Beyond market orientation: Knowledge management and the innovativeness of New Zealand firms

Knowledge is seen as a critical resource, with both tangible and intangible attributes. Effective knowledge management is emerging as an important concept that enables all the resources of firms, including knowledge, to be used effectively. A knowledge‐management orientation is positioned in this paper as a distinctive capability that supports the creation of sustainable competitive advantages such as innovation. Using an instrument to measure a knowledge‐management orientation, which is grounded in Kohli, Jaworski and Kumar's work on a market orientation, this paper identifies four clusters of firms based on knowledge‐management practices that exist within the New Zealand business environment. The clusters are then described according to their innovation and financial performance profiles. The study finds that firms with a knowledge‐management orientation outperformed those classified as market‐oriented. The study also shows a market orientation to be a subset of a knowledge‐management orientation.