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This study advances research on the return from entrepreneurial orientation by examining how a firm's internal system (i.e. strategic human resource management) and the external environment (i.e. technical turbulence) within which a firm operates interact in the relationship between entrepreneurial orientation and product innovation performance. Using a matched sample of 151 chief executive officers and other top executives from Chinese manufacturing firms, this study finds that entrepreneurial orientation is positively related to product innovation performance and that this relationship is stronger among firms implementing strategic HRM practices to a greater extent. Furthermore, the three-way interaction test indicates that the interactive effect of entrepreneurial orientation and strategic HRM practices on product innovation performance is stronger for firms operating in a less turbulent environment.

Chinese lower-level employees' perspective on western-style HRM is neglected. Partly remedying this gap, we report changes in non-managerial employees' feelings as they move from employment in Chinese-owned enterprises to that in Anglo-American-invested multinational corporations (MNCs). We investigate the employees' appreciation of their enterprise and three work aspects linked both to their enterprise HRM environment and to Chinese cultural emphases. Our findings show that increases in pride in enterprise and in feeling responsible for own work correlate significantly with increased intention to stay, but increases in feeling involved in enterprise decision-making do not. This suggests that Chinese non-managerial employees appreciate western-style HRM practices that resonate with their cultural values but not otherwise. Further, this suggests that Chinese cultural emphases on mianzi, collectivism and power distance remain important for non-managerial employees and that Chinese MNC unit managers, when introducing HRM practices, need to take account of possible differences in outlook between them and their subordinates.