Explaining the Paradigmatic Model of Survival-Oriented Innovation in Food Industry Firms in Tehran Province: Examining the Role of Entrepreneurial Orientation, Operational Innovation Strategies, and Organizational Barriers

This study aimed to develop a model for explaining innovation mechanisms within the bureaucratic context of Iran’s food industry. Although prior literature has predominantly focused on formal research-and-development models in stable environments, a gap remains in understanding informal and reactive innovation patterns in resource-constrained and turbulent settings. This study focuses on reactive and survival-oriented innovation, which, unlike R&D-driven models, emerges from adaptive responses to environmental, structural, and operational pressures. A qualitative approach based on Grounded Theory methodology (Strauss & Corbin, 1998) was employed. Data were collected through semi-structured interviews with 10 senior managers, middle managers, and key experts in Tehran Province’s food industry who possessed lived experience in product development and exposure to structural challenges. Theoretical sampling continued until theoretical saturation was achieved. Data analysis involved open coding (reducing 800 initial codes), axial coding, and selective coding. Trustworthiness was ensured through triangulation and member checking. The resulting model, structured within the axial coding paradigm, comprised the following components: causal conditions (entrepreneurial orientation, including opportunity recognition, empowerment, long-term budgeting perspective, bottom-up entrepreneurship, and a multi-industry vision); strategies (operational innovation strategies such as creative adaptation, step-by-step testing, organizational agility, contract manufacturing, and grassroots innovation); contextual conditions (organizational barriers, including bureaucratic structures, employee resistance, short-term managerial orientation, and person-dependent systems); intervening conditions (environmental turbulence, including economic instability, regulatory pressures, supply constraints, and sanctions); and consequences (survival-and-growth-oriented innovation performance, including survival-driven innovation, sanction-oriented innovation, entrepreneurial exit, and process innovation). Accordingly, during the selective coding stage, the core category of “reactive survival-oriented innovation within organizational bureaucracy and environmental turbulence” was identified. The findings highlight the role of survival-oriented innovation approaches in turbulent and bureaucratic environments. Theoretically, the proposed model contributes a framework for innovation in emerging markets. Practically, the findings underscore the necessity of fostering bottom-up idea generation, strengthening top-management support for reducing hierarchical rigidity through organizational agility, and enhancing cross-functional collaboration to overcome sanctions-related and economic turbulence constraints. The study is limited by the relatively small sample size and the interpretive nature of the qualitative approach. Future research is encouraged to quantitatively test the proposed model using samples and to conduct cross-industry investigations.