• Home
• Regulation
• Regulatory Policy
• Compliance Costs
• BCC Perceptions Survey
• Perceptions of NZ Firms
• Section 2: Survey Demographics

• Regulatory Policy

• Compliance Costs

• BCC Perceptions Survey

• BCC Survey Summary
• Perceptions of NZ Firms
• Media Statements

• Firm Size
• Export Involvement
• Firm Stage
• Growth Intentions
• Industry Type
• Summary

As already noted in the introduction, the researchers were interested in examining the way in which different groups of firms respond differently to their compliance obligations. For the purpose of this study a number of ways of exploring the difference between firms were identified: firm size; export involvement; firm stage; growth intentions and industry type. These five "dimensions" (and their respective sub-categories as explained below) were used throughout the study to collect and organise the data. The following section presents the demographic data from the total sample (490 firms).

Firm Size

There is evidence to suggest that firms that are of different sizes will exhibit differences in the way they perceive their compliance commitments. In particular, it is clear that non-employing firms have a different experience of compliance to those encountered by firms that employ. In order to examine the impact of size on the perceptions of compliance, firms in this study were grouped in terms of four size categories. These categories focused on those firms that might be described as micro, to reflect the characteristics of the New Zealand business population, in which over 85% of all firms employ fewer than 5 FTEs.¹¹

Figure 1: Sample by Size

Export Involvement

Given the interest in this study on the way in which compliance may have an impact on a firm's ability to engage in growth-related strategies (such as exporting), the researchers categorised the respondents in relation to exporting.

Figure 2: Sample by Export Involvement

All respondents were asked to describe their firm's involvement in export over the last 24 months in terms of whether they are currently exporting or not. Respondents who answered that they were not currently exporting were then asked whether they considered their product or service "to be inherently capable of export, or being provided to overseas customers, from New Zealand". This question elicited the responses below:

Figure 3: Export Capability and/or Intentions (for Non-Exporters)

Firm Stage

When considering the possible implications of compliance, it is intuitively attractive to assume that mature firms will find compliance less onerous than those that are new. For this reason the researchers were interested in examining compliance perceptions in relation to firm stage. Given the difficulty of defining firm "maturity" in a way that is appropriate to firms of all sizes and in all industries, the respondents in this study were asked to define their own stage of growth, i.e. if they saw their firm as "recently established and still finding a market", "mature and stable" or "somewhere between these two".

Figure 4: Sample by Firm Stage

Growth Intentions

The focus of this study was on the way in which manager's perceptions of compliance impact on growth. Given the difficulty of defining growth in a way that is appropriate to firms of all sizes and in all industries, respondents were again asked to provide their own view on their growth intentions: They were asked if they saw their firm as "contracting to a smaller size or volume of business", "consolidating at about its current size or turnover" or "growing significantly through current or new products, services or clients".

Figure 5: Sample by Growth Intention

Industry Type

There is considerable agreement that compliance is not experienced in the same way by all industry sectors. Nor are the direct or indirect costs or consequences of compliance equally borne by all. To ensure that these differences were reflected in the study, a decision was made to identify a number of sectors of potential interest because of anecdotal evidence of their compliance problems. For this survey six sectors were chosen.¹²

Figure 6: Sample by Industry Group

Summary

Firms and their managers are not all the same, and the 490 respondents in this study were deliberately selected to demonstrate the heterogeneity of the New Zealand business population. As a result the sample offers a unique glimpse into the way in which firms that are different in terms of firm size, export involvement, firm stage, growth intentions and industry type, differ in the way they regard the impact of compliance. This notion is explored in the following sections of this report.

¹¹Industry & Regional Development Branch, Ministry of Economic Development. (2002) SMEs in New Zealand: Structure and Dynamics. Wellington, New Zealand: MED.

¹²These sectors were chosen by MED. If the survey is repeated other industry sectors could be substituted, and although the responses would not be directly comparable to the initial study, it would allow a picture of compliance across sectors to be built up.