تاثیر استراتژی کسب و کار بر فعالیت محصول جدید: نقش بازارگرایی

In this paper, we propose that business strategy influences new product activity both directly and indirectly via its influence on market orientation. Accordingly, we develop a framework linking firms' relative emphasis on cost leadership, product differentiation and focus strategies to firms' customer and competitor orientation as well as their new product development and introduction activity. We use this framework to develop a simultaneous equations model that is tested on survey data from 175 Dutch firms of varying size and across different industries in the manufacturing sector. The surprising findings are that a greater emphasis on a focus strategy results in a decreased emphasis on customer orientation and that competitor orientation has a negative direct influence on new product activity and an indirect positive effect via customer orientation. We discuss the implications of these findings for theory and practice.

New product development and introduction are activities of vital importance to the growth and performance of firms. Despite considerable research into factors leading to successful new product activity (e.g., Henard & Szymanski, 2001 and Montoya-Weiss & Calantone, 1994) as well as the consequences of such activity (e.g., Cardozo et al., 1993 and Manu & Sriram, 1996), little work has examined how business strategy influences the degree to which new product development and introduction is undertaken within the firm Dröge & Calantone, 1996, Zahra, 1993 and Zahra & Covin, 1993. The limited attention to the strategy–new product activity relationship is surprising given that new product activity is of strategic importance to firms and is therefore very likely to be influenced by the firm's strategic choices. For instance, a firm that primarily follows a strategy of product differentiation is more likely to be involved in new product development than a firm that follows a cost leadership strategy (Porter, 1980). Likewise, prospector firms are likely to be more intensely involved in new product activity than firms that pursue other strategy types (Miles & Snow, 1978). In this paper, therefore, we focus on how firms' relative emphasis on different business strategies influences the degree to which they engage in new product development and introduction. Further, we aim to open up the ‘black box’ between strategy and new product activity by studying the role of a potential mediator, namely market orientation. Recent research suggests that the degree to which a firm is involved in new product activity depends on the extent and nature of its market orientation Athuene-Gima, 1995, Athuene-Gima, 1996, Han et al., 1998, Hurley & Hult, 1998, Narver et al., 2000 and Ottum & Moore, 1997. Summarizing this view, Narver et al. (2000, p. 11) state that “a market orientation, whether reactive or proactive, is the foundation for a firm's innovation efforts.” Market orientation may be considered at multiple levels in the firm (Deshpandé, 1999) and is, accordingly, conceptualized in two ways in the current literature: as an organizational culture and as a set of behaviors. The first, cultural view considers market orientation as a set of organization-wide shared values. It posits a causal chain leading from these values, through norms for market orientation that reflect expectations about specific behaviors, to actual market-oriented behaviors themselves Deshpandé & Webster, 1989 and Homburg & Pflesser, 2000. As business strategy is an indisputable reflection of organizational choices (Porter, 1996), a firm's strategy is also likely to be influenced by its cultural values. In the cultural view, therefore, market orientation would precede business strategy. In contrast to the cultural view, the second, behavioral view posits market orientation as consisting of a set of behaviors and resource allocations reflective of an organization-wide responsiveness to customers' needs and wants (Noble, Sinha, & Kumar, 2002; see Kohli & Jaworski, 1990 and Ruekert, 1992). Such behaviors serve to implement specific choices made by an organization and are therefore likely to follow from the firm's specific strategy (Walker & Ruekert, 1987). In this paper, we adopt the behavioral view of market orientation. Accordingly, we conceptualize strategy as influencing market orientation rather than vice versa, and hypothesize specific links between different strategies and the behavioral components of market orientation. Consistent with Narver and Slater (1990), we consider two behavioral components of market orientation: customer and competitor orientation. Most of the large body of work on market orientation has not made the distinction between firms that are primarily customer-oriented versus those that are primarily competitor-oriented. Similar to Han et al. (1998), Noble et al. (2002), and Slater and Narver (1994), we treat the market orientation construct as multidimensional. Further, firms' orientation towards customers or competitors is likely to influence how they respond to changes in the marketplace, in particular, the extent to which firms develop and introduce new products. Therefore, the extent and nature of a firm's market orientation will at least partially mediate the relationship between the firm's business strategy and its new product activity. For example, a firm that mainly follows a differentiation strategy could pursue new product activity in different ways depending on whether its focus is on customers (pro-active) or competitors (reactive). While a pro-active firm will identify and respond to long-term customer needs and thus be more customer-oriented Narver et al., 2000 and Slater & Narver, 1998, a reactive firm will identify and respond to competitors' actions and thus be more competitor-oriented (Schnaars, 1994). Our conceptualization of market orientation within the context of the business strategy of the firm—conceptualized as an antecedent of market orientation—and the actual implementation of this strategy through new product activity—conceptualized as a consequence of a specific type of market orientation—extends Jaworski and Kohli's (1993) framework of antecedents and consequences of market orientation to a strategic context. It is also consistent with the implementation literature on how strategic marketing choices are executed within the firm (Noble & Mokwa, 1999). By doing the above, this paper contributes to the extant literature in the following ways. First, it helps to further our understanding of how firms' strategic choices influence the degree to which new product development and introduction activities are undertaken within the firm. In contrast to the existing research on new product development which typically takes a prescriptive stance (a focus on the factors that determine successful from unsuccessful products), we adopt a descriptive approach that seeks to understand what strategic factors drive the extent to which firms engage in a specific, highly significant, market-oriented activity such as new product development. Our focus, therefore, is not on the new product development process as such (cf. Olson et al., 1995 and Sethi, 2000) but on its outcomes, specifically the extent to which new products are developed and introduced by firms (cf. Zahra, 1993). Second, by examining the potential mediating role of market orientation as a set of behaviors, we are able to better understand how business strategies drive actual implementation of cross-functional activities within the firm. Understanding the links between a firm's market orientation and its underlying business strategy is critical to understanding how an organization-wide commitment to markets can be created or, conversely, how this commitment may fail to arise in a firm. Third, as market orientation refers to the implementation of the marketing concept within the firm (Kohli & Jaworski, 1990), our approach adds insight into the role of the marketing function within the firm and its contribution towards the implementation of the firm's strategic choices Anderson, 1982 and Homburg et al., 1999. Given that some have questioned the marketing function's contribution to new product development within the firm (e.g., Workman, 1993) as well as the need for firms to be market-oriented in general and customer-oriented in particular (Christensen & Bower, 1996), our approach speaks directly to an issue of considerable importance to business practice (see Slater & Narver, 1998). This paper is organized as follows. First, we discuss a conceptual framework linking firms' business strategy to the nature and extent of their market orientation and extent of new product activity. Next we draw on this framework to formulate hypotheses relevant to the objectives of our study. We then discuss the method we employ to test these hypotheses, present the results of our study and discuss their implications for research and practice. We conclude with the limitations of the study and our recommendations for future research.

