IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/ids/ijmcst/v4y2025i1p77-99.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Entrepreneurial orientation and international performance of South Korean SMEs: the sequential mediating role of absorptive capacity and strategic adaptation

Author

Listed:
  • Junggeun Kim
  • Donghyun Ken Kim
  • Sohyeon Kim
  • Taewoo Roh

Abstract

Given that international SMEs face liability of foreignness and smallness in foreign markets, this study examines the impact of entrepreneurial orientation on international performance. Based on the organisational learning theory, this study proposes absorptive capacity and strategic adaptation as mediators of this mechanism. The empirical analysis of 144 Korean SMEs through a PLS-SEM analysis shows that absorptive capacity and strategic adaptation successfully mediate the relationship between entrepreneurial orientation and international performance. From the perspective of the entrepreneurship theory and organisational learning theory, these empirical findings explain how entrepreneurial SMEs achieve higher performance in foreign markets through learning and adaptation. For practitioners looking to enter foreign markets or improve their international performance, these findings confirm the importance of entrepreneurship and adapting through learning to enhance performance in foreign markets.

Suggested Citation

  • Junggeun Kim & Donghyun Ken Kim & Sohyeon Kim & Taewoo Roh, 2025. "Entrepreneurial orientation and international performance of South Korean SMEs: the sequential mediating role of absorptive capacity and strategic adaptation," International Journal of Multinational Corporation Strategy, Inderscience Enterprises Ltd, vol. 4(1), pages 77-99.
  • Handle: RePEc:ids:ijmcst:v:4:y:2025:i:1:p:77-99
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.inderscience.com/link.php?id=146210
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ids:ijmcst:v:4:y:2025:i:1:p:77-99. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sarah Parker (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.inderscience.com/browse/index.php?journalID=450 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.