Mediating role of organizational learning on the relationship between knowledge management process and firm innovativeness: An application on technology development zones

In today's competitive conditions, knowledge is a vital element that businesses use in all their processes. With the globalization, the unprecedented increase in the number of competitors and the intensification of competition in every field has led the knowledge become a critical asset that is difficult for companies to imitate. For this reason, managing the knowledge assests effectively has become one of the top priorities for businesses. In addition, innovation, which has entered the business literature with J. Schumpeter and has become a strategic competitive tool over time, is on the agenda of enterprises without losing its importance. The rapid change in customer needs and expectations, especially after the development of information technologies, has forced businesses to innovate in order to gain new customers and not to lose their existing customers to their competitors. When the literature is examined, it is seen that the knowledge of the enterprises lies at the core of innovation that provides competitiveness. This relationship between knowledge and innovation raises the question of how there is an interaction between how firms manage existing and new knowledge and their innovativeness levels. In the light of the statements above, the main purpose of this research is to examine the relationship between knowledge management process and innovativeness and whether organizational learning mediates this relationship. At the same time, the aim of the study is to determine the knowledge management, organizational learning and innovativeness levels of the IT companies. The research was conducted on the IT firms operating in the technology development zones in TR42 East Marmara Region and ODTÜ and Ankara technology development zones. First of all, exploratory and comfirmatory factor analysis were performed on the data that were collected via questionnaire. Then, linear regression method, structural equation modelling and Process analysis were used to test the hypotheses of the study. The findings were interpreted and then various suggestions for both researchers and practitioners were presented. According to results of the research, the steps of acquiring, transforming and applying the knowledge constituting the knowledge management process have a positive and significant effect on the organizatonal learning and innovativeness levels of the enterprises. Similarly, the research demonstrates that organizational learning has a positive and significant effect on innovativeness. Another result is that the organizational learning levels of enterprises play a mediating role in the interaction between knowledge acquisiton, conversion and application processes and innovativeness. Finally, knowledge protection process has no significant effect on organizational learning and firm innovativeness.