دانلود رایگان مقاله انگلیسی خلاقیت و توسعه سازمانی: نقش رهبری سازمانی - امرالد 2017

Abstract

Purpose: This study assesses the moderation effect of organizational leadership on the relationship between service firm’s innovation strategy and organizational development. The study argues that in Ghana where power distance is high, organizational leadership provides the needed impetus for strategies such as innovation to achieve enhanced firm performance. Design/methodology/approach: Data was collected from different service firms across Ghana for this study. A confirmatory factor analysis was used for construct reliability and validity checks. Robust regression estimations were then performed to test the hypothesized relationships. Findings: The results show that both product innovation as strategy and organizational leadership are positively related to organizational development (i.e. financial and non-financial performance). It was also found that organizational leadership does not only serve as a predictor of strategy formulation but provides the necessary strategic fit between a firm’s strategy and business environment to achieve organizational development. Implication/Originality: This study has shown that in high power distance cultures, firms that are able to align their leadership orientation with their institutional environment are able to create a better fit between their strategic orientation and business environment in order to enhance organizational development.

Conclusion and implications

We seek to assess the nature of the moderation effect of organizational leadership on the relationship between firms’ strategy and organizational development. The study argues that in Africa and for that matter Ghana, where power distance is high (Hofstede et al., 1997), organizational leadership provides the needed incentive for strategies such as innovation to achieve firm performance enhancement. We posit that organizational leadership does not only serve as predictor of strategy formulation but provides the needed strategic fit for strategy implementation to achieve organizational development in the form of firm performance enhancement. The institutional structures of high power distance cultures should therefore guide leaders of organizations to cultivate a strategic fit between firms’ strategic orientation and the business environment to improve on the firm performance.

The results from this study have significant theoretical and managerial implications for organizational development in Africa. Our results show that both innovation as a strategy and organizational leadership impact on organizational development in terms of financial and non-financial performance. The implications for these findings are that firms in Africa and specifically in Ghana’s services sector can improve on their financial and non-financial performance by investing in product innovations. The positive relationship found between innovation and performance is akin to previous studies (e.g. Anning-Dorson, et al., 2015; Gronum, et al., 2012; Crossan and Apaydin, 2010). By extension, African firms may seek performance improvement through differentiating their products from the competition, by going for first mover advantage from their new products and constantly introducing new services in their market of operations.