Management development, innovation and performance of small exporting firms in New Zealand

Abstract

The study investigates the impact of engagement in management development (MD) activities by the owner-managers of small exporting firms on firm-level innovation and the latter’s impact on the firms’ overall performance. Guided by the resource-based view of the firm, the study argues that MD can endow firms with valuable resources that fuel organisational innovation which enables firms to reap positive rates of return from their export operations. The study addresses a lacuna in the literature on the role of MD in the internationalisation of small firms. The study is a survey of 263 small exporting firms in New Zealand’s service and manufacturing industries. Logistic regression technique was used to examine the hypotheses on the MD – innovation – export performance nexus.