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Motivated by the unique opportunity that a crisis period provides for capturing and reassessing specific entrepreneurial behaviors, this paper takes on the debate about the entrepreneurial attributes of informal ventures "IVent" and their endeavor to formalize. In doing so, Cronbach's alpha rationales and contingency analysis are applied to quantitative data from street vendors of the main markets of Cameroon to investigate informal entrepreneurial behavioral dynamics and their impact on a hypothetical willingness for change during the COVID-19 pandemic. It was uncovered that IVent have activated entrepreneurial attributes of resilience, intention and orientation. Also, specific composites or variables of entrepreneurial orientation and resilience have been found more supportive of IVent's endeavor to formalize than others. The novelties in that regard are: (1) While most of the variables related to the composite of innovativeness reinforce the desire to formalize, the variable of "routine" plays a hindering role. (2) The composite of proactiveness is not significantly related to the willingness to formalize. (3) The composite of risk-taking has proven significant to IVent's transformation aims. And (4) contrary to all other variables of the attribute of resilience and self-efficacy, the variable of behavior control appears to hamper the aim to move out of the shadows. It is argued that facilitating Ivent's dynamics and aspiration to formalize necessitates policymakers to advance policies that support the development of the uncovered determining composites. Furthermore, academia should undertake an extensive investigation into the role that the captured non-significant variables, attributes, and composites may play in fostering IVent's shadowed business lifecycle. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Entrepreneurship orientation is a fundamental topic both in entrepreneurship and in management that has a critical role in the development of the firm. The purpose of this paper is to study the relationship between entrepreneurial orientation (EO) and firm growth, specifically, how entrepreneurial leadership and market orientation mediate the relationship between EO and firm growth. The population of this study is agricultural small- and medium-sized enterprises (ASMEs) across Tehran Province. The survey instrument is questionnaires that were sent to 240 owners and/or top managers of ASMEs as a sample. Validity of the questionnaires has been verified in two ways of face and construct, and its reliability has been verified using Cronbach's alpha. The collected data has been analyzed by using the structural equation modeling. The results reveal that EO significantly influences firm growth in ASMEs. Notably, entrepreneurial leadership (EL) and market orientation (MO) perform a mediating role in the relationships between EO and firm's growth in ASMEs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose - The aim of this paper is to determine the role of the technology park support in the relationship between entrepreneurial orientation (EO) and enterprise performance. Research method - A multi-stage statistical analysis with elements of econometrics was utilised. The reliability of individual scales by Cronbach's alpha test was performed. Variables were treated as reflective and latent and exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis was performed. The relationship between the variables studied (analysis of Pearson correlation and Tau-B Kendall) was assessed. The Structural Equation Modelling (SEM) technique was used, including mediation analysis. Results - Technology park support is not a significant mediator of the relationship between EO and performance. Originality/value / implications/recommendations - The study results are a good starting point for further research to identify the variables which mediate the EO-performance relationship. They are also an inspiration to examine why companies in technology parks do not use the offer of support from these centres. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: This paper aims to investigate the effects of entrepreneurial orientation (EO) on the performance of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) with mediating role of differentiation strategy in Pakistan. Design/methodology/approach: A theoretical framework has been developed to base the hypotheses, as also to determine the exact approach in this study. To establish the influence of EO on the performance of SME, a five-point Likert scale questionnaire has been used to collect data from middle and senior managers who operate in SMEs in the manufacturing sectors. The sample illustrates 166 incumbents, comprising 68.07 per cent from middle management and 31.93 per cent from senior management operating in manufacturing sector of SMEs, by means of a stratified random sampling technique. The collected data were analyzed using SPSS and Amos graphics software. Hypotheses were tested by using structural equation modeling (SEM) technique. Findings: EO, as a whole, presents a significant positive effect on the performance of SMEs. Moreover, differentiation strategy partially mediated the relationship between EO and performance of SMEs. Two dimensions of EO, proactiveness and risk-taking propensity, strongly increased firm performance while innovativeness, competitive aggressiveness, autonomy and competitive energy did not cause any significant change. The findings differ from the current view of western enterprises that innovativeness (INO) played a major role by increasing performance of SMEs. The results transpired that innovativeness (INO) tends to reduce performance of SMEs, but the p-value did not reach a high significance value. Research limitations/implications: The main limitation of this empirical study is comparatively a small size of the sample. The analysis of power suggests that a larger sample could have provided more reliable and extensive results. Regardless of that, the analysis of reliability, using the Cronbach's alpha, exhibited the consistency of outcomes in providing an accurate portrait of the EO influences on the performance of SME. Practical implications: The study verifies that two dimensions of EO have considerable effects on the performance of SMEs, while the others have not, whereas, the EO, as whole, has significant positive effect on performance of SMEs. These findings should be helpful for researchers looking for appropriate performance measures, and for entrepreneurs aiming at getting support for their decisions and evaluating their performance. Originality/value: The current study appears to be first of its kind focusing on the link between EOs, as whole, and its dimensions, to performance of SMEs and differentiation strategies within the specific context of Pakistan. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]