Should fast-food franchisees pursue entrepreneurial orientation?

• Although it is widely accepted that entrepreneurial orientation (EO) improves firm performance, scholars have advised that particular attention should be paid to the context. In this research, we investigate a less explored context of franchising where business systems and procedures are usually dictated to franchisees by franchisors. Therefore, whether a franchisor should allow franchisees to pursue EO (innovativeness, proactiveness, risk-taking, competitive aggressiveness, and autonomy) is not clear. In the context of franchising, the majority of prior studies have mainly focused on the employment of EO as a unidimensional construct and at the franchisor level. In this research, we take a bottom-up perspective and evaluate the impact of different dimensions of EO on franchisees’ performance. Our analysis of a multi-group of 183 restaurant franchisees located in Sweden and Iran reveals that only the pursuit of proactiveness and competitive aggressiveness improves a franchisee’s performance and other dimensions do not play a significant role in improving performance in this context.

Subject headings

SAMHÄLLSVETENSKAP  -- Ekonomi och näringsliv -- Företagsekonomi (hsv//swe)

SOCIAL SCIENCES  -- Economics and Business -- Business Administration (hsv//eng)

Keyword

entrepreneurial orientation

franchising

franchisee

franchisee performance

restaurant industry

Strategiskt entreprenörskap (StrEnt)

Strategic Entrepreneurship

Publication and Content Type

ref (subject category)

art (subject category)