한국 시스템통합 산업의 생태지위(Niche) 구조와 기업간 경쟁역학 : 네트워크 분석을 통한 기업 성과의 설명

The current study empirically examines the effects of niche structures on firm performance in the Korean systems integration industry using the methods of social network analysis. Although the concept of niche has been frequently used in the literatures of organizational ecology and strategic management, it has been seldom empirically measured in a systematic manner. The concept of niche has been just referred to without being clearly defined in the strategic management literature, while it has been discussed primarily at the theoretical level without an elaboration of methods for measurement in the literature of organizational ecology that has taken this concept seriously in its theory developments. In the organizational ecology literature, the concept of niche has occupied the very central stage of its theoretical formulations since the early years of this influential paradigm. For instance, many of its theoretical arguments, such as competitive exclusion, niche overlap, and resource partitioning, cannot be sustained without presuming the dynamics of niche. Although the concept of niche has been rigorously articulated at the theoretical level in the organizational ecology literature for these reasons, this otherwise methodologically sophisticated paradigm has been uncharacteristically lenient in the empirical measurement of niche. Niche has been measured usually by a priori categories in product markets in most empirical studies of the organizational ecology literature. To overcome these limits of existing literatures that have not been able to provide a generally acceptable measure of niche, the current paper employs the methods of social network analysis in the empirical configuration of niche structures. Relying on methods for the analysis of joint-involvement networks, we measured structural characteristics of niches by constructing a network data-set in which firms participating in a same business area were regarded to have a tie of competition. By applying the theoretical implications of network properties to our case of joint involvement in same business areas, we erect the following four hypotheses. First, we hypothesize that betweenness centrality as a measure of the firm’s adoption of generalist strategy will positively affect performance. Second, we hypothesize that network efficiency as a measure of the firm’s structural hole strategy will positively affect performance. Third, we hypothesize that network constraint as a measure of the firm’s compounding competition with a particular set of other firms will negatively affect performance. Fourth, prestige centrality as a measure of the firm’s competition with powerful other firms will negatively affect performance. We empirically tested the four hypotheses for the sample of Korean systems integration firms. According to the results of hypothesis-testing, three out of the four independent variables measuring structural characteristics of niche – betweenness centrality, prestige centrality, and network efficiency – turned out to have statistically significant effects on firm performance measured by net profit. The findings of this study may contribute significantly to the literatures of organizational ecology, social network analysis, and strategic management by providing a generally acceptable measure of niche and also by suggesting a way to integrate these three important areas of management studies. Moreover, the findings of this study may practically contribute to business practitioners by suggesting effective strategies for building the firm’s niche structures.