电子商务的应用与中小企业的绩效外文文献翻译.docx

电子商务的应用与中小企业的绩效外文文献翻译.docx

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电子商务的应用与中小企业的绩效外文文献翻译

文献出处：

MichaelAbebe,（2014）"Electroniccommerceadoption,entrepreneurialorientationandsmall-andmedium-sizedenterprise（SME）performance", JournalofSmallBusinessandEnterpriseDevelopment,Vol.21Iss:

1,pp.100–116

原文

Electroniccommerceadoption,entrepreneurialorientationandsmall-andmedium-sizedenterprise（SME）performance

MichaelAbebe

Introduction

Thesignificantrolethatsmallandmedium-sizedenterprises（SMEs）playintheUSeconomyiswelldocumentedintheliterature.Asthepaceofeconomicglobalizationcontinuestoescalate,SMEsareincreasinglyexperiencingfiercecompetitionbothfromtheirdomesticandforeigncounterparts（MatlayandWesthead,2005; Etemad,2004; JulienandRamangalahy,2003; LuandBeamish,2001）.Inordertooffsettheirinherentresourceandsizedisadvantagesandstaycompetitive,SMEsemployanumberofcompetitivestrategiesandtools.Onesuchcompetitivetooliselectroniccommerce（e-commerce）（Raymond etal.,2005; Kleindl,2000;Stewart,1997）.

E-commercehasincreasinglybecomeanimportanttechnologicalmediumthroughwhichbusinessesservetheircustomers,expandtheirgeographicalreach,respondtocompetitivepressureandreduceoperationalcosts（MartinandMatlay,2003; Beck etal.,2005; WymerandRegan,2005）.Despitethetremendousamountofgrowthine-commerceadoptionaroundtheglobe,thereisstillasignificantdiscrepancybetweenSMEsandlarge,well-establishedfirms（Fomin etal.,2005; Pratt,2002）. Pratt（2002）,inastudyconductedfortheOfficeofAdvocacy,USSmallBusinessAdministration（SBA）,observedthatonly58percentofSMEshadawebsitecomparedto77percentoflargerfirms.Similarly,asurveyconductedbyForresterResearchfoundthatonly40percentofSMEssoldtheirproductsandservicesontheinternet（Weiss,2004）.Theseandothersimilarstudieshavenotedthat,whilesmallbusinessowners（managers）valuetheimportanceofe-commerce,relativelyfewofthemareabletoestablishaneffectivewebpresenceduetonumerousorganizationaldifficulties.

Pastscholarlyworkinthisareahasextensivelyexploredthepotentialstrategicbenefitsandpitfallsofe-commerceadoptioninSMEs（e.g. Johnston etal.,2007; MartinandMatlay,2003; WymerandRegan,2005; GrandonandPearson,2004; BianchiandBivona,2002; Webb,2002）.Ingeneral,pastresearchevidenceindicatesthatSMEsadopte-commerceinordertopursueaglobalstrategythatenablesthemtotargetabroadercustomerbase（MehtaandShah,2001; Moodley,2003; Beck etal.,2005）,addressenvironmentalandcompetitivepressuresintheirindustries（WymerandRegan,2005; GrandonandPearson,2004）,andtakeadvantageofsignificantcostsavingsassociatedwithimplementingsuchatechnology（Raymond etal.,2005; Riemenschneider etal.,2003; SantarelliandD'Altri,2003）.Despitethegrowingnumberofempiricalresearchdealingwithe-commerceissuesinSMEs,theliteraturehaslargelybeenconfinedtoexploratorystudiesthatexaminevariousfactorsaffectinge-commerceadoptioninSMEs（WymerandRegan,2005; HoughtonandWinklhofer,2004; Matlay,2004）.

Thisstudyseekstocontributetotheliteraturebyaddressingtworesearchquestions:

1.Istherearelationshipbetweene-commerceadoptionandperformanceofSMEs?

2.Moreimportantly,doesthedegreeofmanagers'entrepreneurialorientationmoderatetherelationshipbetweene-commerceadoptionandSMEperformance?

Accordingly,thisstudyfirstexaminesempiricallytherelationshipbetweene-commerceadoptionandSMEperformanceusingcross-sectionaldatacollectedfromtheSouthernpartoftheUSA.Thisstudytheninvestigateswhetherowner-managers'levelofentrepreneurialorientationmoderatesthee-commerceadoption-performancerelationshipinSMEs.

Thisstudyspecificallyfocusesonthismoderator（i.e.entrepreneurialorientation）fortworeasons:

first,sincemanagers（owner-mangers）ofSMEsareoftenmoredirectlyinvolvedinstrategicaswellasoperationaldecision-making（includingtechnologyadoptiondecisions）thanisthecaseinlargebusinesseswithmultiplelayersofmanagement（RaymondandBlili,2000; WincentandWesterberg,2005）,examiningtheroleofmanagerialcognitiveandbehavioralcharacteristicswillenhanceourunderstandingofe-commerceadoptioninSMEsanditsimpactonoverallfirmperformance.Second,byexaminingthisspecificmoderatorempirically,thisstudyextendstheongoingresearchthatpredominantlyfocusedonexploratoryissuesine-commerceadoptiontoincludetheconditionunderwhichSMEs'e-commerceadoptionenhancesfirmperformance.Hence,focusonthismoderatorprovidesavaluablecontingencyperspectivethatsuggeststheconditionunderwhichthee-commerceadoption-performancerelationshipisenhancedordiminished.

