Showing papers by "Danny Miller published in 2011"
TL;DR: A review of the literature on entrepreneurial orientation can be found in this article, where the authors argue the importance of linking EO to current theories in strategy, organization theory, and economics.
Abstract: Using Miller (1983) as a starting point, this article reviews the literature on entrepreneurial orientation or “EO.” It summarizes Miller's major points before recapping some of the subsequent literature and assessing why EO has become such a prominent topic. It identifies weaknesses in the literature, some of which, paradoxically, Miller wrote his article to guard against. It then makes recommendations for extending conceptually, and improving methodologically, future research on EO, arguing the importance of linking EO to current theories in strategy, organization theory, and economics. Methodological reorientations are also suggested to arrive at more cumulative and practical findings.
674 citations
TL;DR: The authors argue that explanations of performance must take into account not simply ownership, but who are the owners or executives and how their social contexts may influence their strategic priorities, and they support the role identities and logics of family nurturers and thus strategies of conservation.
Abstract: There is controversy in the literature about the effects of ownership on strategy and performance. Some scholars have taken agency explanations as definitive, arguing that closely held firms outperform. Empirical studies, however, show conflicting findings for firms with concentrated ownership: lone founder firms outperform, family firms do not. Such conflicts may be due to the failure of agency theory to distinguish between the social contexts of these different types of owners. We argue that explanations of performance must take into account not simply ownership, but who are the owners or executives and how their social contexts may influence their strategic priorities. Family owners and CEOs, influenced by family stakeholders in the business, are argued to assume the role identities and logics of family nurturers and thus strategies of conservation. By contrast, lone founders, influenced by a wider set of market-oriented stakeholders, are argued to embrace the identities and logics of entrepreneurs and strategies of growth. Family founders and founder-executives are held to blend both orientations. These notions are supported in a study of Fortune 1000 companies.
459 citations
01 Jan 2011
TL;DR: The authors argue that explanations of performance must take into account not simply ownership, but who are the owners or executives and how their social contexts may influence their strategic priorities, and they support the role identities and logics of family nurturers and thus strategies of conservation.
Abstract: There is controversy in the literature about the effects of ownership on strategy and performance. Some scholars have taken agency explanations as definitive, arguing that closely held firms outperform. Empirical studies, however, show conflicting findings for firms with concentrated ownership: lone founder firms outperform, family firms do not. Such conflicts may be due to the failure of agency theory to distinguish between the social contexts of these different types of owners. We argue that explanations of performance must take into account not simply ownership, but who are the owners or executives and how their social contexts may influence their strategic priorities. Family owners and CEOs, influenced by family stakeholders in the business, are argued to assume the role identities and logics of family nurturers and thus strategies of conservation. By contrast, lone founders, influenced by a wider set of market-oriented stakeholders, are argued to embrace the identities and logics of entrepreneurs and strategies of growth. Family founders and founder-executives are held to blend both orientations. These notions are supported in a study of Fortune 1000 companies.
385 citations
TL;DR: This paper argues that both these views have application but under different circumstances, determined in part by the degree to which the firm and its executive actors are embedded within the family and thus identify with its interests.
Abstract: Two contradictory perspectives of family business conduct and performance are prominent in the literature. The stewardship perspective argues that family business owners and managers will act as farsighted stewards of their companies, investing generously in the business to enhance value for all stakeholders. By contrast, the agency and behavioral agency perspectives maintain that major family owners, in catering to family self-interest, will underinvest in the firm, avoid risk, and extract resources. This paper argues that both these views have application but under different circumstances, determined in part by the degree to which the firm and its executive actors are embedded within the family and thus identify with its interests. Stewardship behavior will be less common, and agency behavior will be more common the greater the number of family directors, officers, generations, and votes, and the more executives are susceptible to family influence. These findings are supported among Fortune 1000 firms, as well as among the subsample of those firms that are family businesses.
378 citations
01 Jan 2011
TL;DR: The authors argue that family CEOs will outperform in smaller firms with more concentrated ownership and underperform in larger firms having more dispersed ownership; they will do neither where firms are smaller and ownership is more dispersed or firms are larger and ownership more concentrated.
Abstract: There has been much debate concerning the performance of family firms and the drivers of their performance. Some scholars have argued that family management is to blame when family firms go wrong; others claim that family management removes costly agency problems and encourages stewardship. Our thesis is that these disagreements can only be resolved by distinguishing among different types of family firms. We argue that family CEOs will outperform in smaller firms with more concentrated ownership and underperform in larger firms with more dispersed ownership; they will do neither where firms are smaller and ownership is more dispersed or firms are larger and ownership is more concentrated. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
301 citations
TL;DR: While mothers feel empowered that the phone has allowed them to partially reconstruct their role as parents, their children are significantly more ambivalent about the consequences of transnational communication.
