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Management, Vol. 4, Issue 1, Feb  2021, Pages 19-36; DOI: https://doi.org/10.31058/j.mana.2021.41002 https://doi.org/10.31058/j.mana.2021.41002

Differential Advantage as a Correlate of Organizational Competitiveness: A Study of Selected Small-Scale Enterprises in Aba, Abia State of Nigeria

Management, Vol. 4, Issue 1, Feb  2021, Pages 19-36.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.31058/j.mana.2021.41002

Onyeaghala Obioma Hyginus 1* , Gift J. Eke 2 , Dannap Edmond Nanzing 3

1 Department of Business Administration, Federal University Wukari, Wukari, Nigeria

2 Department of Office and Information Management, Niger Delta University, Wilberforce Island Bayelsa State, Nigeria

3 Department of Business Administration, Kwararafa University, Wukari, Nigeria

Received: 23 August 2020; Accepted: 22 October 2020; Published: 1 December 2020

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Abstract

This study sought to ascertain if there is correlation between differential advantage and organizational competitiveness. A cross sectional survey research design was adopted in the study to determine the nature of the situation under investigation. All small-scale enterprises operating in Aba, Abia State of Nigeria formed the area of this study. However, because there are too many of them and the difficulty in accessing all, the researcher purposely selected the four dominant types for investigation. They are: Tailoring, shoe making, Leather bag and Hat producers. For the fact that the population is known, a proportional and systematic random sampling technique was employed to select representatives from each group and this gave a sample frame of 260. Questionnaire served as the instrument for data collection. The questionnaire was validated and tested for reliability before administration to respondents. Out of the 260 copies of questionnaire distributed to respondents, only 240 were properly completed and retrieved. Both descriptive and inferential statistics were employed in this study. Data were presented in frequency and simple percentage tables, which formed the basis for the analysis. The three null formulated hypotheses were tested with Pearson’s Product Moment Correlation statistical tool aided by the Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS). Results from test of the three hypotheses shows that competitiveness of selected small-scale enterprises correlates significantly with low cost of production (R = 0.517), high skilled labor (R = 0.665) and new technology (R = 0.634) at 0.01 level (2-tailed). The results informed the rejection of the null Hypotheses 1, 2 and 3 in favor of the alternatives. This result shows that differential advantage correlates significantly with competitiveness of small-scale enterprises. The study recommends that business organizations should take advantage of high skilled labour, low cost of production and new technology to rise above competition. They should as well understand that differential advantage as a strategy should be durable, neither imitable or transferable nor transparent or easily replicable. It should be flexible to accommodate changes and sustained over time for it to be effective.

Keywords

Differential Advantage, Competitiveness, Skilled Labour, Low Cost Of Production And New Technology

Copyright

© 2017 by the authors. Licensee International Technology and Science Press Limited. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

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