Showing papers in "Administrative Science Quarterly in 2015"
TL;DR: The authors found that individuals from tight cultures are less likely than counterparts from loose cultures to engage in and succeed at foreign creative tasks; this effect is intensified as the cultural distance between the innovator's and the audience's country increases.
Abstract: This paper advances a new theoretical model to understand the effect of culture on creativity in a global context. We theorize that creativity engagement and success depend on the cultural tightness—the extent to which a country is characterized by strong social norms and low tolerance for deviant behaviors—of both an innovator’s country and the audience’s country, as well as the cultural distance between these two countries. Using field data from a global online crowdsourcing platform that organizes creative contests for consumer-product brands, supplemented by interviews with marketing experts, we found that individuals from tight cultures are less likely than counterparts from loose cultures to engage in and succeed at foreign creative tasks; this effect is intensified as the cultural distance between the innovator’s and the audience’s country increases. Additionally, tight cultures are less receptive to foreign creative ideas. But we also found that in certain circumstances—when members of a tight cul...
312 citations
TL;DR: This article examined early-stage entrepreneurial investment decision making under conditions of extreme uncertainty and found that angel investors rely on a combination of expertise-based intuition and formal analysis in which intuition trumps analysis, contrary to reports in other investment contexts.
Abstract: Using an inductive theory-development study, a field experiment, and a longitudinal field test, we examine early-stage entrepreneurial investment decision making under conditions of extreme uncertainty. Building on existing literature on decision making and risk in organizations, intuition, and theories of entrepreneurial financing, we test the effectiveness of angel investors’ criteria for making investment decisions. We found that angel investors’ decisions have several characteristics that have not been adequately captured in existing theory: angel investors have clear objectives—risking small stakes to find extraordinarily profitable investments, fully expecting to lose their entire investment in most cases—and they rely on a combination of expertise-based intuition and formal analysis in which intuition trumps analysis, contrary to reports in other investment contexts. We also found that their reported emphasis on assessments of the entrepreneur accurately predicts extraordinarily profitable venture ...
284 citations
TL;DR: This article developed and empirically evaluated an institutional theory of gender inequalities in business start-up, ownership, and growth orientation, and argued that in contexts in which institution's gender inequalities were not explicitly considered, they could be seen as a form of sexism.
Abstract: This article develops and empirically evaluates an institutional theory of gender inequalities in business start-up, ownership, and growth orientation. I argue that in contexts in which institution...
272 citations
Abstract: Drawing on institutional theory, we examine how the institutional logics—taken-for granted norms, structures, and practices—of different types of funding partners influence young firms and their search for innovations We test our hypotheses in a longitudinal study of a complete population of ventures in the minimally invasive surgical device industry in the US, supplemented by interviews with industry informants We find that types of funding partners vary significantly from one another: they all provide resources, but their institutional logics differ Venture capitalists (VCs) pick young firms with significant patented technologies and help firms launch products, and high-status VCs strengthen both the patenting and product innovations of young firms Corporate venture capitalists and government agencies also select patent-intensive firms but are less effective than VCs in helping ventures during the relationship because, though these partners often have impressive technical and commercial resources
206 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors examine how chief executive officer (CEO) narcissism influences the interorganizational imitation of corporate strategy, and they theorize that narcissistic CEOs are influenced more by the corporate s...
Abstract: We examine how chief executive officer (CEO) narcissism influences the interorganizational imitation of corporate strategy. We theorize that narcissistic CEOs are influenced more by the corporate s...
173 citations
TL;DR: In this article, the authors question the assumption that the dynamism of institutional logics and practice variations is the result of rivalry among logics, of tensions, of competition among actors and logics.
Abstract: This paper questions a key assumption in the organizations literature that the dynamism of institutional logics and practice variations is the result of rivalry among logics and actors, of tensions...