Abstract: The Philippines is an intensely migrant society with an annual migration of one million people, leading to over a tenth of the population working abroad. Many of these emigrants are mothers who often have children left behind. Family separation is now recognized as one of the social costs of migration affecting the global south. Relationships within such transnational families depend on long-distance communication and there is an increasing optimism among Filipino government agencies and telecommunications companies about the consequences of mobile phones for transnational families. This article draws on comparative research with UK-based Filipina migrants — mainly domestic workers and nurses — and their left-behind children in the Philippines. Our methodology allowed us to directly compare the experience of mothers and their children. The article concludes that while mothers feel empowered that the phone has allowed them to partially reconstruct their role as parents, their children are significantly mor...
299 citations
Book•
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11 Apr 2011
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors discuss the history of Facebook and the anthropology of Facebook, and 15 theses on what Facebook might just be, including the history woman and the philosophy of double doubles.
Abstract: Preface PART ONE - PORTRAITS 1) Marriage Dun Mash Up 2) Avatar 3) For Whom the Bell Doesn't Toll 4) The Book of Truth 5) It's Who You Know 6) Community 7) Time Suck 8) Cultivating FarmVille 9) It Was Just Sex 10) Getting the Word Out 11) Picking BlackBerrys 12) The History Woman Lagniappe The Philosophy of Doubles PART TWO - The Anthropology of Facebook A) The Invention of Fasbook. B) The Fame of Facebook. C) 15 theses on what Facebook might just be. Glossary and Acknowledgements
283 citations
TL;DR: Based on notions from the identity theory, the authors argues that in public firms in which ownership is concentrated, owner-chief executive officer (CEO) identities will influence entrepreneurial operations. But they do not consider the role of minority shareholders.
Abstract: Based on notions from the identity theory, this study argues that in public firms in which ownership is concentrated, owner–chief executive officer (CEO) identities will influence entrepreneurial o...
256 citations
TL;DR: This article argued that the shortcomings of many Western companies stem from too little attention to relational considerations, while those of many Eastern companies are caused by excesses and distortions of the relational perspective.
Abstract: Executive Overview Borrowing from classical Eastern philosophy and Chinese culture, this paper draws lessons in leadership, strategy, and organization for today's managers. It begins by articulating the relational philosophy, in particular the Chinese tradition of thought in which all entities are conceived to exist within the context of one another and in which integration, balance, and harmony are sought over distinction and comparison. It examines how this relational mindset shapes interpersonal relationships, communication, and temporal considerations. Lessons are then drawn for leadership, strategy, and organization for both Eastern and Western businesses. We argue that the shortcomings of many Western companies stem from too little attention to relational considerations, while those of many Eastern companies are caused by excesses and distortions of the relational perspective. The relational approach provides an ideal path toward an “ambicultural” mode of management, one that avoids dangerous extrem...
166 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors employ agency theory to argue that the effects of family ownership versus management will be quite different: the former is expected to contribute positively to performance, the latter is argued to erode performance.
94 citations
TL;DR: In this article, the authors provide an inspiring historical example of how that can happen and illustrate some conditions under which one might expect similarly happy circumstances to arise and provide a historical analysis of how it can happen.
Abstract: Executive Overview Agency theory stipulates that executives will use their superior information to exploit owners unless effectively monitored or incentivized to do otherwise: Agents here are held to be opportunists and owners responsible parties. However, sometimes agency theory misses the mark and the reverse holds true. It may be the owners who exploit their firm and compromise its long-term interests, and steward-like agents who use their superior information to benefit a firm and its stakeholders. This analysis provides an inspiring historical example of how that can happen and illustrates some conditions under which one might expect similarly happy circumstances to arise.
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors argue the need for multitemporality (MT), the ability to achieve enduring success by meeting both short and long-term challenges, and show how many family firms are in a su...
Abstract: In this commentary, we argue the need for multitemporality (MT)—the ability to achieve enduring success by meeting both short– and long–term challenges—and we show how many family firms are in a su...
TL;DR: In this paper, the Pas River catchment in northern Spain (650 km2) was examined using computer tools to examine the spatial patterns of fluvial landscapes that are associated with five domains of hydro-geomorphic processes and landforms.
