5.1. Configurational Analysis of High-Performing Employees’ Intrapreneurial Behavior
In the configurational analysis of high-performing employees’ intrapreneurial behavior, employees’ intrapreneurial behavior (FEB) was chosen as the outcome variable. The selection criteria were set to ensure consistency greater than 0.8 and a minimum case threshold of 4. The generated truth table was analyzed using fsQCA3.0 in order to obtain the configuration results of the factors influencing employees’ intrapreneurial behavior. Based on the intermediate solution of the final results, six configurations that can achieve employees’ intrapreneurial behavior were identified. The specific configuration paths are listed in
Table 5.
According to the output results, the configuration of high intrapreneurial behavior among employees yielded six result paths with an overall coverage of 0.787. Thus, a combination of the preceding conditions in these six result paths can explain approximately 79% of the sample cases of intrapreneurial behavior in employees. Among these paths, the second has the highest coverage rate (0.673), indicating greater explanatory power for employees’ intrapreneurial behavior. Simultaneously, all combination paths have consistency values higher than the standard threshold of 0.8, with four exceeding 0.9. The overall consistency is 0.887, indicating a high level of consistency for the six preceding condition paths in explaining employees’ intrapreneurial behavior, making them significant contributing factors to this behavior.
In the two driving modes of high intrapreneurial behavior among employees, the first is the ability-driven mode, which includes Solution 1a (Entrepreneurial Competence * Task Valence * Perceived Value * Reward Mechanism), Solution 2a (Entrepreneurial Competence * Entrepreneurial Self-Efficacy * Management Support * Reward Mechanism), Solution 4a (Entrepreneurial Competence * Entrepreneurial Self-Efficacy * ~Task Valence * ~Perceived Value * Reward Mechanism), and Solution 6a (Entrepreneurial Competence * Entrepreneurial Self-Efficacy * Task Valence * ~Perceived Value * ~Management Support * ~Reward Mechanism). In all four paths, entrepreneurial competence serves as the core condition, playing a dominant role in explaining the paths, while the other variables serve as marginal conditions. In the configuration of Solution 1a, FEC * FTS * FPV * FRW indicates that when employees possess entrepreneurial competence, regardless of their level of entrepreneurial self-efficacy, as long as they have high task valence and perceived value and the company has corresponding reward mechanisms, employees can engage in intrapreneurial behavior. In the configuration of Solution 2a, FEC * FES * FMS * FRW indicates that when employees have both entrepreneurial competence and self-efficacy, and the company provides management support and reward mechanisms, employees’ intrapreneurial behavior can occur regardless of their levels of task valence and perceived value. In the configuration of Solution 4a, FEC * FES * ~FTS * ~FPV * FRW indicates that even with low levels of task valence and perceived value, and regardless of the presence of management support, employees with entrepreneurial competence and self-efficacy, along with some reward mechanisms in the company, can still exhibit intrapreneurial behavior. In the configuration of Solution 6a, FEC * FES * FTS * ~FPV * ~FMS * ~FRW indicates that when employees have entrepreneurial competence and self-efficacy and possess high levels of task valence, even with low perceived value and a lack of support and rewards from the company, they will engage in corresponding intrapreneurial behavior.
The second mode is the value-driven mode, which includes Solution 3a (Entrepreneurial Competence * Perceived Value * Management Support * Reward Mechanism) and Solution 5a (Entrepreneurial Self-Efficacy * Task Valence * Perceived Value * Management Support * Reward Mechanism). In both paths, perceived value and management support serve as core conditions, playing a dominant role in explaining the paths, whereas the other variables serve as marginal conditions.
In the configuration of Solution 3a, FEC * FPV * FMS * FRW indicates that when employees perceive high value in returns and the company fully supports employees’ intrapreneurial behavior, regardless of their level of entrepreneurial self-efficacy, as long as employees possess entrepreneurial competence and the company has corresponding reward mechanisms, they will spontaneously engage in intrapreneurial behavior. In the configuration of Solution 5a, ~FES * FTS * FPV * FMS * FRW indicates that even in the absence of entrepreneurial self-efficacy, if employees have high levels of task valence and perceived value, and the company provides support and rewards, employees’ intrapreneurial behavior can occur regardless of their level of entrepreneurial competence.
