A study on entrepreneurial orientation and resource acquisition: The effects of social capital

Abstract

Entrepreneurial Orientation (EO) has emerged as an important construct within the strategic
management and entrepreneurship literatures over the past two decades. Empirical studies on the
determinants of firm’s resource acquisition have shown a fairly consistent positive relationship
between the EO of the firm’s senior management and firm’s resource acquisition capability. Studies
aimed at understanding this relationship have primarily focused on analyzing the separate dimensions
of EO, or on isolating contingency variables that are thought to moderate this relationship. However,
there has been limited research on the mechanisms that might moderate the influence of EO on firm’s
resource acquisition capability. According to the Resource-Based View (RBV) of the firm, resource
acquisition tends to be considerably more challenging for enterprises. The RBV implies that differential
endowment of organizational resources is an important determinant of strategic actions and
performance. Previous research has shown that social networks can give firms an important advantage
in the acquisition of valuable resources. The resource acquisition benefits derived from social networks
are particularly important for enterprises because they can help firms to overcome market information
hurdles and enable them to develop new capabilities in an efficient manner. The proposed study will
seek to evaluate the roles of social capital in accounting for the influence of EO on resource
acquisition.