Strategic Organizational Knowledge Orientation and Firm Performance: An Empirical Research of Beverage Businesses in Thailand

Abstract

As the primary constructive strategic advantage for an organization, significant observations have been logged recently for organizational knowledge as the most valuable strategic asset for an organization. This is likely to encourage creative new ideas leading to performance. Although the relationship between organizational knowledge and performance has been well-documented by earlier studies, a review of previous literature reveals that there are few studies on the dimensions of organizational knowledge viewed in terms of its consideration as a strategic asset. Therefore, this research aims to investigate the relationships between each dimension of strategic organizational knowledge orientation (SOKO), and its impact towards the consequence variables (organizational creativity, new idea generation, organizational innovation, business competitiveness and firm performance). The questionnaire survey method is used to collect the data from the managing directors or management partnership of 117 beverage businesses in Thailand. Regression results indicate that one dimension of SOKO (decision-making skills emphasis) is positively related to all of the consequence variables. However, each dimension of SOKO (emphasis business operation understanding focus, managerial information awareness, organizational experience usefulness, and environmental education dynamism) has partially direct effects on the consequence variables of SOKO. The contributions and suggestions for further research are also provided.