Ownership mindset, autonomy, and innovation: Contingent pathways to entrepreneurial success in emerging economies

Despite the growing interest in employee ownership behavior as a driver of organizational outcomes, research exploring the nexus between employees’ ownership mindset and new venture performance remains nascent. To address this gap, we integrate self-determination theory and psychological ownership theory to build a conditional indirect effects model, theorizing that an employee ownership mindset enhances new venture performance both directly and indirectly through bootleg innovation and that the strength of these relationships is amplified at higher levels of job autonomy. To test our hypotheses, we collected primary data from 210 SMEs from Sub-Saharan Africa–Ghana, an emerging market, and observed that an employee ownership mindset does not exert a direct effect on new venture performance. Instead, its influence operates indirectly through bootleg innovation. Moreover, the indirect effect strengthens as job autonomy increases. We contribute to the entrepreneurship and organizational behavior literatures by elucidating the mechanisms and contingencies through which employee ownership behaviors shape new venture outcomes, offering nuanced insights for theory and practice in emerging market contexts.