Failure learning and entrepreneurial resilience: the moderating role of firms’ knowledge breadth and knowledge depth
Journal of Knowledge Management
ISSN: 1367-3270
Article publication date: 8 March 2021
Issue publication date: 17 November 2021
Abstract
Purpose
Drawing on the knowledge-based view, the purpose of this study is to investigate the differential effects of failure normalization (FN) and failure analysis (FA) on entrepreneurial resilience (ER) and examines how firms’ knowledge breadth (KB) and knowledge depth (KD) moderate these effects in distinctive ways.
Design/methodology/approach
The study uses a mixed-methods approach, including a two-wave survey study among 226 entrepreneurial high-tech firms in China and a qualitative study.
Findings
The findings reveal that FA has a stronger positive effect on ER than FN. KB enhances the effect of FA on ER, whereas KD enhances the effect of FN on ER but buffers the effect of FA on ER.
Practical implications
The study advocates that entrepreneurs need to be aware of the importance of ER and strengthen the reflection on failure. Additionally, the study suggests that entrepreneurs should match FN and FA with firms’ knowledge characteristics. With this match, KB and KD can exert greater impacts on the effect of failure learning on ER.
Originality/value
Knowledge can influence the effect of learning on firm capability. However, such an effect in entrepreneurial firms linking to ER remains to be explored. This study contributes to ER from the failure learning perspective and extends knowledge management theory in the entrepreneurship context.
Keywords
Acknowledgements
Erratum: It has come to the attention of the publisher that the article, Yao, K., Li, X. and Liang, B. (2021), “Failure learning and entrepreneurial resilience: the moderating role of firms’ knowledge breadth and knowledge depth”, Journal of Knowledge Management, Vol. ahead-of-print No. ahead-of-print, omitted a first affiliation for Bang Liang. This error was introduced in the editorial process and has now been corrected in the online version. The publisher sincerely apologises for this error and for any inconvenience caused.
Many thanks to the associate editor and two anonymous reviewers for their insightful and constructive comments. Kai Yao and Xiaolin Li contributed equally to this work and should be regarded as co-first authors. This work was supported by The National Social Science Fund of China under Grants 16ZDA057. Kai Yao and Xiaolin Li contributed equally to this work and should be regarded as co-first authors.
Citation
Yao, K., Li, X. and Liang, B. (2021), "Failure learning and entrepreneurial resilience: the moderating role of firms’ knowledge breadth and knowledge depth", Journal of Knowledge Management, Vol. 25 No. 9, pp. 2141-2160. https://doi.org/10.1108/JKM-10-2020-0772
Publisher
:Emerald Publishing Limited
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