INFLUENCE OF KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT INFRASTRUCTURE, KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT PROCESS CAPACITY, ORGANIZATIONAL LEARNING, AND INNOVATION MANAGEMENT ON ORGANIZATIONAL PERFORMANCE IN THAILAND METAL INDUSTRY
The metal industry plays a vital role in international business expansion, increased of national income, employment creation and social stability promotion as well as an environmental change in domestic and international business operation. Small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in countries with resource and competitiveness deficiencies will face more strict and severe challenges in their business operation. Consequently, how to promote SMEs to improve their capacity to achieve sustainable competitiveness becomes the most crucial issue of current organizations. This research aims to 1) examine the level of knowledge management infrastructure, knowledge management process capacity, organizational learning, innovation management and organizational performance in Thailand metal industry, 2) examine the influence of knowledge management infrastructure, knowledge management process capacity, organizational learning and innovation management towards organizational performance in Thailand metal industry, and 3) develop the model of organizational performance in Thailand metal industry. The mixed research methodology was applied in both the quantitative and qualitative ones. In view of the quantitative term, the sample group was the members of the Siam Metal Association consisting of distributors, manufacturers, importers and exporters of metal products and ferrous metal, a total of 440 persons who were collected by the stratified sampling based on 20-time criteria of the observed variables. Data collection was conducted through questionnaires whereas structural equation modelling was applied for data analysis. For the qualitative term, an in-depth interview was undertaken among the primary informants; 20 executives and managers of the captioned industry. The findings revealed that 1) knowledge management infrastructure, knowledge management process capacity, organizational learning, innovation management and organizational performance in Thailand’s metal industry were all at a high level, 2) knowledge management infrastructure, knowledge management process capacity, organizational learning and innovation management influenced the organizational performance in Thailand’s metal industry with a statistical significance level of .05, and 3) the organizational performance model of Thailand’s metal industry as developed by this study was called the OKOKI model (O = Organizational Performance , K = Knowledge Management Infrastructure, O = Organizational Learning, K = Knowledge Management Process Capability, I =Innovation Management). Additionally, the qualitative findings also indicated that to gain better operating performance in Thailand’s metal industry, entrepreneurs should place importance on innovation management and technology related to the metal industry system in order to enable employees to increasingly utilize their expertise for working effectively, decrease redundant tasks, mitigate operating risks, create competitive advantage and enhance more organizational competency. This research’s findings can be also applied to exploring new opportunities, and developing new products, strategies and creativity for systematic organization development and sustainable competitive advantage.
Knowledge Management Infrastructure/ Knowledge Management, Process Capacity/ Innovation Management / Organizational, Learning/ Organizational Performance.