Influence of organizational configurations on startup performance

Abstract

This article aimed to investigate the influence of organizational configurations on startup performance. The gap addressed by the article involved analyzing factors simultaneously, considering the possibility of equifinality with regard to the understanding about startup performance. A survey was conducted of 112 southern Brazilian startups. To compose the configurations, the cluster analysis technique was used. The chi-squared and covariance analysis (ANCOVA) tests were used to identify the effect of organizational configurations on startup performance. The results reinforced the assumptions of the configurational approach, highlighting the relationship of interdependence of imperatives in explaining organizational performance. The main distinctive characteristics of the three startup configurations found were: size; characteristics of the information from the management control system (MCS); entrepreneurial orientation (EO); cost leadership strategy (CLS); acceleration; and entrepreneurial source of investment (ESI). The results showed that differences in the characteristics of the information from the MCS and in the level of EO represent a deviation from the ideal configuration and are related with a drop in performance. The paper extends the knowledge on the imperatives investigated for the context of startups and on how these interact to compose the configurations. The results were shown to be relevant in explaining performance, corroborating the idea of equifinality, in which two distinct configurations presented similar performance. By analyzing the configurations that presented the best performance, managers can evaluate in which configuration they find themselves so as to guide actions to improve the startup success rate.