Network topology and firm innovation performance

Drawing on a network perspective on interorganizational learning, we argue that a firm can produce more innovations and enjoy better performance if it builds reasonable network topology that provides access to new knowledge developed by other organizations. This study develops a research model that links the properties of knowledge and the features of a firm´s knowledge network topology to predict innovation performance. This research chooses questionnaire survey and gets 206 availability records. Using SPSS15.0 and LISREL8.51 software tools, the results show that the network topology has significant, positive or negative effects on firm innovation performance. This model may help decision makers of those types of organizations to effectively turn knowledge into actions by matching their firms´ knowledge network topology to the particular properties of the knowledge that is going to be communicated.