Employee's perceptions of market orientation in a transitional economy : China as an example

Market orientation places a special emphasis on the dissemination of and responsiveness to market intelligence throughout the whole organization. However, it is still not well understood how employees at different levels perceive their firm's market orientation. This paper represents a first attempt to study market orientation at the employee level in the whole organization. Based on a survey of 1,357 managers and workers in China, we find that junior managers and front-line workers are less likely to perceive their firms as market-oriented than senior managers, group culture facilitates employees' market orientation perceptions, and a positive personal attitude toward change is beneficial to developing market orientation behaviors. The results also show that market orientation has a strong, positive impact on employees' job satisfaction, organizational commitment, and confidence in the firm's future performance. Im plications on how to promote employee's market orientation behavior in a transitional economy are discussed,