• Journal of Information Technology Applications and Management
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• v.15 no.3
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• pp.127-152
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• 2008

This study sought to explore how SMEs are utilizing EC. Drawing on existing research on IT and EC related field, this study presented the framework of EC utilization level and analyzed its affecting factors in the point of organizational perspectives; strategy and competency. The impact of EC utilization on firm performance was also examined by employing BSC. Structural equation model was applied to test the relationships among the theoretical constructs with data from 171 SMEs. The results showed that the rate of EC utilization in SMEs is growing quite rapidly. However, manufacturing related firms still remain at a lower level compared to service related firms. As for the two affecting factors of EC utilization level, it was found that the level of EC utilization appeared to be driven not by strategy but by competency. This result implicates that EC utilization in SMEs doesn't reach to strategic purpose yet, while it is dependent on firm's competency. As far as the impact of EC utilization on firm performance, the study showed that the level of EC utilization has significant relationship with all perspectives performance indicators of BSC. This study can provide the managers with current EC utilization pattern and the guidelines as to where to put the efforts in the EC utilization and how to get an effective EC utilization strategy in the future.

• Korean Journal of Construction Engineering and Management
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• v.8 no.6
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• pp.246-262
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• 2007

The performance of projects has always been an area of interest in the construction industry. Roles of all construction supply chain partners are necessary; however the role of a contractor firm in the construction project is pivotal. So, this research intended to explore a Construction Firm's performance criteria which could measure the level of performance of that firm in an ongoing project. Data was collected from construction professionals working in three principal project participant organizations, namely Owner, Consultant and Contractor. A total of 113 nos. of performance measuring items were sorted from literature review and used to collect data. Statistical tools processed by SPSS program was employed to analyze the data. Out of total 113 items, only 65 nos. of variables were found to be acceptable to every population group of this study. Factor analysis revealed 12 key performance predicting factors (KPPF) with 53 predictive indicators. 12 KPPFS with index weight are: work progress and smoothening (9.3%), change order management and work accuracy (9.1%), business relationship building (8.1%), adequacy of construction work procedure (8.6%), quality performance (8.0%), health and site safety adequacy (8.8%), Innovative contractor (8.0%), adequacy of construction site information (6.8%), compliance with contract plan/specification requirements (8.9%), creditworthiness and financial capability (8.3%), intra-agency relationship and responsiveness (7.0%) and resource management (9.2%). These results could be useful to project management body to evaluate performance of its contractor firm on site as well as the contractor itself to assess own performance and its subcontractors on-site.

• Asia pacific journal of information systems
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• v.18 no.4
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• pp.57-81
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• 2008

