Internal vs. External Assessment: Are Small Firms Overestimating their Abilities?

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

5-2012

Department

School of Business

Abstract

Organizational performance overestimation by internal stakeholders can be detrimental to firm success. This paper compares the internal and external assessments of organizational performance for small manufacturing firms who participated in a mass merchandising supplier screening program. This program consisted of a self-assessment questionnaire completed by the firm owners (internal stakeholders) and a standardized product/firm assessment completed by trained professionals (external stakeholders). Two primary areas of performance overestimation by firm owners are identified--marketing and financial management. These findings suggest that an expert, external evaluation of a firm's strengths and weaknesses is important, especially for small firms with greater resource constraints.

First Page

42

Last Page

46

Volume

8

Issue

1

ISSN

09732330

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