结构性社会资本如何影响技术创新——基于组织学习的视角

The Impact of Structural Social Capital on Technological Innovation:Perspective of Organizational Learning

本文将社会资本、组织学习和技术创新纳入到统一框架中,构建结构性社会资本对技术创新作用机制的概念模型,并且通过对101家高新技术企业的问卷调查,阐述并验证利用式学习和探索式学习在结构性社会资本和技术创新间的中介作用。研究表明:(1)不同类型的结构性社会资本对不同的组织学习方式产生不同的影响,不同类型的结构性社会资本对不同类型的技术创新的影响也不相同。频繁的社会互动、高度网络中心性和行业内部联系有利于利用式学习,也有利于渐进式创新;较低的社会互动、高度网络中心性和行业外部联系有利于探索式学习,也有利于激进式创新;(2)利用式学习与渐进式创新正相关,探索式学习与激进式创新正相关;(3)利用式学习和探索式学习分别在结构性社会资本对渐进式创新和激进式创新的影响机制中发挥中介作用。

Technological innovation is considered a critical determinant of firm performance and survival. For high-technology ventures in emerging countries such as China, successful innovation is of paramount importance, relying on not the ability of single firm to generate and develop creative ideas, but the ability of acquiring and in- tegrating external resources. Social capital, which places significant emphasis on the role of external relationships, is defined as ＂the sum of actual and potential resources embedded within, available through, and derived from the network of relationship possessed by an individual or social unit＂. Recent advances in understanding technological innovation have been informed by social capital theory. Accommodating the market trend, research on the combination and relationship between social capital and technological innovation connects business strategy theory with technological innovation theory. Technological inno- vation and social capital request enterprise to strengthen knowledge stock by some new ways such as sharing in knowledge assets, cooperating with external partner and so on. The exploitation and exploration in knowledge stock promotes technological innovation performance and strengthens enterprise＇ s competitive advantages in market. Exploratory learning and exploitative learning are critical to stimulate the latent capacity effectively and en- hance the knowledge stock that enterprise＇ s technological innovation depends on. And creative knowledge acquired by exploratory learning and exploitative learning is gradually critical source for enterprise to generate new knowledge and new products or services. Moreover, it is impossible to acquire, utilize and integrate new knowledge isolated from external environment. Accordingly, it is necessary for us to examine the relationship between structural social capital and technological innovation in the context of exploratory learning and exploitative learning, in order not to extend the application of social capital, but also to deeply recognize the channels by which corporate stimulates in- novation. This paper puts three fields of social capital, organizational learning and technological innovation into a unified framework. We review and build a conceptual framework of the impact of differential effects of social ties, network centrality, intra-industry managerial ties and extra-industry managerial ties of structural social capital on exploratory and exploitative learning and subsequently exploratory and exploitative learning on different types of technological innovation. In this work, the questionnaire is used to collect data. The research drew on a convenient sample of 264 high technology ventures. Totally, the research obtained data from 101 firms, for a valid participation rate of 38.2%. Using statistic, analysis software such as SPSS and AMOS,the data is computed and analyzed. And some methods such as correlation analysis, main component factor analysis, multiple linear regression and structural equation rood Ii^g（SEM） were used to verify all the hypothesis deduced from the conceptual model empirically. And some itm;J~, i i^g arid important conclusions are as follows： （1）Different types of structural social capital have a distinctive impacl on two paradigms of organizational learning, and also have a distinctive impact on two paradigms of techno- logical innovation. That is, structural social capital characterizing more social ties among actors of network, higher network centrality and more intra-industry managerial ties not only has a positive effect on exploitative learning sig- nificantly, but also promotes incremental innovation. Meanwhile, structural social capital characterizing less social ties among actors of network, higher network centrality and more extra-industry managerial ties has a positive effect on exploratory learning significantly, but also promotes radical innovation. （2）Exploratory learning has a positive impact on radical innovation, while exploitative learning has a positive impact on incremental innovation. （3）The results also support the argument that exploratory learning intermediately shapes the relationship between structural social capital and radical innovation, and exploitative learning plays a intermediate role in the relationship between structural social capital and incremental innovation. This research makes some contribution to the fields of social capital, organizational learning and technological innovation. The findings draw attention of managers from high technological firms operating in China to the impor- tant rote of structural social capital in enhancing learning and innovation performance.