interorganizational learning, industrial Internet of things technology and innovation performance: a resource-based perspective

PurposeThe authors observe the influence of intellectual capital (IC) on innovation performance with the mediating role of interorganizational learning (IOL) in the Pakistani automotive industry. Besides, industrial Internet of things (IoT) technology is used as moderating variables between IOL and innovation performance.Design/methodology/approachStructural equation modeling (SEM) presents scholars with extra flexibility and enhanced research conclusions. SEM is described as a statistical methodology and the best tool used for hypothesis testing. The authors used partial least squares SEM for testing hypotheses. The simple random sampling technique followed to collect data from respondents, and 492 questionnaires were used for analysis.FindingsThe outcomes reveal that IC enhances innovation performance and IOL. Moreover, IOL increases innovation performance. IOL significantly mediates between IC and innovation performance. Industrial IoT technology improves innovation performance. Finally, industrial IoT technology strengthens the positive association between IOL and innovation performance.Practical implicationsThis study concentrates on the issue of how managers use IOL and industrial IoT technology to take higher advantage of IC that increases innovation performance.Originality/valueThis is the initial study that builds a theoretical framework to integrate IC, IOL, industrial IoT technology and innovation performance. Although prior researchers observe the association between IC and innovation performance, less concentration was paid to understand the role of interorganizational leadership and industrial IoT technology in leveraging organizational IC.

The Role of Internationalization Orientation in Mediating the Relationship between Capabilities and Intention to Export: An Empirical Analysis on SMEs

Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) have a strategic role in the Indonesia's economy; however, they have a low contribution on the national export. Studying on SMEs internationalization becomes important to understand factors that influence them to go international. Using resource-based view perspective, the objective of study is to investigate how the organizational capabilities influence the intention of SMEs to export through internationalization orientation. A model was developed that explained the impact of personnel management, product development, and production capabilities on internationalization orientation, and eventually affect the export intention. Primary data were collected through a field survey by distributing structured questionnaires to SMEs over three months, resulting 86 eligible responses. These empirical data were analyzed to validate proposed model using partial least square - structural equation modeling technique (PLS-SEM). The results indicated that internationalization orientation mediated partially the effect of personnel management and product development capabilities on SMEs intention to export. The other finding displayed the unexpected result that there was insignificant influence of production capabilities on internationalization orientation and export intention. This study suggests that to increase the intention of SEMs to export, the firms must have capabilities in managing their personnel and developing unique and innovative product consistently.

Brand equity retention after rebranding: a resource-based perspective

Brand equity retention after rebranding: a resource-based perspective

The Oxymoron of Digitalization

How do small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) perceive the prerequisites and critical factors of digitalization? The objective of this article is to map SMEs' digital maturity and their views on how to manage the opportunities and challenges brought about by digitalization in order to foster competitiveness in local, regional, national, and international contexts. The study draws on a resource-based perspective, which views the firm as a unique bundle of assets and resources that, if utilized in distinctive ways, can create competitive advantage. The study builds on triadic relations as an interactive learning process that occurs in the interaction between actors as the concept of open innovation postulates. This study was conducted as an interpretative phenomenological analysis (IPA) study of SMEs and actors in innovation system in Gävleborg County in Sweden. It uses a qualitative approach featuring in-depth interviews, workshops, and focus-group interviews. The findings suggest a digital divide between SMEs, with a discrepancy in opportunities to benefit from the digitalization potential among the population studied. The divide manifests itself through economics, usability, and empowerment. Digitalization should not be viewed as merely a technology issue, but as a better way to run a business, as a platform for development and dissemination of knowledge about the critical factors for increased competitiveness that creates competitive values in production with digitalization as a starting point and creates an understanding of the how and what creates competitiveness in each critical factor.

The timing of diversification and startup firms’ survival: a resource-based perspective

ABSTRACT The study investigates the determinants of first-time diversification activities undertaken by about 3,000 startups in the United States. Drawing on the resource-based view, we examine the impact of resource endowment on the timing of diversification. We further examine the effect of the timing of diversification on the likelihood of firm survival and then test for persistence. The analysis offers three main insights. First, resources play a crucial role in early diversification. Second, early diversification reduces the hazard of exit from the market. Third, the positive impact of early diversification on survival attenuates after five to six years. Our study contributes to the literature on the resource-based view and firm survival. The findings have important implications for entrepreneurs, policymakers, and entrepreneurship scholars.