Abstract: . One of the major challenges in river restoration is to identify the natural fluvial landscape in catchments with a long history of river control. Intensive land use on valley floors often predates the earliest remote sensing: levees, dikes, dams, and other structures alter valley-floor morphology, river channels and flow regimes. Consequently, morphological patterns indicative of the fluvial landscape including multiple channels, extensive floodplains, wetlands, and fluvial-riparian and tributary-confluence dynamics can be obscured, and information to develop appropriate and cost effective river restoration strategies can be unavailable. This is the case in the Pas River catchment in northern Spain (650 km2), in which land use and development have obscured the natural fluvial landscape in many parts of the basin. To address this issue we used computer tools to examine the spatial patterns of fluvial landscapes that are associated with five domains of hydro-geomorphic processes and landforms. Using a 5-m digital elevation model, valley-floor surfaces were mapped according to elevation above the channel and proximity to key geomorphic processes. The predicted fluvial landscape is patchily distributed according to hillslope and valley topography, river network structure, and channel elevation profiles. The vast majority of the fluvial landscape in the main segments of the Pas River catchment is presently masked by human infrastructure, with only 15% not impacted by river control structures and development. The reconstructed fluvial landscape provides a catchment scale context to support restoration planning, in which areas of potential ecological productivity and diversity could be targeted for in-channel, floodplain and riparian restoration projects.
TL;DR: The authors provides a historical perspective on communication among Filipino transnational families before the explosion of communication channels and opportunities accompanying the arrival of mobsters in the Philippines, in the early 1970s.
Abstract: This paper provides a historical perspective on communication among Filipino transnational families. Before the explosion of communication channels and opportunities accompanying the arrival of mob...
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors provide an appropriate concept of leadership for scholars of strategy and organization and suggest its research implications for addressing gaps in the literature on strategy and organisation, and suggest several research directions.
Abstract: Leaders’ efforts at shaping people’s convictions are vital to the effectiveness of formal and informal organizations (Hambrick, 2004; Whittington, 2003). Unfortunately, the domains of strategy and organization theory have been ignoring the critical role of leadership – a concept that may both enlighten and help bridge the two domains. In strategy, the emphasis has been largely on economically rational behaviour, competitive positioning, and resources and capabilities. In organization theory, the focus has been on macro-social levels of analysis and on structural parameters. In each domain there has been too little attention paid to the micro-processes of individual human interaction in which beliefs and values – indeed convictions – are transferred among people within an organization: a process that is at the heart of developing and implementing strategy, and a central contributor to, and outcome of organization design. We shall argue this process to be, in essence, leadership. One possible reason for the neglect of leadership in strategic organization is that we lack a robust concept of it that would be useful to scholars in this domain. Certainly, there have been thousands of studies of leadership, and the term has enjoyed a wide range of definitions and conceptions (Bass, 2008; Yukl, 2006). In fact, Bass’s Handbook of Leadership contains about 10,000 references! However, the concept of leadership is sometimes cast too broadly to have clear implications for organizational behaviour, or too narrowly to do it justice in the many management situations in which it occurs (Podolny et al., 2010). That may limit its usefulness. The objective of this essay is to provide an appropriate concept of leadership for scholars of strategy and organization and to suggest its research implications. First we relate why most current notions of leadership are unable to capture fully its significance for the study of strategic organization. Then we propose a baseline conception of leadership whose parameters are promising for that purpose. We also investigate the boundaries of the term to appreciate its varieties. We conclude with the implications our conception of leadership has for addressing gaps in the literature on strategy and organization, and suggest several research directions.
TL;DR: In this article, an ordinal logistic regression model was used to predict and map process domains in regions with complex physiography using descriptors measured from high-resolution lidar-derived digital elevation models (DEMs).
Abstract: [1] Lithologic transitions and glaciations create complex longitudinal profiles that control contemporary erosion and deposition processes. In areas with these characteristics, traditional morphometric approaches for predicting process domains, such as area-slope plots, can be augmented by considering other predictors measured from high resolution lidar-derived digital elevation models (DEMs). Ordinal logistic regression was used to model the distribution of hillslope, swale, colluvial channel, and fluvial channel domains, as identified during field surveys. The study area was a glaciated region of the Rocky Mountain foothills with a complex lithostructural setting. Relationships between domains and a suite of geographic information system–derived descriptors were explored. Predictors included profile anomalies measured at the reach and basin scale using a normalized stream length–gradient (SL/k) index. Drainage area was the dominant factor controlling domains. A model with area as the only predictor was 82% accurate. Reach slope relations were not consistent. A model that also included lithology and basin-scale SL/k index variation was 87% accurate. Domain transitions had larger area thresholds in basins with resistant conglomerate versus sandstone or shale formations and where SL/k index was more variable along a profile. In a restricted model of hillslope, swale, and colluvial channel domains, profile curvature measured over 100 m was also related to domain occurrence. A model for regional-scale mapping applications with six additional predictors was 95% accurate. The results showed that ordinal logistic regression can be used to predict and map process domains in regions with complex physiography using descriptors measured from high -resolution DEMs.
