Examining the relationship between Intrapreneurship, Institutions, and Perceived Sectoral Growth: A Meso-Level Empirical Study in the Manufacturing Sector

Abstract

Intrapreneurship study is not a new concept to scholars in the field of strategic management and economics just to mention few. However, what is consistent with the intrapreneurship literature is the ambiguities in its context, antecedents, moderation or mediation, consequences and its synonymity with the concept of corporate entrepreneurship. As wide as the phenomenon of intrapreneurship is, it takes different form of dimensions and contexts to achieve desired performance outcomes. For instance, innovation, corporate venturing, strategic renewal, institutions are widely acceptable dimensions while firm, industry, region and country are well known contexts of intrapreneurship. However, effects of these dimensions and contexts can easily be interchanged. Of particular interests are; (i) intrapreneurship influence in the context of sectoral economy, (ii) what factors drive and moderate intrapreneurship to grow industries, particularly in the manufacturing sector (iii) the dichotomy of industry and sectoral concepts of entrepreneurship and (iv) sectoral growth as a perceived performance outcome of intrapreneurship. Thus, the domains of entrepreneurship, institutions, industry agglomeration, and sectoral economic performance are synthesised and critiqued with the objectives of investigating the relationships among these variables and in particular, if both formal and formal institutions moderate the effects of innovation, corporate venturing and strategic renewal on the growth of the Ghanaian manufacturing sector. The main focus is to integrate the associated theories of new institutions, new (endogenous) growth, and externality theory in a unique scholastic platform that is complemented with the concept of indigenous study which debunks that the ontology and epistemology of the western nations’ philosophy as entrenched in most of the entrepreneurship literature fit all issues and gaps of the phenomenon globally. Hence, the peculiarity of culture, traditions, regulatory environment in different countries, differentiate performance outcomes among the different economies. Framework of sectoral economy and perceived sectoral growth was conceptualised, while the dependent and independent variables were operationalised in the context of sector as a unit of analysis which is distinct from industry view of entrepreneurship. To buttress this conceptual framework, contingent focus was put on the nexus of industry agglomeration externalities and intrapreneurship dimensions on one hand, and on sectoral growth on the Omotosho Intrapreneurship, Institutions and Sectoral Growth other hand. The choice of quantitative analysis methodology design was adopted. In this methodology, stratified sampling was followed by the use of structured questionnaire on a 7-point Likert scale items for all the measurement variables and responses collected from the sampled instrument were analysed using basic statistics and structural equation modelling (SEM) as a comprehensive regression analysis. The main findings from the study include; (i) industry agglomeration externalities of specialisation, diversity, competition and technology spillovers have positive and significant relationships with innovation, new business start-up, industry transformation and the growth of the manufacturing sector of Ghana. (ii) innovation dimension and formal institutional role of regulation are positively and significantly related to the Ghanaian manufacturing sector. These findings answered some of our research questions that point to the effects of industry agglomeration externality, regulation and innovation on the growth of Ghana manufacturing sector. Therefore, validating the concept of sectoral entrepreneurship. Finally, this study has two implications; its contributions to theories bridging and policy implications for the current industrial policy in Ghana. With some limitations such as the ambiguity of the concept of sectoral entrepreneurship, dichotomy between the concepts of industry and sectoral entrepreneurship, and focusing on a single sector analysis instead of multi-sector analysis of the Ghanaian economy, we suggest some appropriate theoretical and policy recommendations to expand the frontiers of entrepreneurship literature, empirical investigation and future research.