Inflexible and Stubborn? Analyst evaluations of long-term orientation in family and nonfamily firms

Financial analysts provide recommendations about a firm’s earnings potential based on relevant aspects of a firm’s strategy. Despite the dangers of myopic short-termism, analysts may look unfavorably upon a firm’s long-term orientation (LTO)—up-front investments in property, plant, and equipment that can develop a firm’s operational capabilities. Using agency and resource-based perspectives, we argue that analysts will give worse recommendations as firms increase capital LTO because it signals principal-agent problems, excess capacity, and a stubborn commitment to inflexible structure. Moreover, analysts may have differing attributions based on context, such as family ownership, because capital LTO may signal principal-principal conflicts, prioritization of the family’s noneconomic goals over financial goals, and/or mismanagement. Using a sample of US manufacturing firms from 2007-2016, results indicate that capital LTO is negatively related to mean recommendations. Family ownership provided interesting and significant results. While nonfamily firms demonstrated a linear negative relationship, family firms had a quadratic relationship—an initial increase as family firms increased capital LTO to median industry levels and then decreasing when capital LTO was much longer than industry peers. Firms should consider the trade-offs of developing long-term capabilities with potential unfavorable analyst recommendations, and family firms should consider the signals that family ownership can send in combination with investment strategies.

Dusting Off and Bouncing Back: The Role of Resilience in the Relationship between LMX and Well-Being

Drawing on data from a two-wave longitudinal study with 484 physicians working in the Brazilian healthcare system during the Covid-19 pandemic, we explore the impact of leader-member exchange (LMX) on employees’ psychological well-being (burnout and professional fulfillment). Specifically, using a resource-based perspective, we postulate that high-quality relationships with supervisors have the potential to promote a state of resilience, and ultimately, improve employees’ well-being by providing valuable resources that allow employees to effectively adapt and respond to adverse events. Our findings corroborate our theoretical model showing that LMX reduces physicians’ burnout and increases their professional fulfillment through the enhancement of their resilience. Moreover, the results indicate that the follower’s self-concept is an important boundary condition of the effectiveness of LMX, such that the effects of LMX on burnout and professional fulfillment are weaker when employees have higher levels of independent self-construal. Overall, the study provides evidence that resilience, fostered by relationship-oriented leadership, plays a key role in bouncing back from hardship and avoiding the deterioration of well-being at work, especially in face of severe adversity.

Resolving conflicting results of intellectual capital’s influence on innovative capability

Previous studies have shown conflicting results of intellectual capital’s influence on innovative capability. The conflicting results impede not only theoretical development but also managers’ investment decisions on innovation. This study indicates that divergent knowledge (positive effect), reluctantly sharing knowledge, self-justification (for prior period decision), and sunk cost fallacy (negative effects) explain the human capital conflicting results; inertial (positive effect) and overinvestment (negative effect) explain the organizational capital conflicting results. This study further argues that a firm’s dynamic capability help itself sense (entirely new and partially new) opportunities, seize the strategic-fit opportunities and utilize intellectual capital to transform/enhance its innovative capabilities. Dynamic capability reflects aggregated results of above positive and negative effects and thus resolves the intellectual capital conflicting results. Furthermore, this study argued the social capital facilitate the influences of human capital and organizational capital on innovative capability via opportunities and trust. This study expects following possible findings to contribute theoretical development and managerial implications: (1) when human capital is insufficient, greater human capital increases incremental innovative capability but decreases radical innovative capability. However, to 2 increase radical innovative capability, sufficient human capital is required. (2) Firms incline to overinvest organizational capital in incremental innovative capability; however, dynamic update of organizational capital is a key to increase incremental innovative capability. (3) Dynamic capability mediates the relationship between intellectual capital and innovative capability. Dynamic capability explains the influence of organizational learning on innovative capability from a resource-based perspective. (4) Social capital moderates the relationship between human capital/organizational capital and radical/incremental innovative capability. (5) dynamic capability discloses the mechanism/process of intellectual capital’s influence on innovative capability; human capital and organizational capital, per se, are actors/predictors for increasing innovative capability. Social capital provides opportunities and trust to facilitate (moderate) human capital and organizational capital to increase innovative capability; together with human capital and organizational capital, social capital influences innovative capability through dynamic capability.

