ORGANISATIONAL LEARNING CAPABILITY AND INNOVATION: STUDY ON COMPANIES LOCATED IN REGIONAL CLUSTER

Abstract

The paper aims at addressing the influence of organisational learning capability on innovation performance of firms embedded in a regional cluster. Using a structural equation modelling, and based on a survey data of firms in the textile industry, we tested the relationships between learning capability, innovation and regional cluster’s embeddedness. The results of the model estimates show that while learning capability has a positive effect on the innovation performance of firms (efficiency and effectiveness), organisations embedded in territorial agglomerations reveal a greater degree of cooperation and creation of local capabilities, once they make part of a local productive and innovative system. The results also shed light on how the complex relationships between economies of agglomeration and the learning process affect innovation of firms. More, particularly, we suggest that the degree of cooperation among firms and the development of organisational capability may affect their innovation performance. While we do not compare the performance of firms inside and outside regional cluster, we attempted to set up how different degrees of cooperation can shape the development of innovation capabilities and innovation performance.