The Growth Corridor

One of the biggest challenges business executives face is to simultaneously increase sales growth and performance. Ambiguities in existing management research on the relationship between growth and performance raise the question whether there is in fact an optimum growth rate. The aim of this study is to reconcile market, resource, and financial factors to study the relationship between growth and firm performance. In three consecutive papers, determinants of profitable growth are studied. The results suggest that there are firm-specific boundaries of optimum firm growth. Companies whose sales growth rate exceeds its competitor's growth, while at the same time remaining within the firm's financial limits, enjoy higher levels of long-term performance. The model of the growth corridor reconciles these findings. It provides a hands-on management tool that business executives can use to determine their firm's optimum rate of sales growth.