Understanding Budget Cuts within Student Services in Community Colleges: A Critical Review of Practical Responses for Human Resource Leaders

Using a critical lens, this article discusses some of the most common recommendations for human resource and community college leaders on how to respond to budget cuts to student affairs and support services at community colleges. Student affairs and support services are often the first to experience budget cuts in higher education, yet little is known about the impact of—as well as responses to—declining budgets to such services in community colleges. As part of this critical analysis, we frame recommendations using resource-based perspectives to better understand institutional actions in the face of budget cuts, such as identifying sustainable alternative financial resources and increasing efficiency of existing financial and human resources through increased coordination with other community college units. We also discuss how these best practices can also lead to other challenges in times of financial crisis that institutional leaders should consider.

CEOs\u2019 International Work Experience and Compensation

In this paper, we study the effect a CEO’s international work experience has on his or her compensation. By combining human capital theory with a resource dependence and a resource-based perspective, we argue that international work experience translates into higher pay. We also suggest that international work experience comprises several dimensions that affect CEO compensation: duration, timing and breadth of stays abroad. With data from Europe’s largest stock market firms, we provide evidence that the longer the international work experiences and the more numerous they are, the higher a CEO’s compensation. While, based on our theoretical arguments, we expect to find that later international work experiences pay off for CEOs, our empirical analysis shows that earlier international work experiences are particularly valuable in terms of compensation. In addition, our data support the argument that maturity allows a CEO to take advantage of the skills, knowledge and competencies obtained via international experience—and to receive a higher payoff. With our study, we improve the understanding of how different facets of a CEO’s background shape executive remuneration.

Unpacking the role of innovation capability: Exploring the impact of leadership style on green procurement via a natural resource-based perspective

In response to the growing urgency of environmental concerns in civil society, governments have been accelerating their pursuit of green procurement. However, green procurement faces substantial barriers and challenges that are internal to the governmental organizations. Using a natural resource-based view as the theoretical lens, this study developed and tested a model on how leadership styles and innovation capability influence green procurement. The findings showed that neither transformational nor transactional leadership styles influence green procurement, although they do influence innovation capability. Notably, innovation capability fully mediates the relationship between both transformational and transactional leadership styles and green procurement. Our findings offer a more advanced understanding of the impact of leadership style on e-procurement and the role of innovation capability, thereby addressing the crucial questions of how leadership style and innovation capability can enhance green procurement to improve environmental sustainability.

Relating within-person personality variability to organizational citizenship behavior and counterproductive work behavior: A resource-based perspective

Research on the effects of within-person personality variability has mainly focused on the consequences for subjective well-being. Drawing on a resource-based approach, we extend this field to the work domain, expecting that since deviating from one’s average trait level is resource intensive, it should relate negatively to behaviors that require the investment of additional resources, such as organizational citizenship behavior (OCB), while it should relate positively to behaviors that replenish one’s resources, such as counterproductive work behavior. Using two personality dimensions that are predictive for work-performance (conscientiousness and core self-evaluations), and a new variability index that is not confounded by the mean, we find an effect of personality variability on negative performance outcomes (counterproductive work behavior), while no relation is found with positive forms of extra-role performance (organizational citizenship behavior). These results were replicated across three separate experience sampling studies, confirming that, while within-person personality variability is related to performance, those relationships are relatively weak and they do not hold for every performance facet.

