Management Styles and Performance of Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises in Malaysia

Management style as a concept and practice continue to attract much attention in the literature. As a fieldof study, the review of past research reveals that previous studies that examined management styles have mainly focused on large companies. Despite the importance of management style to small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), not many studies have attempted to investigate the management stylesembraced by these firms, especially in the Malaysian context. This study investigates the relationships between management styles and performance of SMEs. Using structured questionnaire, the data was collected from 186 SMEs operating in the manufacturing sector. The results of the study show that management styles are associated to the performance of the SMEs.