The Importance of Opportunity Recognition Behaviour and Motivators of Employees When Engaged in Corporate Entrepreneurship

Abstract

Organisational innovation depends on individuals and managers fostering and maintaining the innovative capacities of the firm, where opportunity recognition is important for promoting corporate entrepreneurship. The study is unique in its focus on understanding opportunity recognition behaviours and motivators of employees and how these perceptions may influence corporate entrepreneurial activity. The study is conducted in an under-researched emerging market context, where 187 respondents were surveyed in the financial sector industry. The empirical findings indicate that employees perceive themselves as having high levels of opportunity recognition behaviours and motivators which are positively associated with willingness to engage in corporate entrepreneurial initiatives. The results further show that there is a significant positive relationship between opportunity recognition behaviours and the frequency of opportunities recognised. Implications highlight the importance of fostering opportunity recognition behaviours within an organisation and motivating employees to act innovatively.

Organisational antecedents of innovative firms: a focus on entrepreneurial orientation in South Africa

“…The study employed a cross-sectional design and was survey-based. Such a design is suitable to address the limitations of previous studies by empirically testing hypotheses where much uncertainty exists (Urban and Wood, 2015).…”

“…Several studies have empirically tested the influence of EO on firm performance (Ireland et al, 2009;Zahra and Covin, 1995) and reported a strong relationship over time, which means that EO is effective within the organisation over a certain period. Moreover, EO has been identified as an important predictor of firm growth in the South African context (Urban and Wood, 2015). Organisational performance in fast and changing environments such as emerging markets, make strong demands on the ability of firms to efficiently develop and utilise their resources in order to meet customer demands (Hoskisson et al, 2000).…”

“…Scholars confirm that entrepreneurship and innovation are positively associated to each other and interact to help an organisation to flourish (Urban and Wood, 2015;Wales, 2015). Not only are entrepreneurship and innovation complementary, but a combination of the two is vital to organisational success and sustainability in today's dynamic and changing environment (Dess and Lumpkin, 2005).…”

“…A longstanding literature has theorised corporate entrepreneurship as a multidimensional phenomenon, which incorporates the behaviour and interactions of the individual, organisational, and environmental elements within organisations (Antoncic and Hisrich, 2001;Moon et al, 2016;Phan et al, 2009). Extensive research on entrepreneurial behaviour by management and employees has highlighted a link between a firm's entrepreneurial orientation (EO) and performance across different industries and contexts (Ireland et al, 2009;Morris et al, 2010;Urban and Wood, 2015). EO is a form of organisational structure-making practice governed by corporate entrepreneurship (Covin and Miller, 2013), where research confirms that EO has three dimensions: innovativeness, risk-taking, and proactiveness (Covin and Miller, 2013;Murimbika and Urban, 2014;Wales, 2015).…”

Ahead of the Curve: Leveraging Antecedents of Corporate Entrepreneurship to Pull Off Competitive Advantage

“…Innovation-based corporate entrepreneurship is a development that emphasizes and clarifies the relationship between research areas of corporate entrepreneurship and innovation (Salamzadeh and Kirby, 2017). Innovation and entrepreneurship are positively related to each other to help an organization to be more successful and expansive (de Jong, 2013; Jarrar and Smith, 2014; Urban and Wood, 2015). Technological innovation can play a significant role to achieve higher level economic benefits by facilitating the production of new goods and services if it is well arranged and supported.…”