Development of Entrepreneurial Orientation of Export Manufacturers from Emerging Economies

This paper is an empirical investigation of the major drivers of entrepreneurial orientation (EO) of export manufacturers from emerging economies. The paper asserts that there is scarcity of empirical research on EO in the contexts with weak institutions, as those in emerging economies. This research carries clear policy and practical implications regarding the factors supporting or constraining the development of EO. Drawing on the resource-based view and institutional theory, this study applies a partial least squares path modelling method to test conceptual predictions on the survey sample of 105 export manufacturers from two East African countries. It additionally uses importance-performance-matrix analysis to identify the most important predictor variables. Consistent with the resource-based view and institutional theory, research findings reveal that firms capitalise on all predictor variables, i.e. institutional support (IS), learning orientation (LO) and manufacturing capability (MC) to shape their EO. Furthermore, the research findings reveal that LO and MC mediate the relationship between IS and EO. This paper represents one of the very first original studies that have combined the resource-based view and institutional theory to establish the major drivers of entrepreneurial orientation in the contexts of weak institutions found in emerging economies.