政治和商业网络关系与企业探索式创新:一个整合模型

The Role of Political Ties and Business Ties in the Whole Process of Exploratory Innovation: An Integrated Model

本文借鉴现有的创新两栖模型框架,并立足于我国"关系型"社会的现实背景,通过整合社会资本理论和PFI模型,探讨了企业的政治网络关系和商业网络关系在整个探索式创新周期中的作用。运用问卷调查的方法对来自于京津唐、长三角和珠三角地区的172家高科技企业的516名高管进行了配对调查。实证研究结果显示,在探索式创新的前期开发阶段,企业的政治网络关系对探索式创新没有显著影响,而商业网络关系对探索式创新有显著的积极影响;在探索式创新的后期获利阶段,两种社会网络关系显著地正向调节了探索式创新与企业绩效之间的关系。

Today, whether China＇ s economy can operate stably and healthily has directly related to the orderly development of the world economy. However, with more than thirty years of rapid development, China＇ s economy has encountered a bottleneck. Specifically, according to the ＂20157 Chinese Entrepreneurs Growth and Develop- ment Project Report＂ from CESS （China Entrepreneur Survey System） , the present situation of innovation of Chi- nese enterprises mainly exists two problems. First, most of the enterprises primarily focus on incremental innovation and rarely engage in radical innovation. Second, the enterprises＇ ratio of outputs and innovation inputs is relatively low, that is, enterprises can not effectively make profits from innovation. With respect of the above two practical problems, how to effectively promote Chinese enterprises to carry out exploratory innovation and improve the output benefit is the topic desperately need to be researched for academia and business. And this is also the primary task for enterprises to achieve organizational ambidexterity. So the article aims to start a systematic study around this top- ic and based on Chinese situation. In the area of how to promote exploratory innovation, the academics generally believe that in the current com- plex environment, a single enterprise in terms of resources or capabilities is not sufficient to support the effective im- plementation of exploratory innovation, and enterprise social networks （social capital） is important influence factor to promote exploratory innovation. However, current studies on the relationship between corporate social network and exploratory innovation primarily revolve around the structural features of social network, tie features and so on. Few studies distinguish different types of network ties when exploring their impact on exploratory innovation. In the area of enhance exploratory innovation output gains, the attention given by academics is much less than how to promote exploratory innovation. As these gaps exist, this article explores the relationship among Political Ties, Business Ties, Exploratory Inno- vation and Firm Performance through integrating the Social Capital Theory and PFI model drawing lessons from am- bidextrous model and based on Chinese context valued ＂Guanxi＂. Specifically ,this article will divide exploratory in- novation into the stage of research and development and the stage of commercialization and profiting. Then, we will explore the different roles of Political Ties and Business Ties in the two stages. We adopt survey methods to do a pai- ring investigation of 516 executives of 172 high-tech enterprises from the Beijing-Tianjin-Tangshan, the Yangtze Riv- er Delta and the Pearl River Delta region. The empirical results indicate that in the pre-development stage of explor- atory innovation, political ties don＇t have significant impact on exploratory innovation, but business ties have signifi- cant positive impact on exploratory innovation. In the post-profiting stage of exploratory innovation, the two types of managerial ties both have positive moderating effect on the relationship between exploratory innovation and firm per- forlnance. Taken together, the findings of this study contribute to existing knowledge in several ways. First, we draw les- sons from ambidextrous model of Duncan and divided the whole process of exploratory innovation into two stages of research and development and commercialization and profiting, this article pulis the study about innovation to a more systematic and process perspective and makes some contribution for the further understanding of the innovation process of enterprises. Meanwhile, based on China＇s reality background value ＂Guanxi＂ ,we integrate the social cap- ital （social networks） theory and PFI model and thus make some certain contribution for better understanding the role of managerial ties in the realistic context. Second, the conclusions of this study are a useful supplement to the study of the antecedent variables of exploratory innovation and help to deepen the understanding of the influence of the political ties and business ties. Third, we find that in China, appropriability regime can not be viewed entirely as an exogenous variable. This extends the original assumptions of PFI model.