Open Journal of Business and Management, 2022, 10, 3409-3435 https://www.scirp.org/journal/ojbm ISSN Online: 2329-3292 ISSN Print: 2329-3284 DOI: 10.4236/ojbm.2022.106168 Nov. 22, 2022 3409 Open Journal of Business and Management The Impact of Entrepreneurial Orientation on Innovation Performance in Nigerian Firms: The Mediating Effect of Knowledge Management Abudu Kehinde Funmilayo * , Mintah Clement * , Ejiofor Nnaemeka Solomon, Elvis Kwame Ofori, Nsorah Johnkingsley Onyedikachi School of Economics and Management, Taiyuan University of Technology, Taiyuan, China Abstract Entrepreneurial orientation has grown in prominence as a productive struc- ture that includes complex sets of interactions that drive economic actors’ competitive skills by inducing innovation. However few econometric indices have been carried out within emerging economies. Hence this paper seeks to investigate the impact of entrepreneurial orientations on innovation perfor- mance in Nigeria, using knowledge management as a mediating factor. Before doing so, we marry the insights of several pieces of works of literature on knowledge management, and innovation performance, stemming from Or- ganizational Theory of Innovation, and Schumpeterian Theory of Innovation. A survey design was adopted for the study. A valid sample of 329 impacted the study using the Cochran formulae for sample size determination. The re- search employed the Partial Least Square method for the main analysis and the Ordered Logistic Regression method for robustness check. In this study, we accept all hypotheses due to their significant and mutual relationship to the measured variable. Though knowledge management capability showed an insignificant impact on innovation performance, it correlated strongly with innovation performance in the matrix analysis. Even though the knowledge management capability construct variable was statistically insignificant on the dependent variable, there was a positive correlation. This can further be in- vestigated in future research to ascertain reality. Hence, this research is a call on policy ramification and blueprint approach not only for firms in Nigeria but in other jurisdictions striving for innovation performance. The research find- ings indicate that businesses with high entrepreneurial orientation can iden- tify new opportunities and have higher inclination to successful performance. How to cite this paper: Funmilayo, A. K., Clement, M., Solomon, E. N., Ofori, E. K., & Onyedikachi, N. J. (2022). The Impact of Entrepreneurial Orientation on Innovation Performance in Nigerian Firms: The Me- diating Effect of Knowledge Management. Open Journal of Business and Management, 10, 3409-3435. https://doi.org/10.4236/ojbm.2022.106168 Received: September 13, 2022 Accepted: November 19, 2022 Published: November 22, 2022 Copyright © 2022 by author(s) and Scientific Research Publishing Inc. This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution International License (CC BY 4.0). http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ Open Access