An Empirical Study Of Market Knowledge Competence As A Source Of Organizational Performance

The arrival of the era of knowledge economy provides not only great chances for enterprises, but also furious competition as well. How to gain and maintain sustainable competitive advantages, and pursue superior organizational performance are the most important questions the enterprisers care about. No matter in traditional environments or in modern environments, creating customer value is the key issue for enterprises to develop and keep customers. Therefore, enterprises must fully concern about customer needs and constantly compare with competitors so as to find opportunities to create customer value and create valuable differences of their products and services. Based on these activities, enterprises deliver these specific valuable characteristics promptly to customers to gain competitive advantages. So enterprises must manage the market knowledge effectively in order to learn from customers and competitors efficiently, integrate internal knowledge with market knowledge, and create and deliver valuable knowledge to customers.This dissertation made a thorough literature review about market knowledge, analyzed the relationship between market knowledge and organizational performance, and put forward a theorical model. In order to make the research more comprehensive and innovative, three stages of research work are conducted.Firstly, on the basis of literature review and depth interview, the dissertation defines the concept of Market Knowledge Competence as a series of processes through which an enterprise can acquire market knowledge by various means and create new knowledge through integration and conversion processes, thus market knowledge can create sustainable competitive advantages for an enterprise. Based on this, the dissertation further specifies three dimensions: customer knowledge management capability, competitor knowledge management capability, interior knowledge integration capability. The dissertation develops a three-demension scale, and tests its reliablility and validity by the samples from equipment manufacturing industry.Secondly, based on Knowledge Management Theory and Strategic Management Theory, the dissertation builds up a theoretical model, in which the three dimensions of Market Knowledge Competence influence Organizational Performance with the mediate effect of Marketing Capabilities and Knowledge Management Practice. Then the model is tested empirically. The results indicate that Marketing Capabilities and Knowledge Management Practice are the most immediate antecedents of Organizational Performance. Both of them influence Organizational Performance directly, while Knowledge Management also influences Organizational Performance via Marketing Capabilities. The three dimensions of Market Knowledge Competence influence Organizational Performance via Marketing Capabilities and Knowledge Management. They have significant effects on Marketing Capabilities, while customer knowledge management capability and competitor knowledge management capability have significant effects on Knowledge Management. Interior knowledge integration capability is influenced by Knowledge Management significantly. Further more, customer knowledge management capability and competitor knowledge management capability have significant effects on interior knowledge integration capability.Finally, the dissertation specifies Market Stability, and examines the moderate effects of Market Stability to the relationship between Market Knowledge Competence and Organizational Performance. After testing the theoretical model with the different samples specified by Market Stability, the results show that the model is valid and reliable in different market enviorments. By testing the differences of covariances in different market enviorment samples, we find that from high market stability to low market stability, Marketing Capabilities has more and more effect on Organizational Performance, as well as the relationship between Knowledge Management Practice with Marketing Capabilities, while the influence of Knowledge Management Practice on Organizational Perofrmance has no significant change. As Market Stability gets lower, customer knowledge management capability and interior knowledge integration capability have more and more positive effect on Marketing Capabilities, while the effect of competitor knowledge management on Marketing Capabilities gets lower. Besides, as Market Stability gets lower, customer knowledge management capability has more and more positive effect on Knowledge Management Practice, Competitor knowledge management capability has less and less positive effect on Knowledge Management, and the effect of Knowledge Management Practice has no significant change on interior knowledge integration capability.The innovations of this dissertation are: (1) Based on the literature review and depth interview, the dissertation defines the concept of Market Knowledge Competence and specifies the concept with three dimensions and nine components. The dissertation develops a reliable and valid multi-dimension scale with the data of equipment manufacturing industry. (2) Based on Knowledge Management Theory and Strategic Management Theory, the dissertation builds up and tests a theoretical model, in which the three dimensions of Market Knowledge Competence influence Organizational Performance via Marketing Capabilities and Knowledge Management Practice. (3) Based on the former research, the dissertation specifies the Market Stability and exams the moderating effects of Market Stability to the relationship between Market Knowledge Competence and Organizational Performance. As a result, the dissertation proves the validity of the theoretical model in dynamic market enviorments.