Theoreticalbackgroundandhypothesisdevelopment

E-commerceadoptionandSMEs'performance

Following KalakotaandWhinston（1997）,thispaperdefinese-commercefromtheB2Cperspectiveasbeing“thebuyingandsellingofinformation,productsandservicesviacomputernetworks”（p.3）.Asubstantialportionofthecurrentliteratureone-commerceadoptioninSMEsfocusesonfactorsthatinfluencetheadoptionandnon-adoptiondecision（e.g. Riemenschneider etal.,2003; GrandonandPearson,2004; Matlay,2004; Fomin etal.,2005; WymerandRegan,2005）.Thetheoryofplannedbehavior（Azjen,1991）,thetechnologyacceptancemodel（Davis,1989）,thetheoryofreasonedaction（AzjenandFishbein,1980）andthediffusionoftechnologytheory（Rogers,1995）aremajortheoreticalunderpinningsinmostoftheextantliterature.Researchine-commerceadoptionhasexaminedanumberofinternalandexternalfactorsinfluencingtheadoptiondecisioninSMEs（GrandonandPearson,2004; SutanonpaiboonandPearson,2006; Loane,2006; Saffu etal.,2008）.

Forinstance,intheirstudyof100managersfromSMEsintheUSA,GrandonandPearsonfoundthatorganizationalreadiness,externalpressure,andperceivedeaseofusesignificantlyaffecte-commerceadoption.Otherstudiesintheliteratureconsideredthebenefitsandrewardsofe-commerceadoptioninSMEs（StockdaleandStanding,2004; Raymond etal.,2005）. Raymond etal. （2005） studiedtheassimilationofe-businessactivitiesinmanufacturingSMEs.Accordingtotheirfindings,mostofthebenefitsandbusinesscapabilitiesderivedfrome-businessadoptioncanbecategorizedas“communicational/informational”functions,“businessintelligence”functionsand“transactional/collaborative”functions.Communicativefunctionsofe-commercemayincludepromotionofproductsand/orserviceaswellasinteractionwithcustomers.Businessintelligencefunctions,ontheotherhand,involveattractingpotentialclientsbothdomesticandabroadandgatheringcompetitorormarketintelligence（QuelchandKlein,1996; BianchiandBivona,2002; HoughtonandWinklhofer,2004）.Finally,transactional/collaborativeusefocusesonsellingproductsand/orservicesaswellasinteractingwithbusinesspartnersinordertocollaborateonR&Dandmarketing（Raymond etal. 2005）.Suchcollaborationsincludemaintaininganddevelopingrelationshipswithclients,channelpartner,suppliersandnetworkpartners（Coltman etal. 2001; Loane,2006; Auger,2005）.ThetransactionalbenefitsgenerallyextendtopromotingSMEsandservicingcustomersinnewmarketswithreducedoperationalexpenses（SantarelliandD'Altri,2003; Lohrke etal.,2006）.

Thisstudyextendstheongoingresearchone-commerceadoptionbyexaminingtherelationshipbetweene-commerceadoptionandperformanceofSMEs.Morespecifically,itisarguedthattherewillbeapositiveandsignificantinfluenceofe-commerceadoptiononSMEs'performanceduetotwomajorintermediaryorganizationalprocesses.First,e-commerceadoptionpositivelyaffectsSMEsperformancebyprovidinganenhancedandstreamlinedbusinessprocessmanagement.Severalstudiesintheliteraturefoundthate-commerceplaysanimportantroleinreducingtransactioncostsaswellasenablingamoreefficienthandlingofinternalbusinessprocessesinSMEs（e.g. Turner,2000; ChanandLee,2003; SantarelliandD'Altri,2003; Lohrke etal.,2006）.SantarelliandD'Altri（2003）,forinstance,observedintheiranalysisofItalianmanufacturingandserviceSMEsthatadoptingarobuste-commercecapabilityallowsthefirmstoreducethetransactioncostsinvolvedwithexternaldistributionchannels.Similarly,Lohrke etal. （2006）,drawingfromthetransaction-costeconomics（TCE）theory,proposedandtestedtheargumentthatSMEswithhighinformationspecificitytendtoadopte-commercemorethanthosewithlowerinformationspecificity,partlybecauseofthepossibilityofreducingthetransactioncostinvolvedindeliveringhighlyspecializedcustomersupport.Theresultsoftheiranalysesof47USmanufacturingSMEsprovidedsupportfortheirargument.Pastresearchhasalsoshownthate-commerceadoptioninSMEsimprovetheefficiencyofnotonlyinternalbusinessprocessesbutalsothebroadersupplychain（JohnstonandWright,2004;Kim etal.,2008）.Theseandothersimilarstudiesshowthate-commerceadoptionaffectstheoverallperformanceofSMEsprimarilybyprovidingamoreefficientandstreamlinedinternalbusinessprocessesthatinturntranslateintosignificantcost-savingandprofitability.

Thesecondintermediaryorganizationalprocessthroughwhiche-commerceadoptioninfluencesSMEsperformanceisenhancedmarketingcapability.OneofthemostobviousshortcomingsofSMEsistheirsizeandresourcedisadvantage vis-à-vis theirlargercompetitors.Hence,SMEsfacesignificantchallengesnotonlyinidentifyinganddevelopingabroadercustomerbasebutalsoincompetingagainstglobalcompetitors（Etemad,2004;