Transactive memory system and entrepreneurial team performance: the impact of ability to improvise and market competition

Purpose: Drawing upon the social exchange theory, this study examines the interplay of transactive memory system (TMS) with improvisation and market competition intensity for the impact on entrepreneurship performance. Design/methodology/approach: This study used the temporal separation technique and used a questionnaire survey to collect data with a final sample of 423 valid responses forming 74 entrepreneurial teams from firms across 6 cities in China. Findings: The expertise and credibility of the TMS has a significant positive impact on entrepreneurial performance and improvisation which mediates the relationship between the expertise and credibility of the TMS and entrepreneurial performance. The intensity of market competition positively moderates the mediating role of improvisation between the expertise and credibility of the TMS and entrepreneurial performance. Originality/value: This study contributes to the literature on entrepreneurship in emerging economies and entrepreneurial teams. Literature on TMS lacks studies on entrepreneurship performance. The authors' contextualized TMS perspective examines the impact of specific behavior of improvisation and, therefore, holds the promise to offer a novel angle to investigate how exactly TMS impacts entrepreneurship performance while engaging in micro-level processes and entrepreneurial phenomena such as surprises and response to surprises through improvisation. The study adds the context of social exchange theory to performance of entrepreneurial teams.