Exploring impact of entrepreneurial orientation on firm performance – moderators’ variability under changing market conditions

Previous research has indicated that the impact of entrepreneurial orientation (EO) on performance is ambiguous. This relationship can be affected by numerous factors – both internal and external. This study aims to examine the moderating impact of inter-organizational cooperation, competitive behaviors, digitalization, diversification, and flexibility on the relationship between EO and performance; it also assesses the impact of market conditions on the relationships that were examined above. The sample was comprised of 150 small printing companies, and the moderating roles were analyzed with PLS-SEM. The results confirmed the strong positive impact of EO on firm performance under both non-crisis and crisis conditions. The results indicated that, under crisis conditions, the impact of EO on market performance is positively moderated by inter-organizational cooperation, digitalization, and diversification. However, these factors do not moderate the examined relationship under non-crisis conditions – they only become moderators during a crisis. When supported with the Welch-Satterthwait statistical test, these observations indicated the moderating role of market conditions on the other factors that were examined in this study. With its findings, this study contributes to the literature on entrepreneurship and crisis management. The originality of the study is two-fold: first, this study examines the moderating impact of several factors that have not been previously tested on the EO–performance relationship; and second, it compares the examined models (and the entrepreneurial behaviors that are reflected in these models) and tests the moderating roles of the examined factors under two different market conditions (non-crisis, and crisis). In this way, the study tests the moderating role of market conditions as it relates to the examined moderators.