Purpose

This paper aims to examine the effect of technological, organizational and environmental factors on the level of innovation outcomes in manufacturing small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs).

Design/methodology/approach

Drawing on the technology-organization-environment theory this paper conducts a discriminant analysis of firms’ innovation level based on a data set of manufacturing SMEs.

Findings

The results show that low- and high-innovative firms can be distinguished in terms of information technology (IT) knowledge and infrastructure, commitment-based human resources (HR) selection practices, exploitative innovation and organizational capital.

Practical implications

The study findings support the idea that innovation is a complex phenomenon explained by multiple factors. As a consequence, firms need to devote extra efforts to develop IT knowledge and infrastructure, commitment-based HR selection practices and organizational capital because these are crucial for obtaining greater innovation outcomes. In addition, the identification of exploitative innovation as a strong discriminant variable highlights that the most effective way to be a highly innovative SME is through incremental innovation, which permits the firm to capitalize as much as possible on previous exploratory efforts.

Originality/value

Although many studies have highlighted that innovation is more challenging for SMEs than for their larger counterparts, the vast majority of studies has been conducted in large companies. This paper extends prior literature by analyzing the discriminant variables that may distinguish between low- and high-innovative manufacturing SMEs.

中文翻译：

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高创新和低创新企业的判别分析：IT、人力资源、创新战略、智力资本和环境活力的作用

目的

本文旨在研究技术、组织和环境因素对制造业中小型企业 (SME) 创新成果水平的影响。

设计/方法/方法

本文借鉴技术-组织-环境理论，基于制造业中小企业数据集对企业创新水平进行了判别分析。

发现

结果表明，在信息技术 (IT) 知识和基础设施、基于承诺的人力资源 (HR) 选择实践、开发性创新和组织资本方面，可以区分低创新和高创新公司。

实际影响

研究结果支持创新是一种由多种因素解释的复杂现象的观点。因此，公司需要付出额外的努力来开发 IT 知识和基础设施、基于承诺的人力资源选择实践和组织资本，因为这些对于获得更大的创新成果至关重要。此外，将剥削性创新确定为一个强判别变量，突出表明成为高度创新的中小企业最有效的方法是通过渐进式创新，这使公司能够尽可能多地利用以前的探索性努力。

原创性/价值

尽管许多研究强调，与大型同行相比，中小企业的创新更具挑战性，但绝大多数研究都是在大公司中进行的。本文通过分析可能区分低创新和高创新制造业中小企业的判别变量来扩展先前的文献。