Mediating Role of Innovations as a Factor of Firm’s Competitiveness

The goal of this paper is to clarify conceptually the role of innovations as a firm’s competitiveness factor. Particularly, it aims to reveal how the innovations mediate the impact of innovation antecedents and determinants on performance. The paper is based on the achievements of the basic theories of competitiveness such as activity-based view, resource-based view, dynamic capability view, configuration approach, and innovation studies. As a conceptual paper it tries to identify previously unexplored connections between some constructs. The paper proposes a conceptual model which links the influence of the firm’s internal and external factors on both innovations and performance, with the innovations’ own impact on performance. In this case the innovations mediate the performance effects of the preceding factors. The interrelation of different types of innovation implies also that innovations can influence performance directly or indirectly (through their interaction). The paper is restricted to the analysis of selected theories which are considered as most relevant to the study of the firm’s competitiveness. It is acknowledged that other economic and institutional theories can also contribute to this topic. The implications for managers are that developing some basic factors that impact both innovations and performance, may lead to both higher innovativeness and competitiveness.