Title: The complexity of small business growth: a Saudi perspective

Authors: Hafedh Ibrahim; Mahmoud Mohammad Al-Ajlouni

Addresses: College of Business Administration, Northern Borders University, P.O. Box: 1321, Arar, Saudi Arabia ' College of Business Administration, Northern Borders University, P.O. Box: 1321, Arar, Saudi Arabia

Abstract: Drawing from complexity theory, the study takes a configurational approach towards small business growth and contributes to literature by demonstrating how three sets of causal conditions, that is, entrepreneurial orientation, firm resources, and the environment, combine to form configurations that affect small business growth. The study was conducted in the Middle East (Saudi Arabia) and analysed data from a survey of 369 SMEs using fuzzy set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA). The results corroborate the equifinality and the asymmetric nature of small business growth demonstrating that no single factor is key in initiating small business growth, and that there is no single exclusive causal path leading to that outcome and that the causal conditions of combinations that lead to small business growth are different from that lead to non-growth.

Keywords: small business growth; entrepreneurial orientation; firm resources; environmental uncertainty; fsQCA; fuzzy set qualitative comparative analysis; complexity theory; Middle East.

DOI: 10.1504/MEJM.2018.095580

Middle East Journal of Management, 2018 Vol.5 No.4, pp.356 - 384

Received: 02 Oct 2017
Accepted: 12 Nov 2017
Published online: 11 Oct 2018 *

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