Entrepreneurial Competencies and Competitiveness of Small and Medium Firms

Abstract

newlineToday, Entrepreneurs play an influential role for the development of the economy across the globe. The empirical investigations conducted in recent years suggest a considerable and positive relationship between entrepreneurial role and competencies and firm performance as well as building the organizations competitiveness for growth and sustenance. However, research appears to be limited in the domain of understanding competencies of entrepreneurs for survivability and sustainability particularly for the small and medium sized enterprises who are viewed as vital agents of advancement in all economies. An attempt is made to understand the contribution of entrepreneurial competencies to a firm s growth through the assessment of self-efficacy, resource base, opportunity identification, and a matching innovation among other factors. In general, the entrepreneur tries to reduce the risk of failure through the available individual characteristics, means, and other resources. The entrepreneur brings forth a set of competencies and implements these through entrepreneurial roles. It is said that a venture is an extension of the entrepreneurial self. More so, in the case of small and medium enterprises (SMEs) where the entrepreneur plays most of the organizational roles required. Logically, a high level of required competencies, self-efficacy, and deployed resources should lead to sustainability and success. Unfortunately, it is a stylized fact that most entrepreneurial ventures fail within the first few years. So, the broad question remains how competencies translate through the roles and influence the competitiveness or the performance of a venture? The competencies are individual in nature, the roles are played in the organizational context and the competitiveness is organizational as well as in the market context. This research attempts to explain this broad research gap in the context of SMEs as this sector is one of the key contributing factors for revenue generation, employment, and economic advancement