Enhancing effects of value co-creation in social commerce: insights from network externalities, institution-based trust and resource-based perspectives

ABSTRACT Parties in a positive affective state generally boost creativity in social commerce. Superior institution-based trust may enhance multi-sided partners’ positive affective reactions that lead to facilitate actively engagement for achieving the benefits of value co-creation. This study develops a conceptual model in which third-party assurance mechanisms and third-party logistics act as moderating constructs for examining the relation between agility and the network effect, both of which affect value co-creation. The results show that institution-based trust operates through the interaction between agility and multi-sided mechanisms in ensuring the value co-creation as it reinforces the network effects in the process. The findings of the study provide practical insights into how online merchants can reinforce the interaction between agility and multi-sided mechanisms so as to provide positive affective state and in turn enhance network effects and value co-creation that improves the social commerce platform as a whole.

Corporate environmentalism and brand value: A natural resource-based perspective

ABSTRACT Given ever-increasing engagement of firms in corporate environmentalism over the past few decades, a multitude of studies investigated the antecedents and consequences of corporate environmentalism. Extant studies exploring the consequences of corporate environmentalism predominantly measured its effects on firm performance. However, to the best of our knowledge, no study thus far has explored whether or not the key pro-environmental initiatives pertaining to corporate environmentalism carried out by industrial firms have any effect on market-based assets, namely, brand value. This study endeavored to address this gap in the literature. Drawing on natural resource-based view of the firm (NRBV), this study argued that industrial firms committed to corporate environmentalism reap rewards in the form of higher brand value. This study investigated three salient areas of corporate environmentalism, namely, environmental innovation, efficiency in using natural resources and emission reduction. The findings of this research demonstrate that industrial firms that outperform in environmental innovation, use fewer natural resources, and reduce emission have a higher brand value. Interestingly, while environmental innovation and efficiency in using natural resources contribute fairly equally to brand value, ability to reduce emissions contributes the least to brand value creation.

Workplace ostracism and feedback-seeking behavior: a resource-based perspective

Based on the model of proactive motivation and the conservation of resources (COR) theory, the current study examines how workplace ostracism as a negative relational context influences feedback-seeking behavior (FSB) and whether personal (i.e., loss-focused coping orientation) and condition resources (i.e., supervisor and spousal support) can buffer the detrimental impacts of workplace ostracism on employees. Using a sample of 506 employees from China, we employed the PROCESS macro to examine our hypotheses. The results showed that workplace ostracism had a negative indirect impact on FSB by reducing vitality. Employees’ personal and condition resources also weakened the direct detrimental impact of workplace ostracism on vitality as well as its indirect impact on FSB (i.e., moderated mediation effects). This study extends the relational antecedents of FSB by examining workplace ostracism. More importantly, we provide a resource perspective to interpret how and when workplace ostracism influences FSB, moving beyond the dominant cost-value framework in the FSB literature.

The antecedents of corporate entrepreneurship: multilevel, multisource evidence

This study employed a resource-based view to develop a multilevel model of firm-level high-performance work systems, dyad-level human capital, firm-level bridging ties and unit-level corporate entrepreneurship. We collected multisource and multilevel data from 420 senior managers, 1260 managers and 3348 employees of 210 units from 96 Taiwanese manufacturing and service sectors firms. The results revealed that dyad-level human capital partially mediated the relationship between firm-level high-performance work systems and unit-level corporate entrepreneurship and firm-level bridging ties moderated the effect of firm-level high-performance work systems on unit-level corporate entrepreneurship through dyad-level human capital. Our findings contribute to corporate entrepreneurship by exploring its antecedent and indirect effect from a resource-based perspective. Furthermore, we have found that the indirect influence of firm-level high-performance work systems and unit-level corporate entrepreneurship varies as a function of the bridging ties at the firm level. This paper advances existing research by offering new insights in the area of corporate entrepreneurship.

A study on top managers from a resource-based perspective

PurposeThis study aims to apply the resource-based and upper-echelons perspectives to integrate concepts of strategic decision-making (i.e. speed and quality) and transformational leadership behavior (i.e. inspirational motivation, intellectual stimulation, individualized consideration and idealized influence) to examine how these resources are influenced by the characteristics of top managers (i.e. demographic backgrounds and entrepreneurial orientation) to affect firm performance.Design/methodology/approachUsing evidence from a sample of 111 top managers from different firms in Taiwan, this research examined the relationships among the selected variables using two versions of the designed questionnaire: one for the leader, and the other for the followers. Confirmatory factor analysis and structural equation modeling were used to analyze the data.FindingsThe findings reveal the following: the entrepreneurial orientation of top managers does affect their leadership style, which affects firm performance; if top managers display traits of transformational leadership, then firm performance will be higher, likely because transformational leaders tend to make high-quality decisions and strategic decision-making speed was influenced by the experience of top managers and the inspirational motivation provided by transformational leadership.Originality/valueThis study makes three specific contributions: improving the limitations of demographics-based top-management studies by investigating both demographics and psychological characteristics; advancing research on the relationships between entrepreneurial orientation and performance by integrating transformational leadership behaviors and examining the proposed research model from a resource-based perspective.