Based on the analysis of previous literature, high perceived value represents the overall value that employees attach to the rewards they receive for completing job tasks. Strengthening perceived value increases employees’ willingness to engage in intrapreneurial behavior. With the provision of management support by a company, obstacles to employees’ internal entrepreneurship are greatly reduced. The reward mechanism ensures that employees receive adequate rewards for completing tasks, thereby motivating those with entrepreneurial competence to actively engage in internal entrepreneurial activities and achieve value acquisition.
Simultaneously, employees who lack entrepreneurial self-efficacy have low confidence in engaging in innovative and entrepreneurial activities. Self-efficacy alone is not sufficient to promote employees’ intrapreneurial behavior. However, when task valence and perceived value are high, employees have strong expectations and perceptions of rewards. Additionally, the company provides extensive management support and sets corresponding reward mechanisms for employees’ intrapreneurial behavior, which largely satisfies their expectations for rewards after completing their work. Employees’ pursuit of value counterbalances the negative effects of their lack of self-efficacy and motivates them to attempt intrapreneurial behavior. It should be noted that in these two paths, employees’ pursuit of value and the company’s management support play core roles.
Among the six configurations, entrepreneurial competence appeared most frequently in five resulting paths. This is a core condition in configurations such as solutions 1a, 2a, 4a, and 6a. Perceived value and organizational management support appear to be the core conditions in the two result paths. This indicates that entrepreneurial competence, perceived value, and management support play crucial roles in determining whether employees engage in intrapreneurial behaviors.
According to the qualitative comparative analysis method, intrapreneurial behavior is not influenced by a specific combination of conditions but rather exists in multiple combined paths. In each result path, multiple factors work together to trigger the behavior, indicating the presence of multiple concurrent causal relationships among the factors. For example, in Solution 2a, intrapreneurial behavior is the result of the combined effects of entrepreneurial competence, self-efficacy, management support, and reward mechanisms.
The two types of high intrapreneurial behavior modes–ability-driven and value-driven–are formed by the combined effects of different combinations of antecedent conditions. The presence or absence of certain antecedent conditions can lead to intrapreneurial behavior. For example, entrepreneurial competence is a core condition in various result paths of the first behavior mode, but it may or may not be present in Solution 5a. This suggests that, although entrepreneurial competence has a positive facilitating effect on employees’ intrapreneurial behavior, the absence of entrepreneurial competence does not necessarily prevent employees from engaging in intrapreneurial behavior. This demonstrates the asymmetry of causal relationships.
5.2. Configurational Analysis of Non-High-Performing Employees’ Intrapreneurial Behavior
Based on the previous analysis, causal relationships in the qualitative comparative analysis exhibit asymmetry. The occurrence of results is not solely determined by a single linear relationship but requires different combinations of antecedent conditions to provide joint explanations. Therefore, the configurations derived in this study for high intrapreneurial behavior cannot be directly applied to non-high intrapreneurial behavior. Non-high intrapreneurial behavior is caused by specific combinations of antecedent conditions. Consequently, in the configuration analysis of non-high intrapreneurial behavior, the variable “non-high intrapreneurial behavior (~FEB)” is selected as the outcome variable, using the same consistency and case coverage thresholds as in the previous analysis. Results of the specific configuration path analysis are presented in
Table 6.
According to the output results, configurations of antecedent conditions influencing non-high-performing employees’ intrapreneurial behavior construct five result paths, with an overall coverage of 0.669. Thus, combinations of antecedent conditions in these five resulting paths can explain approximately 67% of the cases of non-high-performing employees’ intrapreneurial behavior. The first path has the highest coverage rate of 0.514, indicating greater explanatory power for non-high-performing employees’ intrapreneurial behavior. The consistency of these five paths is higher than the standard value of 0.8, with an overall consistency of 0.895. This finding suggests that these five configurations of antecedent conditions exhibit a high level of consistency in contributing to the occurrence of non-high-performing employees’ intrapreneurial behavior, making them important factors in explaining such behavior. This study categorizes these five result paths into three patterns that influence non-high-performing employees’ intrapreneurial behavior (
Table 6).
The influence configuration of employees’ non-high intrapreneurial behavior consists of five result paths and three patterns. To gain a deeper understanding of the influence mechanism of employees’ intrapreneurial behavior, this study analyzes and discusses the influence configuration of employees’ non-high intrapreneurial behavior.