Knowledge is an essential strategic weapon for sustaining competitive advantage and is the key determinant for organizational growth. When knowledge is shared and disseminated throughout the organization, it increases an organization's value by providing the ability to respond to new and unusual situations. The growing importance of knowledge as a critical resource has forced executives to pay attention to their organizational knowledge. Organizations are increasingly undertaking knowledge management initiatives and making significant investments. Knowledge sourcing is considered as the first important step in effective knowledge management. Most firms continue to make an effort to realize the benefits of knowledge management by using various knowledge sources effectively. Appropriate knowledge sourcing strategies enable organizations to create, acquire, and access knowledge in a timely manner by reducing search and transfer costs, which result in better firm performance. In response, the knowledge management literature has devoted substantial attention to the analysis of knowledge sourcing strategies. Many studies have categorized knowledge sourcing strategies into intemal- and external-oriented. Internal-oriented sourcing strategy attempts to increase firm performance by integrating knowledge within the boundary of the firm. On the contrary, external-oriented strategy attempts to bring knowledge in from outside sources via either acquisition or imitation, and then to transfer that knowledge across to the organization. However, the extant literature on knowledge sourcing strategies focuses primarily on large organizations. Although many studies have clearly highlighted major differences between large and small firms and the need to adopt different strategies for different firm sizes, scant attention has been given to analyzing how knowledge sourcing strategies affect firm performance in small firms and what are the differences between small and large firms in the patterns of knowledge sourcing strategies adoption. This study attempts to advance the current literature by examining the impact of knowledge sourcing strategies on small firm performance from a holistic perspective. By drawing on knowledge based theory from organization science and complementarity theory from the economics literature, this paper is motivated by the following questions: (1) what are the adoption patterns of different knowledge sourcing strategies in small firms (i,e., what sourcing strategies should be adopted and which sourcing strategies work well together in small firms)?; and (2) what are the performance implications of these adoption patterns? In order to answer the questions, this study developed three hypotheses. First hypothesis based on knowledge based theory is that internal-oriented knowledge sourcing is positively associated with small firm performance. Second hypothesis developed on the basis of knowledge based theory is that external-oriented knowledge sourcing is positively associated with small firm performance. The third one based on complementarity theory is that pursuing both internal- and external-oriented knowledge sourcing simultaneously is negatively or less positively associated with small firm performance. As a sampling frame, 700 firms were identified from the Annual Corporation Report in Korea. Survey questionnaires were mailed to owners or executives who were most erudite about the firm s knowledge sourcing strategies and performance. A total of 188 companies replied, yielding a response rate of 26.8%. Due to incomplete data, 12 responses were eliminated, leaving 176 responses for the final analysis. Since all independent variables were measured using continuous variables, supermodularity function was used to test the hypotheses based on the cross partial derivative of payoff function. The results indicated no significant impact of internal-oriented sourcing strategies while positive impact of external-oriented sourcing strategy on small firm performance. This intriguing result could be explained on the basis of various resource and capital constraints of small firms. Small firms typically have restricted financial and human resources. They do not have enough assets to always develop knowledge internally. Another possible explanation is competency traps or core rigidities. Building up a knowledge base based on internal knowledge creates core competences, but at the same time, excessive internal focused knowledge exploration leads to behaviors blind to other knowledge. Interestingly, this study found that Internal- and external-oriented knowledge sourcing strategies had a substitutive relationship, which was inconsistent with previous studies that suggested complementary relationship between them. This result might be explained using organizational identification theory. Internal organizational members may perceive external knowledge as a threat, and tend to ignore knowledge from external sources because they prefer to maintain their own knowledge, legitimacy, and homogeneous attitudes. Therefore, integrating knowledge from internal and external sources might not be effective, resulting in failure of improvements of firm performance. Another possible explanation is small firms resource and capital constraints and lack of management expertise and absorptive capacity. Although the integration of different knowledge sources is critical, high levels of knowledge sourcing in many areas are quite expensive and so are often unrealistic for small enterprises. This study provides several implications for research as well as practice. First this study extends the existing knowledge by examining the substitutability (and complementarity) of knowledge sourcing strategies. Most prior studies have tended to investigate the independent effects of these strategies on performance without considering their combined impacts. Furthermore, this study tests complementarity based on the productivity approach that has been considered as a definitive test method for complementarity. Second, this study sheds new light on knowledge management research by identifying the relationship between knowledge sourcing strategies and small firm performance. Most current literature has insisted complementary relationship between knowledge sourcing strategies on the basis of data from large firms. Contrary to the conventional wisdom, this study identifies substitutive relationship between knowledge sourcing strategies using data from small firms. Third, implications for practice highlight that managers of small firms should focus on knowledge sourcing from external-oriented strategies. Moreover, adoption of both sourcing strategies simultaneousiy impedes small firm performance.

• Journal of Korea Technology Innovation Society
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• v.19 no.1
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• pp.137-160
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• 2016

This study assesses the structure relationships between resource, product and process innovation capability, technology commercialization competence and performance of firms in Daedeok Innopolis. In particular, this study attempts to analyze technology commercialization competence that may be influenced by product and process capabilities. The development of the research model is based on the literature of resource-based view and the empirical studies of technology commercialization competence. The survey of 109 firms was conducted from January 5, 2015 through February 4, 2015. We investigate the role of a firm's technology commercialization competence in determining its performance by performing Partial Least Squares analysis. The results indicate that a firm's human resources and intangible resources lead to a higher level of its product and process innovation capabilities. This study, however, finds that a firm's tangible resources do not have significant effects on its product and process innovation capabilities. And the study finds evidence that firm's product and process capabilities have positive effects on its technology commercialization competence. The study also finds that a firm's technology commercialization competence is a driving force behind its performance, showing that its technology commercialization competence positively involves its performance. In addition the study finds that technology commercialization competence mediates the relationship between a firm's innovation capability and performance, indicating that the technology commercialization used as mediating variable positively affects its innovation performance.

• Journal of Korean Society of Industrial and Systems Engineering
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• v.21 no.45
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• pp.279-289
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• 1998

This paper investigates relationship between information technology(IT) and firm's performance. Responses from 101 companies relating to their experiences with IT implementation are presented. In this paper, it is assumed that companies' resource classified as the human, business, and IT resource relying on resource-based view, and its performance as the overall performance and IT performance. The findings show that IT resource among companies' resource is most strongly correlated with its performance. In particular, IT-intensive firms show better the overall performance than IT-lagging firms.

• International Commerce and Information Review
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• v.12 no.4
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• pp.25-45
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• 2010

The objective of this paper is to review the mechanics of how global e-trade practices can affect a firm's performance. It is well known that the introduction of global e-trade systems can save transaction costs at the macro level. However this study is extended at micro level by determining whether global trade transaction costs influence positively or negatively in exporting firms performances at firm level. A theoretical framework is suggested for determining the usage and performance of global e-trade with the global e-trade barriers. An empirical analysis of South Korean exporting firms has been undertaken. This paper concludes that the global e-trade has yet to overcome the barriers resulting from the transaction costs and asset specificity. In this regard, appropriate action like intensive education and training program should be implemented in order to make South Korea's global e-trade more matured.

