Zamurai Masuka, Irvine Langton, Chengedzai Mafini
Abstract
Forward‐looking manufacturing SMEs today are agile, dynamic, and responsive. They play an essential part in employment creation, innovation, and creativity and earn their countries’ much-needed foreign currency. However, in South Africa, manufacturing SMEs show stagnant turnover and employment growth. The study tested a conceptual framework for entrepreneurial orientation, operational efficiency, and performance in SMEs in South Africa. A quantitative approach was employed, and data was gathered using a survey questionnaire distributed to a purposively drawn sample of 494 SME owners, managers, and professional staff in the Gauteng Province of South Africa. The SMART partial least squares (PLS, version 3.0) package was utilised as a tool for data analysis. Hypotheses tests showed that all entrepreneurial orientation practices influence the operational efficiency of manufacturing SMEs. The study also confirmed that operational efficiency positively affects SMEs’ financial and non-financial performance. The study proposes a new model of entrepreneurial orientation, operational efficiency, and organisational performance of SMEs. The study is essential as it offers innovative and new insights into entrepreneurial orientation and business performance to the existing body of knowledge within the sphere of entrepreneurship in South Africa and other developing countries.