The first pattern is the ability hindrance type, which includes two paths: Solution 1b (entrepreneurial competence * entrepreneurial self-efficacy * perceived value * management support) and Solution 2b (entrepreneurial competence * entrepreneurial self-efficacy * task significance * reward mechanism). In the configuration of Solution 1b, FEC * FES * FPV * FMS indicates that when employees lack entrepreneurial competence, self-efficacy, and perceived value, and when the organization lacks management support, they will inhibit intrapreneurial behavior regardless of the level of task significance or the presence of a reward mechanism. In Solution 2b, the configuration FEC * FES * FTS * FRW indicates that even if employees have a high level of task significance and the organization implements a reward mechanism to motivate them, they will not engage in intrapreneurial behavior if they lack entrepreneurial competence and self-efficacy.
In both results, entrepreneurial competence plays a central role in explaining behavior, leading to naming this pattern as the ability-hindrance type. Based on the previous literature, entrepreneurial competence and self-efficacy are important factors that influence an individual’s ability and cognitive levels. When these two factors are lacking, employees tend to have pessimistic evaluations of their ability to engage in intrapreneurial behavior, believing that they are unlikely to successfully complete such tasks. Their expectations for task completion are very low, and, with the lack of a high level of perceived value, they start devaluing their work in terms of its importance. As a result, the subjective value of internal entrepreneurial work for employees decreases, and, coupled with the absence of management support, employees strongly inhibit intrapreneurial behavior. Even in the presence of high task significance and a reward mechanism, if the core factor of entrepreneurial competence is lacking, employees experience lower levels of motivation, leading to a significant reduction in their engagement in intrapreneurial behavior.
The second pattern is the perception hindrance type, which includes Solution 3b (entrepreneurial self-efficacy * task significance * perceived value * management support * reward mechanism). In the configuration of Solution 3b, FES * FTS * FPV * FMS * FRW indicates that even if employees possess entrepreneurial competence, in the absence of entrepreneurial self-efficacy and management support for intrapreneurial behavior, they will not engage in intrapreneurial behavior, despite high task significance and perceived value. In this path, entrepreneurial self-efficacy and management support are the core variables with primary explanatory roles.
Based on the relevant literature analysis, entrepreneurial self-efficacy is the self-assessment of an individual’s belief in their ability to engage in intrapreneurial behavior. Low levels of self-efficacy reduce employees’ willingness to engage in intrapreneurial behavior. In addition, unlike individual entrepreneurship, intrapreneurial behavior within an organization relies heavily on organizational support. When employees lack the intention to engage in internal entrepreneurship and are unable to obtain management support from the organization, they become more cautious in their evaluation of the task. Hence, their expectations from the task will decrease. Under the dual negative influence of individual and organizational factors, it becomes difficult to generate strong driving forces, and employees develop a sustained perception of low motivation for intrapreneurial behavior.
The third pattern is the value-hindrance type, which includes solutions 4b (entrepreneurial self-efficacy * task significance * perceived value * management support * reward mechanism) and 5b (entrepreneurial competence * entrepreneurial self-efficacy * task significance * perceived value * management support * reward mechanism). In the configuration of Solution 4b, FES * FTS * FPV * FMS * FRW indicates that regardless of the level of entrepreneurial competence, in the presence of low perceived value and lack of management support, employees will not engage in intrapreneurial behavior despite possessing a certain level of entrepreneurial self-efficacy and task significance, and in the absence of a reward mechanism. In the configuration of Solution 5b, FEC * FES * FTS * FPV * FMS * FRW indicates that under the same conditions of low perceived value and lack of management support, if employees have high levels of competence and perception but lack task significance, they will not engage in internal entrepreneurship even in the presence of corresponding incentives. In these two result paths, perceived value and management support are the core conditions that play primary explanatory roles.
Reviewing the relevant literature shows that a lack of perceived value for internal entrepreneurship results in employees having a low level of perceived value for their work. Internal entrepreneurial activities lack sufficient attractiveness to employees, and the inability of the organization to provide support for employees’ intrapreneurial behavior reduces their interest in internal entrepreneurship. Even if employees believe that they are capable of internal entrepreneurship, their perceptions of the value of the task remain low. Under the influence of these core factors, employees’ perceptions of the task’s significance will be low, and the driving force generated will be reduced. Consequently, employees are inhibited from engaging in intrapreneurial behavior.