Entrepreneurial Orientation, Social Networks, and Creative Performance: Middle Managers as Corporate Entrepreneurs

Abstract

Though previous research has highlighted how important it is for middle managers to contribute to corporate entrepreneurship, little work has been done to explore how they produce creative performance by examining the direct, curvilinear and moderating effects of their entrepreneurial orientation and social networks. A total of 337 middle managers conducting marketing, R&D and project management in Taiwan are studied. The results suggest that middle managers' disposition towards proactiveness and innovativeness is positively related to their creative performance, and their internal bonding networks and upper management networks are found to strengthen the effects of entrepreneurial orientation on creative performance. However, middle managers' external bridging networks are found to have an inverted U-shaped curvilinear relationship with their creative performance, and to weaken the effect of entrepreneurial orientation on creative performance. These findings echo the interactionist perspective of creativity, implying that middle managers should manage their social networks more carefully, as social interaction with network actors may either facilitate or inhibit their creativity at work.