• Asia-Pacific Journal of Business Venturing and Entrepreneurship
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• v.11 no.2
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• pp.167-182
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• 2016

The purpose of this study is to investigate the effects of CEO technological capability on management performance and mediating role of firm's technological capability. The empirical data for this study are taken not from subjective studies released by companies but from the Korea Technology Guarantee Fund's(KTGF) technology assessment data. The result are as follows. First, CEO technological capability has a very significant and important influence on firm's technological capabilities and on technological performance(intellectual property rights(-), technology spillover effect(+)) and on management performance. Second, mediating role of firm's technological capability is revealed negatively only between CEO technological capability and intellectual property rights. Because of CEO technological capability has a significant influence on firm's technological capability and management performance, start-up based on expertise show a higher probability of success than the founder.

• Journal of Distribution Science
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• v.13 no.1
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• pp.7-18
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• 2015

Purpose - This study integrates a corporate competition system with a bird predation system to examine how organizational strategic adjustment capacity influences firm performance. By proving the prominent effects on performance, a financial vector is constructed to represent corporate strategic adjustment results, and an operation capacity vector is constructed, which can be categorized as a parameter for locating birds. All these works help us to propose a new method of investment, the portfolio decision model based on the strategic adjustment capacity. Research design, data, and methodology - Strategic adjustment capacity can be decomposed into three aspects: the organizational learning capacity from the top firms, the extent to which firms maintainor rely on the best operational capacity vector in history, and the ability to eliminate the disadvantages or retain the advantages of the operation capacity vector from the previous year. The method of solving cyclic equations is designed to evaluate strategic adjustment. Firms manufacturing specialized equipment are chosen to test the effects of the strategic adjustment capacity on three aspects of firm performance. Results - There is a positive correlation between the capacity to learn from the best firms and performance improvement. The relationship between the dependence or maintenance of a firm's advantages and performance improvement is a U-shape curve, and there is no significant effect of inertial control on performance improvement. Conclusions - A firm's competition system is a sophisticated adaptation, and competitive advantage and performance can be investigated based on the principles of competition in nature.

• International Journal of Costume and Fashion
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• v.5 no.1
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• pp.75-89
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• 2005

The purpose of this study is to empirically ascertain how the fitness between marketing strategy each firm chooses and environment facing each firm affects the performance of firms measured by the growth rate of market share and the growth rate of profit/sales ratio. In doing so, firms are divided into three groups. With regard to the marketing strategy, firms are classified into three groups based on marketing strategy type; prospector, analyzer, and defender. The main result of this study are as follows: First, responding firms are classified into prospector, analyzer, and defender following Miles & Snow's marketing strategy types. This classification is made using a self typing method and further confirmed by a factor analysis using a number of variables relating marketing objectives and marketing mix. Second, the results show that there are significant differences across marketing strategies in the performance measures of the growth rate of market share and profit/sales ratio. It seems, however, that there is no straight forward relationship between the marketing strategy and the performance measures. This strongly implies that the type of marketing strategy to be adopted by each firm should depend on the environment facing each firm. Third, the result indicates that the growth rate of market share tends to depend only on the marketing strategy type regardless of sufficiency and variation of environment, but profit/sales ratio tends to depend on the fitness between marketing strategy type and environment. It implies that a firm should adopt different marketing strategies for different environment characteristics, in order to enhance the efficiency of resources used reflected in the profit/sales ratio.

• Knowledge Management Research
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• v.15 no.1
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• pp.65-84
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• 2014

Organization's innovation capability is strongly tied to its intellectual capital or knowledge utilization. Employees play a key role in generation of intellectual capital and utilization of knowledge in a firm. Thus, the importance of human resource management (HRM) system for enhancing competency of employees and facilitating knowledge sharing between employees is getting its significance. In this paper, we highlighted the effect of HRM implementation to explain the reason of performance differences among firms, adopting the same ideal HRM system. The successful implementation of HRM system as well as the contents of HRM system was critical to enhance firm performance through HRM system. To investigate the effect of HRM implementation on firm performance, we proposed the three components of HRM implementation (i.e.; TMT philosophy, HR department capability and communication) in perspective of sense making and sense giving theory. Then, we analyzed the moderating effect of HRM implementation on the high commitment HRM - firm performance relationship. Empirical results showed that each component of HRM implementation positively strengthened the relationship between high commitment HRM and firm performance. In addition, the composite index of HRM implementation calculated by average value of three components revealed more significant moderating effect between the two. Furthermore, We discussed the academical and practical implications, and suggested future research directions.