Entrepreneurship, Innovation, and Crisis: SME Responses to the COVID-19 Pandemic

197 Pages·2022·10.524 MB·English

by  Joanna Duda, Rafał Kusa

“The great scientific value and the strength of the publication, that is, the huge
knowledge contained there and application of a variety of research tools, as
well as the skills of research and drawing conclusions show the monograph is a
compendium of knowledge entrepreneurs need to manage their enterprises in
the era of the COVID-19 pandemic.”
Anna Wolak-Tuzimek, Kazimierz Pulaski University of
Technology and Humanities, Poland

Entrepreneurship, Innovation, and
Crisis: SME Responses to the
COVID-19 Pandemic
Entrepreneurship, Innovation, and Crisis: SME Responses to the COVID-19 Pandemic
aimstoaddresstheconditionsfortheoperationsofsmallandmedium-sized enter-
prises (SMEs) during the time of the COVID-19 pandemic as well as the gov-
ernmental support for entrepreneursin suchindustriesas tourism, manufacturing,
recycling,education,andprinting,aswellasthecreativeindustry.
Through the presentation of various strategies for the functioning and
development of companies under crisis conditions along with new manage-
ment approaches for coping with them, this book discusses the conditions for
the operations of SMEs during the time of the COVID-19 pandemic as well
as the support for entrepreneurs that has been offered by the governments of
different countries.
Thisapproachwillallowourresultstobeusefulforawideaudience–makingit
especiallyvaluabletoresearchers,academics,policymakers,andadvancedstudents
whoareinterestedincrises,entrepreneurship,SMEs,andstrategicmanagement.
Joanna Duda is Professor of Management as well as a senior researcher and
lecturer at AGH University of Science and Technology in Krakow, Poland.
Rafał Kusa is Assistant Professor as well as a researcher and lecturer at AGH
University of Science and Technology in Krakow, Poland.
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Edited by Robert Blackburn, University of Liverpool, UK
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Edited by Bérangère Deschamps, Audrey Missonier, Catherine Thévenard-Puthod,
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Corporate Volunteering, Responsibility and Employee
Entrepreneurship
Aldona Glin´ska-Newe´s and Beata Glinka
Entrepreneurial Communities and Ecosystems: Theories in Culture,
Empowerment, and Leadership
Edited by Morgan R. Clevenger and Michael W-P Fortunato
Empowering Entrepreneurial Communities and Ecosystems: Case
Study Insights
Edited by Michael W-P Fortunato and Morgan R. Clevenger
Entrepreneurship, Innovation, and Crisis: SME Responses to the
COVID-19 Pandemic
Edited by Joanna Duda and Rafał Kusa
Entrepreneurship,
Innovation, and Crisis: SME
Responses to the COVID-19
Pandemic
ł
Joanna Duda and Rafa Kusa
Firstpublished2022
byRoutledge
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ISBN:978-1-032-24721-2(hbk)
ISBN:978-1-032-24722-9(pbk)
ISBN:978-1-003-27989-1(ebk)
DOI:10.4324/9781003279891
TypesetinBembo
byTaylor&FrancisBooks
Contents
List of illustrations viii
List of contributors x
Preface xiv
1 Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises and COVID-19: A European
Perspective 1
2 Impact of the Crisis on SME Creativity and Growth 21
3 Finland and the COVID-19 Crisis: SMEs and Financial Risk 46
4 Poland and the COVID-19 Crisis: Strategies of Small Polish
Printing Companies 83
5 Estonia and the COVID-19 Crisis: Changes in Markets and
Business Models in Tourism Sector 109
6 Latvia and the COVID-19 Crisis: Innovation in Electronics
Manufacturing 132
7 Lithuania and the COVID-19 Crisis: Digitalization, Self-
organization, and Creative Industry Ecosystem 150
8 Mitigating the Impact of the Crisis in a Multi-industry Perspective:
Summary of Studies 170
Index 178
Illustrations
Figures
1.1 Change percentages of GDP and GDP per capita in Estonia,
Finland, Latvia, Lithuania, and Poland during period of 2017–
2020. 5
1.2 Change percentages of shares of imports and exports in GDPs
during period of 2017–2020 in Estonia, Finland, Latvia,
Lithuania, and Poland. 7
1.3 Unemployment percentages of populations in labor forces of
Estonia,Finland,LatviaLithuania,andPolandfrom2017through
2020. 9
3.1 Relationship between absolute change in financial risk from 2019
to 2020 and number of employees. 70
3.2 Median absolute changes in sales growth rate and periodic profit
margin from 2019 to 2020 by Industries B–X. 74
5.1 Response stages to crises. 113
5.2 Changes in the turnover and number of employees in NSPA. 118
5.3 Changes in the Manor’s turnover and number of employees. 124
5.4 Changes in the turnover and number of employees in CSPA. 125
5.5 ChangesintheturnoverandnumberofemployeesoftheVillage. 127
6.1 Support measures (if not currently used) that are considered to be
most effective in supporting companies to reduce impact of the
pandemic on Latvian SMEs from the E&E sector. 142
6.2 Innovations introduced over last two years for Latvian SMEs in
the E&E sector. 144
6.3 Opinion of Latvian SME representatives from the E&E sector on
whether introduction of innovations during pandemic has
strengthened company’s competitiveness in the global industry
market. 144
7.1 A conceptual model on the development of a complex adaptive
system. 158
7.2 The validated conceptual model of the complex adaptive system
development. 164
List of illustrations ix
Tables
1.1 Results of Global Entrepreneurship Index 2019, Bloomberg 2021
Innovation Index, and 2021 European Innovation Scoreboard for
Estonia, Finland, Latvia, Lithuania, and Poland 3
1.2 Change percentages in numbers of SMEs, value-added generated
bySMEs, andheadcounts in SMEsof Estonia, Finland,Lithuania,
Latvia, and Poland during period of 2018–2020 11
1.3 SME support instruments that were introduced in 2020 by
governments of Estonia, Finland, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, and
numbers of EU countries to have launched these instruments 15
2.1 Basic characteristics of surveyed enterprises 23
3.1 Industry distribution of the original sample firms and definitions
of the variables 60
3.2 Estimated logistic regression analysis model of financial risk 63
3.3 Descriptive statistics of the financial variables for 2019–2020 65
3.4 Median values of the financial variables by size group 69
3.5 Median values of the financial variables by industries A–X 72
4.1 Descriptive statistics of variables and distribution of enterprises
that decreased, increased, or stayed unchanged in terms of
variables 94
4.2 Descriptive statistics of variables and distribution of enterprises
that decreased, increased, and stayed unchanged in terms of
variables 96
4.3 Change in firm performance (FP) and firm growth (FG) caused
by strategy change 97
4.4 Change in firm performance (FP) in both groups of enterprises
for each strategy 100
4.5 Change in firm growth (FG) in both groups of enterprises for
each strategy 101
4.6 Hypothesis summary 102
5.1 Information about interviews with case companies’
representatives 117