Artikel
Are cooperative firms more agile? A contingency perspective on small and medium-sized enterprises in agglomerations and peripheral areas
In this study of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) operating in German key technology industries, we investigate whether cooperating with others is an effective strategy for SMEs to enhance their organizational agility. Taking a contingency perspective, we are specifically interested in whether this effect depends on the firm’s location in an agglomerated or a peripheral area. Results show that a greater number of cooperative relationships with others is positively associated with SMEs’ organizational agility. This effect is stronger for agglomerated than for peripheral firms, suggesting that agglomerated SMEs can seize the abundant opportunities to cooperate in order to counter agglomeration diseconomies such as organizational inertia and mimetic behavior. This finding highlights the importance of absorbing external knowledge gained in cooperative relationships for SMEs’ organizational agility. Thereby, the study offers a novel perspective on how agglomerated SMEs can actively prevent being negatively affected by the downsides of agglomerations.
- Language
-
Englisch
- Bibliographic citation
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Journal: Small Business Economics ; ISSN: 1573-0913 ; Volume: 58 ; Year: 2020 ; Issue: 1 ; Pages: 281-302 ; New York, NY: Springer US
- Classification
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Wirtschaft
Hypothesis Testing: General
Survey Methods; Sampling Methods
Search; Learning; Information and Knowledge; Communication; Belief; Unawareness
Entrepreneurship
Size and Spatial Distributions of Regional Economic Activity
- Subject
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Small and medium-sized enterprises
Organizational agility
Cooperation
Location
Agglomeration
Periphery
Contingency theory
- Event
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Geistige Schöpfung
- (who)
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Mueller, Elisabeth F.
Jungwirth, Carola
- Event
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Veröffentlichung
- (who)
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Springer US
- (where)
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New York, NY
- (when)
-
2020
- DOI
-
doi:10.1007/s11187-020-00410-3
- Last update
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10.03.2025, 11:42 AM CET
Data provider
ZBW - Deutsche Zentralbibliothek für Wirtschaftswissenschaften - Leibniz-Informationszentrum Wirtschaft. If you have any questions about the object, please contact the data provider.
Object type
- Artikel
Associated
- Mueller, Elisabeth F.
- Jungwirth, Carola
- Springer US
Time of origin
- 2020
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