137 citations
TL;DR: The authors explored the roles that places play in institutional work and found that places played three key roles: places contained, mediated, and complicated institutional work, each of these roles was associated with a distinct ontology of place: places as social enclosures, as signifiers, and as practical objects.
Abstract: The places in which organizational life occurs can have profound impacts on actors, actions, and outcomes but are largely ignored in organizational research. Drawing on ideas from social geography, we explore the roles that places play in institutional work. The context for our study is the domain of housing for the hard-to-house, within which we conducted two qualitative case studies: the establishment of Canada’s first residential and day-care facility for people living with HIV/AIDS, and the creation of a municipal program to provide temporary overnight accommodation for homeless people in local churches. In examining these cases, we found that places played three key roles: places contained, mediated, and complicated institutional work. Each of these roles was associated with a distinct ontology of place: places as social enclosures, as signifiers, and as practical objects. Our findings have significant implications for how we understand the relationship between location and organizations and allow us to develop a process model of places, institutions, and institutional work.
137 citations
TL;DR: For example, the authors argues that the current system of scholarly career incentives is likely to yield a high volume of novel papers with sophisticated econometrics and no obvious prospect of cumulative knowledge development, and that changes in the world of organizations are not being met with changes in how and for whom organizational research is done.
Abstract: Organizational research is guided by standards of what journals will publish and what gets rewarded in scholarly careers. This system can promote novelty rather than truth and impact rather than coherence. The advent of big data, combined with our current system of scholarly career incentives, is likely to yield a high volume of novel papers with sophisticated econometrics and no obvious prospect of cumulative knowledge development. Moreover, changes in the world of organizations are not being met with changes in how and for whom organizational research is done. It is time for a dialogue on who and what organizational research is for and how that should shape our practice.
125 citations
TL;DR: In this article, the authors developed a theoretical framework predicting that gay men and lesbians will concentrate in occupations that provide a high degree of task independence or require a high level of social perceptiveness, or both.
Abstract: Numerous scholars have noted the disproportionately high number of gay and lesbian workers in certain occupations, but systematic explanations for this type of occupational segregation remain elusive. Drawing on the literatures on concealable stigma and stigma management, we develop a theoretical framework predicting that gay men and lesbians will concentrate in occupations that provide a high degree of task independence or require a high level of social perceptiveness, or both. Using several distinct measures of sexual orientation, and controlling for potential confounds, such as education, urban location, and regional and demographic differences, we find support for these predictions across two nationally representative surveys in the United States for the period 2008–2010. Gay men are more likely to be in female-majority occupations than are heterosexual men, and lesbians are more represented in male-majority occupations than are heterosexual women, but even after accounting for this tendency, common to both gay men and lesbians is a propensity to concentrate in occupations that provide task independence or require social perceptiveness, or both. This study offers a theory of occupational segregation on the basis of minority sexual orientation and holds implications for the literatures on stigma, occupations, and labor markets.
124 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors test hypotheses designed to disentangle risk and change as outcomes of behavioral performance feedback routines, and find that managers make decisions involving risk and decisions involving change under different conditions and motivated by different concerns.
Abstract: Using data on 3,225 actively managed U.S. mutual funds from 1980 to 2006, we test hypotheses designed to disentangle risk and change as outcomes of behavioral performance feedback routines. We theorize that managers make decisions involving risk and decisions involving change under different conditions and motivated by different concerns. Our results show internal social comparison across units within a firm will motivate risk, whereas external social comparison across firms will motivate change. When a fund experiences a performance shortfall relative to internal social comparison, the manager is likely to make decisions that involve risk because the social and spatial proximity of internal comparisons trigger individual concern and fear of negative individual consequences, such as job loss. In contrast, when a fund experiences a performance shortfall in comparison with external benchmarks, the manager is more likely to consider the shortfall an organizational concern and make changes that do not necessarily involve risk. Although we might assume that negative performance in comparison with both internal and external benchmarks would spur risky change, our results indicate that risky change occurs most often when a decision maker receives unfavorable internal social performance feedback and favorable external social performance feedback. By questioning assumptions about why and when organizational change involves risk, this study begins to separate change and risk outcomes of the decision-making process.