Entrepreneurial Orientations and Business Financial Performance: The Case of Micro Businesses in Tanzania

Micro business in Africa including Tanzania does not perform well financially due to various business environmental challenges. In this line, entrepreneurial orientations are said to improve micro business financial performance regardless of unfavourable business environment. Despite such importance of entrepreneurial orientations, there was scanty knowledge on the influence of proactive and risk taking behaviour on business sales and costs. Focusing from the Contingency perspective, this article aimed at filling in such knowledge gap. Most studies examined the influence of entrepreneurial orientations on firm performance from the resource-based perspective. However, the influence of entrepreneurial orientations on firm performance depends on the match between entrepreneurial orientations and firm performance goals. The article involved 388 micro businesses from Dar-es-salaam, Mbeya, Morogoro, and Manyara. The questionnaire was used to collect data while Mean and Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) were used as data analysis techniques. The results revealed that proactive behavior had significantly positive influence on business sales and significantly negative influence on business costs. Furthermore, the risk-taking behaviour was found to have significantly positive influence on business costs. Among others, the article recommends that the micro business owners/operators should strengthen their entrepreneurial capacity together with their employees. It will be achieved by establishing sectoral associations in accordance with their business categories, i.e., trade, services and manufacturing in order to organize and access professional entrepreneurial trainings.

The internationalisation of TechnoLatinas from a resource-based perspective

PurposeThis paper investigates how entrepreneurs in an emerging economy in Latin America bundle resources to develop capabilities related to entering new markets whilst creating value for their firms. In particular, the paper explores how individual resources (experiential knowledge and social networks) impact on entrepreneurs' capabilities to exploit new market opportunities.Design/methodology/approachThe paper employs a case study approach to investigate five cases of entrepreneurs driving technology-based businesses in Brazil. Effectuation theory is used as a lens to ascertain how resources impact on the decision-making capabilities of the entrepreneurs and firms. The research adopts a longitudinal approach, capturing data from thirty interviewees over a period corresponding to domestic and international market entry of these TechnoLatinas ' businesses.FindingsThis paper builds on previous resource-based view (RBV) studies by supplementing evidence that individual and firm-level resources determine the development of capabilities to exploit new market opportunities for new firms. The presence of experiential knowledge (in particular, business planning, market analysis and experimentation) and social networks (individual resources) drives to a mix of causal and effectual heuristics; however, in the presence of firm-level resources (human and financial capital), new entrepreneurs tend to shift towards a stronger causal orientation.Research limitations/implicationsThe case companies are high technology, knowledge-intensive Brazilian start-up firms sharing a similar institutional setting. Further research should include a more diverse range of cases including other sectors and other countries in Latin America adopting quantitative design to confirm and generalise these findings.Practical implicationsFor policymakers and practitioners, this research provides guidelines on how entrepreneurs' know-how and social networks can be enhanced by providing access to the international market to speed up the growth of a new firm. For entrepreneurship educators, this research explains how effectual orientation (EO) or causal orientation (CO) influences the entrepreneur to exploit the available resources to maximise the growth of businesses in the international market.Originality/valueThe resource-based literature usually ignores the challenges faced by new resource-constrained firms and the individual-level resources of the entrepreneurs. This research contributes to the RBV, entrepreneurship and internationalisation debate by identifying the interplay between RBV and effectuation theory, particularly by bringing forward the impact of individual resources and capabilities of entrepreneurs to make the decision to enter a new market. Moreover, by using the effectuation theory, the research contributes to a better understanding of how resources are managed to create value and growth in new firms.