평판과 네트워크 유형이 중소기업의 성과에 미치는 영향에 관한 연구

SMEs (Small and Medium Size Enterprises) are regarded as playing a central and vital role in the growth engine of the national economy that leads innovation, generates jobs and facilitates competition. In addition, SMEs contribute heavily to the world economy internationally also (Hean et al., 2007). The role of SMEs can be assessed from an economic and a social point of view. SMEs participate in the market and play an important role in the operation of the market mechanism. SMEs that possess flexibility can also swiftly respond to the changes in consumption trends in the market, thereby strengthening national competitiveness and facilitating future economic growth. SMEs enhance social stability. SMEs account for over 87% of the total employment in South Korea (SMBA, 2009b). SMEs are more likely to experience liability of smallness (Baum, 1996) because of scarce resources. In order to overcome these limitations and to make utilization of resources which are not under their direct control, they try to build networks which are known as contributing to achieving firm performances. Firm reputation means the evaluation and the judgment by the interest circles through their long time experience of a corporation. Gaining firm reputation is an effective means of overcoming the liability of smallness and increasing firm performance (Larson, 1992; Gulati and Higgins, 2003; Roberts and Dowling, 2002). Firm reputation leads to social and economic trust in capabilities (Larson, 1992)These days, as firm reputation (Capraro and Srivastava, 1997; Orlitzky, Schmidt and Rynes, 2003) and network types (reputation network, information network and social network) (Larson, 1992; Robert and Dowling, 2002; Gulati and Higgins, 2003; Lerner, Brush and Hisrich, 1997; Teo and Choo, 2001; Christiaanse and Venkatraman, 2002; Mahama, 2006) are known as contributing to achieving firm performances and many studies have been done so far. Although many studies have been done, they have been focused on each one or limited networks so there is still strong debate about their utility. This study aims to empirically analyze the relationships between network types, firm reputation and business performance and verified what effect firm reputations have upon network types. The main purpose of this study is to find out the mediating effects of network types in the relationship between firm reputation and firm performance, the principal objective of this research is to fill the theoretical gaps via the construction of a comprehensive model : that is, to investigate the mediation effect of network types (Street and Cameron, 2007; Lechner et al., 2006) on the relationships between firm reputation (Grant, 1991; Capraro and Srivastava, 1997; Orlitzky, Schmidt and Rynes, 2003) and business performance in the context of small and medium sized businesses. For this, questionnaire surveys were administered targeting 247 companies that operate their businesses in South Korea. Using the collected data, correlation, reliability, and validity analysis were carried out using SPSS 15.0. The major results are as followings :First, it was found that firm reputations positively affect information networks and reputation networks, while having negative influence on social networks. This result implies that firm reputation is the key factor that influences information networks and reputation networks in Korean SMEs. This result is identical with results from antecedent research such as Barney and Hansen (1994) and Stuart (1998) which argue that firm reputation is closely related to information networks and reputation networks. Second, firm reputations affect business performance in a positive way. It overlaps with the results of a number of studies arguing that firm reputations positively affects business performance (Capraro and Srivastava, 1997; Orlitzky, Schmidt and Rynes, 2003). This result implies that a firm should make an effort to increase its good reputation in order to improve business performance. Third, reputation networks and information networks were found to have significantly positive effects on firm performances (Stuart et al., 1999; Robert and Dowling 2002; Deeds et al., 2004), while social networks did not directly affect firm performance. It also justifies the hypothesis that reputation networks and information networks can mediate the relationship between business performance and independent variables such as firm reputations. Fourth, reputation networks were found to partially mediate the relationship between firm reputation and firm performance. This implies that reputation networks are an important direct driver of business performance. It also appears to be a necessary mediator of the link between firm reputation and firm performance. It would be expected to affect firm performance more efficiently if firm reputations combine with reputation networks. Finally, information networks partially mediated the relationship between firm reputation and firm performance. This result implies the effectiveness of firm reputations appears to operate at least partially via the medium of information networks. The implication here is that for Korean small firms, firm reputation can improve business performance when it is combined with reputation networks and information networks. Through this study, firm reputation, which is also intangible resource, was found to have a positive effect upon building reputation networks and information networks. This implies that a company prefers alliances with a company with a high reputation in order to obtain the benefit of endorsement in forming a relationship, thereby suggesting that a company needs to strive for implementing and managing reputation. Also, social networks were found to have no effect upon firm performance. The research contributes to our understanding of how SMEs can improve their business performance. It shows that to achieve and maintain a positive business performance, it is vital that a firm is able to possess an organizational structure that integrates and incorporates firm reputation, reputation networks and information networks into a coordinated framework that allows activities to take advantage of the benefits. It is hoped that this research and the findings stemming from it can aid future research into the area of improving managerial practices, and to open the door to further research that looks further into these three constructs and the respective interrelationships that exist between them. The findings may help managers of firms to better understand the key factors that should be encouraged in order to achieve economic growth and those which should be avoided. The findings may also help policy makers develop industrial policies to improve the performance of Korean industry. Our study suffers from certain theoretical and methodological limitations. As we utilized a limited number of predictors, future research is needed to take into consideration other possible factors. Another limitation is that we utilized a cross‐sectional sample with questionnaires. Longitudinal data may be more appropriate for this type of research. The generalization of our results is another limitation. This research was conducted on small firms in South Korea. In order to increase generalization, it may prove helpful to carry out a comparative study between two or more countries.