A key premise of our framework is that the influence of business strategy on new product activity is at least partially mediated by market orientation. For full mediation, four conditions have to be met (Baron & Kenny, 1986) (see Table 3 for results of these tests). First, the antecedent independent variables (business strategies) should influence the dependent variable (new product activity). To test for this, we estimated a model of the three business strategies on new product activity and found that differentiation (β=0.10, 2p<0.005) and focus (β=−0.11, p<0.005) significantly influence new product activity (see Table 3). Second, business strategy should influence the mediator (market orientation). To test for this, we estimated a model of the 3 business strategies on market orientation collapsed into a single construct 3 (cf. Han et al., 1998) and found that differentiation (β=0.45, p<0.005) and cost leadership (β=0.17, p<0.05) significantly influence market orientation. Third, the mediator (market orientation) should influence the dependent variable (new product activity). We found that this was true (β=0.14, p<0.005). And finally, the mediator (market orientation) should influence the dependent variable (new product activity) controlling for the direct effect of the independent variables (business strategies). The results indicate that the condition is not fully satisfied. While the influence of market orientation on new product activity is significant (β=0.04, p<0.10), so too is the influence of differentiation (β=0.08, p<0.005) and focus (β=−0.06, p<0.05). Taken together, these results provide support for a partially mediating role of market orientation between business strategy and new product activity Table 4 reports the results of the 3SLS analysis conducted to test our hypotheses as represented in Fig. 1 and , and above. Table 5 reports the direct and indirect effects of the variables in the model, computed using the standardized coefficients from Table 4. Finally, Fig. 2 reports these results in the context of our conceptual framework, representing the standardized estimates on the corresponding individual pathways.5 The results show support for H1. The influence of cost leadership on competitor orientation is positive and significant as predicted (β8=0.15, p<0.05). The results support H2a and H2b. Specifically, as predicted, differentiation has a positive significant influence on customer (β1=0.43, p<0.005) and competitor orientation (β6=0.40, p<0.005), respectively. H2c is also supported as differentiation has a positive significant direct influence on new product activity (β10=0.12, p<0.05). In contrast to H3a, which hypothesizes a positive influence of focus on customer orientation, the results suggest a negative effect (β2=−0.12, p<0.05). However, H3b is supported as focus has a negative influence on new product activity (β11=−0.25, p<0.005). In support of H4, customer orientation has a positive influence on new product activity (β13=1.85, p<0.005). However, in contrast to H5a, competitor orientation has a negative influence on new product activity (β14=−1.78, p<0.005). 6 However, in support of H5b, competitor orientation also has a positive significant influence on customer orientation (β4=1.05, p<0.005). Finally, the only non-hypothesized effect that was found to be significant was the influence of cost leadership on customer orientation (β3=0.14, p<0.05). In sum, the 3SLS results provide considerable support for our hypotheses as well as for a partially mediating role of market orientation in the strategy→NPA relationship.