Entrepreneurial orientation and the performance of auto spare parts and machineries dealers’ association in Lagos State Nigeria

Abstract

The spate of business poor performance and subsequent failures in recent time has been worrisome to practitioners and stakeholders in Nigeria. This is evident from the increasing difficulties in generating returns on investment, increase in profit, creating new venture, increase in market shares, dwindling sales growth, and the inability to sustain the businesses overtime. Premised on this, the study explored the extent of the relationship between entrepreneurial orientation indices (innovativeness, risk-taking propensity, proactiveness, autonomy, competitive aggressiveness and resilience) and the performance of Auto Spare Parts and Machineries Dealers’ Association in Lagos State, Nigeria. Underpinned by resource-based theory, descriptive survey research design was adopted whereby sampled 260 owners/managers participated in the research. Data collected were analyzed using correlation analysis implemented in SPSS version 22 statistical programme. The result indicated that there is significant positive relationship between entrepreneurial orientation components of innovativeness (r = 0.241, p<0.001); risk-taking (r = 0.214, p<0.001); autonomy (r = 0.666 p<0.001); proactiveness (r = 0.135, p<0.001); competitive aggressiveness (r = 0.533, p<0.001) and resilience (r = 0.649, p<0.001) and the performance of Auto Spare Parts and Machineries Dealers’ Association in Lagos State. The study recommended that business practitioners in Nigeria should utilize entrepreneurial orientation components in order to achieve optimal performance. The implication of the finding is that entrepreneurial orientation provides additional insights that enable the owners/managers to respond proactively to ecological hurlyburly within the business environment to achieve results.