Journal Article•
TL;DR: In this article, the authors argue that the identities of owners and owner-managers of public companies can influence innovation and thus performance, and distinguish between innovation input, innovation output and innovation quality.
Abstract: We argue that the identities of owners and owner-managers of public companies can influence innovation and thus performance. We distinguish between innovation input, innovation output and innovation quality. We show that lone founder owners and owner-managers, who we argue embrace entrepreneurial identities, achieve superior innovation output and quality when compared to other firms, even controlling for innovation input. By contrast family owners and managers, who we argue adopt family nurturer identities, spend less on innovation input and also obtain less output and quality, again, controlling for innovation input.
TL;DR: For years now our profession has selected its members, at least in part, on the basis of standardized tests, such as GMAT or GRE, thereby discriminating against dyslexics and others with disadvanta...
Abstract: For years now our profession has selected its members, at least in part, on the basis of standardized tests, such as GMAT or GRE, thereby discriminating against dyslexics and others with disadvanta...
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors introduce the study of material culture as taught under the auspices of anthropology to understand the experience of being a mother and how new media have transformed the relationship between Filipina migrant workers and their left behind children.
Abstract: This paper is concerned with the role of material culture in understanding the experience of being a mother. It introduces the study of material culture as taught under the auspices of anthropology. The concept of objectification as the reduction of persons to things is contrasted with the use of the term to consider the role of objects in making persons. There are three case studies, the first based on an ethnography of Slovakian au pairs, the second on how mothers come to terms with the growing autonomy of their infants as expressed in their relation to consumer goods, and the third is a study of how new media have transformed the relationship between Filipina migrant workers and their left behind children. These three studies help us shift between these two opposed meanings to the concept of objectification, and come to appreciate the degree to which material culture is constitutive of being a mother and problematizes our common sense distinction between subjects and objects.
01 Sep 2011
Abstract: First, I would like to thank Mitch Rose for what is clearly a very thoughtful, considered and heartfelt contribution. I am also thankful for the opportunity to contest his argument and demonstrate that actually my previous writings do pretty much the exact opposite of what Rose claims, at least with regard to their consequences for our understanding of the role of the transcendent in the lives of humanity. The initial representation of my work by Rose is entirely fine. Indeed, I am grateful for a succinct and sympathetic treatment of my arguments. He probably grants me more consistency as a thinker than I actually deserve. The problems come when he starts to draw out what he would see as the consequences of these arguments and when he comes to the more concrete exemplification. Space only allows me a few examples but I hope these will be sufficient. My most extended discussion of these issues appears in the introduction to the edited collection Materiality (Miller, 2005). Perhaps surprisingly, I did not use this book to dismiss the world of the immaterial or emphasize the secular nature of material culture as claimed here. I did exactly the opposite. This is a book whose primary theme is humanity’s apprehension of the divine and the immaterial, precisely what might be otherwise called the absent. My argument and that of several of the key papers that follow, such as that by Engelke (see also Engelke, 2007), is that material culture is not to be seen in opposition to that quest for transcendence, but surprisingly and, if you like, counter-intuitively, it is the only and inevitable means by which we come to that apprehension. From the pyramids of Egypt to the lives of Apostolic Christians, from the coins of Islam to the ineffability of African chiefs, it is through the material world that people attest and come to experience their sense of an immaterial other world that lies beyond the material. I cannot, for the life of me, see how that volume can be read as otherwise. In fact, I think I wrote the argument in an accessible and clear fashion alongside the several concrete examples, so that it would be hard to avoid such a reading of our collective texts. Which makes my argument almost exactly the same as that of Rose (2011) in his illustration of the church. He writes: Journal of Material Culture 16(3) 325–332 © The Author(s) 2011 Reprints and permission: sagepub. co.uk/journalsPermissions.nav DOI: 10.1177/1359183511413650 mcu.sagepub.com J o u r n a l o f