This study aims to present a scientometric analysis, based on author’s network maps, to determine the most influential and relevant authors with papers published about the subject Small- and medium-sized enterprises, competitiveness and its measurement, including the use of key performance indicators. Academic research relies on the prospection to retrieve the most relevant research studies and establishing links to authors from key international research groups. To facilitate this study, we used the
Este estudio tiene como objetivo presentar un análisis cientométrico, basado en mapas de redes de autores, para determinar los autores más influyentes y relevantes con trabajos publicados sobre el tema Pequeñas y medianas empresas, la competitividad y su medición, incluido el uso de indicadores clave de rendimiento. La investigación académica se basa en la prospección para recuperar los estudios de investigación más relevantes y establecer vínculos con autores de grupos de investigación internacionales clave. Para facilitar este estudio, utilizamos los resultados de la investigación de las bases de datos
The scientific production begins with an internal cycle of personal contacts in informal work situations, becoming formal in its external cycle, and validated through publications available in public database files accessed by the Web (Liberman and Wolf,
Scientometrics can be defined as the science of measuring and analyzing Science quantitatively (Abramo,
Scientific research that seeks a greater detail of science, responding to more specific questions, can be subdivided into four types, each one related to a given question: when, where, what and who (Light et al.,
Research based on maps helps us identify the players who have contributed to science, homogeneity vs. heterogeneity, cause and effect, and speed of advancement of knowledge; this makes it possible to monitor the evolution of and identify the most promising areas for further scientific research (Börner et al.
The competitiveness of companies is determined by institutions, policies and other factors, determining their continued presence in the market, profitability and ability to adapt production to demand (Chao et al.,
In 2016, SMEs accounted for 99.8% of all companies, 57.4% of added value, and 66.8% of jobs generated in the European Union (European Union,
The measurement of competitiveness is an important strategic and motivational tool in management that enables organizations to monitor and optimize actual performance (Kozená and Chládek,
KPIs enable managers to assess realistically how far goals and objectives have been achieved (Rebelo et al.,
However, SMEs often experience difficulties in translating knowledge into opportunities, mostly due to a lack of research activity and systematic development (Agostini and Nosella,
Networks formed by relationships between words can involve both relations between words that form a phrase, and the network of words in a dictionary, for example. The first complex networks to be studied were the networks of citations (Newman,
The networks and the relationships between them present two problems that merit attention. The first is that the large number of agents and background can lead to uncertainty or even inconsistency of information, making it difficult to assess the quality and the union of the information provided. The second problem is that it is desirable, and even indispensable, to achieve a solution that is accepted by the majority of the members or at least to assess the degree of agreement between the parties. One of the great challenges in any decision-making scenario within SME is precisely to obtain a complete and unanimous solution agreement between all those involved (Pérez et al.,
Among the articles published that make use of statistical software for the study and analysis of science, the following can be highlighted: Bornmann and Ozimek (
Nerur et al. (
This study aims to present a scientometric analysis, based on authors’ network maps made by
To provide an overview of the developed work, the presentation of results concerning publications used two approaches: one employing quantitative bibliometric indicators, and the other employing scientometric analysis based on maps of authors’ networks, drawn up using a computational tool. Computational tools may be helpful in circumstances such as extending collaborations toward less familiar areas or in interdisciplinary research (Rons,
For this research,
In the first stage, to scientifically quantify available knowledge from studies on SMEs in the areas of competitiveness and its measurement and KPIs, data were collected by taking into consideration all publications in
Each term was searched to be retrieved individually, and in combination with other terms by using the Boolean operator “
In the second stage of research, an approach is presented, based on
To construct maps of authors’ networks through
The results were exported into the scientometric file format “
To obtain a quantitative overview of articles already published on the subjects of relevance, two bibliometric surveys were carried out, taking into consideration articles from the publications indexed to
The initial bibliometric analysis revealed that while retrieving individual search terms, especially the search term “
The next stage of this study is the construction of authors’ networks maps. In these maps, the nodes represent the authors and the bigger and the darker the black colour is, the larger the number of articles published by the author. The edges present the relations of co-authorship of articles and, the thicker and darker the edge, the greater the co-authorship relation between the authors interconnected. The number of records retrieved in each database to elaborate the authors’ networks, considering the respective search terms and the minimum number of articles an author should have published, are presented in
The size of the resulting node in the networks elaborated from the
It is evident from
It can be seen that the map originating from
The next maps of authors’ networks were drawn up using two search terms as a filter.
The presented image shows, from
On
For the next map, presented in
The use of KPIs as an appraisal tool is a topic addressed by several authors and, as shown in
The search terms “
The results obtained presented the most relevant authors as well as their research networks on subjects as competitiveness and its measurement; KPIs and SMEs. We can cite Gunasekaran A. from California State University Bakersfield, USA, Phusavat K. from Kasetsart University, Thailand, and Siluk J.M.C. from Universidade Federal de Santa Maria, Brazil, as prominent among the authors on subjects of competitiveness and measurement. Kraus S. from University of Liechtenstein, Liechtenstein, Huang W.M. from Nanyang Technological University, Singapore, and Eggers F. from Menlo College, USA, on the theme SMEs; and Sayraç B. from Orange Gardens, France, Demestichas P. from Panepistimion Pireos, Greece, and Li J.S. from University of Wisconsin Madison, USA, as prominent among the authors on the subject KPIs. In the results section it can be seen that there are other authors with considerable relevance in the subjects researched.
Differences could be noted between the maps obtained from the
The formatting of authors’ networks alone does not provide enough information to conclude whether an author is relevant in his or her research area. For this analysis to be complete and close to reality, it is necessary to verify other information, such as the number of publications and the authors h-index. In our analyses it was possible to observe that there are authors with node size larger, but with fewer articles published on a topic than other authors with smaller nodes. For example, in the map on the subject “SME”, Eggers F. has node size 15 with 6 articles published on the topic, while Belas J. has node size 14 with 10 articles published. This can be explained by the breadth and reach of the authors’ research networks, the wider their network, the more influence the author has and the more relevant the subject will be. Thus, with the information obtained through maps of authors’ networks, researchers can make sure that the reference they are using comes from an influential research group and with strong research on the subject.
As can be seen from this study, the use of KPIs as a tool to measure the competitiveness of SMEs is a subject that is still considered scientifically incipient, presenting a gap in scientific research that can be exploited by researchers, who can publish their findings and obtain citations.
The computational tool
The authors want to thank Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior for granting them scholarships, to Editage for traducing this article, and the Programa de Pós-Graduação em Sistemas e Processos Industriais – Mestrado from the Universidade de Santa Cruz do Sul.
Los autores desean agradecer a la Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior por otorgarles becas, a Editage por traducir este artículo, y al Programa de Pós-Graduação em Sistemas e Processos Industrais – Mestrado de la Universidade de Santa Cruz do Sul.