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The primary objective of this study is to critically examine the effect of strategic orientation on the performance of small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in Malaysia. Three most comprehensive constructs, namely, entrepreneurial orientation, market orientation, and interaction orientation were adopted to present a holistic picture of the effect of strategic orientation on firm performance. This study adopts a cross-sectional design and uses the stratified random sampling method to select the potential respondents. The complete data were collected from 473 entrepreneurs who operate in the service sector in Malaysia. Findings of this study show that entrepreneurial and market orientations have a positive effect on superior firm performance. As entrepreneurial orientation is shown to be the construct sharing a positive relationship with all the other constructs in the model, it has been identified as the most significant strategic orientation. SMEs in Malaysia should therefore focus on adopting strategies in market orientation by appropriate marketing efforts, and in entrepreneurial orientation where the entrepreneur needs to adopt a proactive stance to counter challenges in the market of new products and changing customer preferences.

This paper reports the findings of an investigation into the ethical outlook of micro business operators. The study was conducted in Australia and is the first such examination of ethical perspectives in this segment of the business population. Micro business is internationally recognizable, economically significant, and strongly entrepreneurial, and it has a high level of control over the values it enacts. The study indicates that ethical considerations are important to Australian micro business operators. While no one single ethical perspective was dominant, nonreligious beliefs and principles were found to be the most important determinant of their ethical values. Some variation was discovered in operator attitudes based on age, gender, and education.

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Differences are identified between the preferred information and learning channels of small and medium-sized tourism enterprise (SMTE) proprietors, who have an interest in business operations (growers) or who have relatively less interest (lifestylers). Lifestylers sign up frequently to tourism industry associations, whereas growers have a tendency to join generic business groupings. The most common information for both groups is marketing related, and intensive use is made of online information to support day-to-day business operations. In aggregate, SMTE proprietors are avid information seekers, attaching importance to the advice provided from experienced and trusted sources. Growers proactively gather information about general management as well as tourism-specific knowledge. Adopting a 'one size fits all' approach to providing information for the SMTE sector is unlikely to be effective.

Home-based business (HBB) growth and expansion has been approached from the perspective of the increase in numbers of HBBs and the economic multiplier effect. However, little is known concerning the actual growth and expansion of the individual HBBs in terms of increase in turnover and sales, number of employees, increase in products and services, return on investment and market share. This is particularly true when narrowed to a specific demographic group, such as women-owned HBBs. This paper explores the growth aspirations and actual growth experiences of women-owned HBBs, as well as the factors both influencing growth and retarding growth amongst women-owned HBBs in Victoria, Australia. We found that over half of female owned HBBs have experienced growth and almost three quarters aspire for future growth. A factor analysis and subsequent correlation and one-way Anova revealed the significant factors associated with growth and retarding growth. We found that prudent business management and external factors in the form of government support and securing a major contract are important factors contributing to growth. Concerning future growth the most important factors were business management and market opportunities such as achieving exports and conducting business over the Internet. HBBs that planned to grow also placed more importance on the barriers to growth. The paper expands knowledge in the domain of women-owned HBBs and challenges the view of women-owned HBBs as less formal organisations with an indifferent attitude towards growth.

This paper discusses the findings of a survey of female entrepreneurs in Australia and provides a profile of the female entrepreneur and their business activity. The characteristics of the entrepreneur are described, including their motivation for going into business, their attitudes toward training and joining networks. The issues of access to finance and family/business conflict are further investigated in the light of current literature. The results indicate that female entrepreneurs in Australia are well educated and tend to commence their businesses with low start-up capital obtained from personal savings or from family and friends. Their businesses are concentrated in the services sector, with a significant number starting out as home-based businesses. Despite evidence that female entrepreneurs have difficulty in obtaining loan funds, the survey results indicated that a high proportion of female entrepreneurs applying for loans were successful. Further analysis of the survey data indicated that the reason for the loan success had little to do with the strength of the business. This was evidenced by the respondents advising that the main type of information requested at the loan interview was personal financial details, that a high proportion of loans were secured by the family home, and that financial institutions required little in the way of ongoing reporting.