Speed of the internationalisation process. The role of objective vs. subjective perceptions of time

Abstract

Time is often neglected as a factor in international business research. In this paper, objective and subjective perspectives of time are incorporated into the study of speed of a firm's internationalisation process. The concept of speed is defined as the relationship between distance and time, and therefore we propose a theoretical framework that applies these two perspectives of time both to distance and to time, and differentiate between three levels of analysis: individual, organisational, and environmental. Our framework also incorporates two mediating constructs: learning speed and risk perception. Ten hypotheses are proposed that contribute towards a better understanding of the temporal dimension of the internationalisation process.