Export propensity, export intensity and firm performance: The role of the entrepreneurial founding team

Abstract

We investigate how the characteristics and experience of the entrepreneurial founding team (EFT) affect the export orientation and subsequent performance of the businesses they establish, while allowing for the mutually reinforcing relationship between exporting and productivity. Using a sample of UK technology-based firms, we hypothesise and confirm that the set of EFT human capital needed for entering export markets is different from that required for succeeding in export markets. Commercial and managerial experience helps firms become exporters, but once over the exporting hurdle it is education, both general and specific, that has a substantially positive effect. The overall pattern of human capital effects on productivity is similar to those for export propensity. We also find evidence that productive firms are more likely both to enter export markets and to be export intensive, and that exporting boosts subsequent firm productivity.

Explaining intermittent exporting: Exit and conditional re-entry in export markets

“…Hence factors that prevent firms from dropping out of export markets -and which have not been accounted for in our exit model -also encourage firms to re-enter the export market. Although our data and model cannot (by definition) identify these unobserved firm-specific characteristics, the existing literature provides room for imagination about possible factors, such as management experience and capability (Ganotakis & Love, 2012), production networking effects (Bertrand, 2011), and differential international strategies (Sui & Baum, 2014).…”

“…For a summary of this literature see Ganotakis and Love (2012). 2 Hashai and Almor (2004) show that knowledgeintensive firms that appear to be 'born global' do in fact go through an internationalization process rather similar to that of larger MNEs.…”

Impacts of Managerial Characteristics on the Export Performance of Small and Medium-sized Firms: Review and Implications

“…Managerial capability is a part of the entrepreneurship and is directly responsible for and involved in export decisions, it could also be viewed as a significant stimulus of positive outcomes at both firm level and society level [1]. This had let many scholars to investigate the facilitating or inhibiting influence of managerial factors on different export dimensions, particularly firm's propensity to initiate export, aggressiveness in foreign markets, advancement along export development path and its performance overseas.…”

The Effects of the Degree of Internationalization on Export Performance: A Research on Exporters in Turkey

“…Thus, the human factor is an important element of the degree of internationalization (Onkelix et al, 2016). The human factor has a significant impact on the pace of internationalization (Loane et al, 2007) and export performance (Ganotakis and Love, 2012) of companies. On the other hand, selection of country as an export market could be a significant costreducing factor for the relationships of the exports company with the domestic and foreign country (He et al, 2016) Furthermore, country-scale geographical expansion is considered as one of the indicators of the degree of internationalization, in other words the intensity of exports (Perçin, 2005;Boehe and Jiménez, 2016).…”