122 citations
TL;DR: The authors examined how skilled return migrants, as cross-border brokers, transfer knowledge across borders using an original dataset of 4,183 former J-1 Visa holders from 81 countries, all of whom had worked in the U.S.
Abstract: Using an original dataset of 4,183 former J-1 Visa holders from 81 countries—all of whom had worked in the U.S.—I examine how skilled return migrants, as cross-border brokers, transfer knowledge ab...
TL;DR: In this article, the authors examine how professionals working in bureaucratic organizations, despite having formal authority, struggle to enact authority over the clients they advise, transforming their right to act as experts into a power struggle.
Abstract: This paper examines how professionals working in bureaucratic organizations, despite having formal authority, struggle to enact authority over the clients they advise, transforming their right to c...
TL;DR: The authors examine how social activist tactics affect the diffusion of social-responsibility practices and examine the adoption of supplier-sanction practices by universities. But they focus on the adoption process of supplier sanction.
Abstract: This paper examines how social activist tactics affect the diffusion of social-responsibility practices. Studying collegiate adoptions of a controversial supplier-sanction practice championed by an...
TL;DR: The authors examine how framing influences an audience's appreciation of products, practices, and people, including the framer, taking the perspective of the audience that evaluates the framing, and examine how the framing influences the audience's understanding of the product, practice, and person.
Abstract: In examining how framing influences an audience’s appreciation of products, practices, and people, including the framer, we take the perspective of the audience that evaluates the framing. We exami...
TL;DR: This paper explored the relationship between status and reputation, examining how its dynamics change over time as these two intangible assets coevolve and how reputation and status are influenced by participation in highly visible events.
Abstract: We explore the relationship between status and reputation, examining how its dynamics change over time as these two intangible assets coevolve and how reputation and status are influenced by participation in highly visible events. Using a sample of more than 400 newly founded venture capital (VC) firms, we find that reputation and status positively influence each other but that reputation has a greater effect on status, particularly when firms are older. We also find that the effect of past status on current status weakens as VC firms age, but the relationship between past and current reputation remains consistent with age. Furthermore, our findings show that participating in big hits— blockbuster initial public offerings—has a positive relationship with status when firms are young and a positive relationship with reputation when firms are older, and it helps low-status and low-reputation firms more than it helps highstatus and high-reputation firms. This study helps differentiate status and reputation, shows how they coevolve, and provides insight into how new firms build these important intangible assets.
TL;DR: The authors showed that the PC norm promotes rather than suppresses the free expression of ideas by reducing the uncertainty experienced by both sexes in mixed-sex work groups and signaling that the group is predictable enough to risk sharing more and more novel ideas.
Abstract: As work organizations become increasingly gender diverse, existing theoretical models have failed to explain why such diversity can have a negative impact on idea generation. Using evidence from two group experiments, this paper tests theory on the effects of imposing a political correctness (PC) norm, one that sets clear expectations for how men and women should interact, on reducing interaction uncertainty and boosting creativity in mixed-sex groups. Our research shows that men and women both experience uncertainty when asked to generate ideas as members of a mixed-sex work group: men because they may fear offending the women in the group and women because they may fear having their ideas devalued or rejected. Most group creativity research begins with the assumption that creativity is unleashed by removing normative constraints, but our results show that the PC norm promotes rather than suppresses the free expression of ideas by reducing the uncertainty experienced by both sexes in mixed-sex work groups and signaling that the group is predictable enough to risk sharing more—and more-novel—ideas. Our results demonstrate that the PC norm, which is often maligned as a threat to free speech, may play an important role in promoting gender parity at work by allowing demographically heterogeneous work groups to more freely exchange creative ideas.
TL;DR: In a qualitative study of BP executives during and after the 2010 Gulf of Mexico oil rig explosion and spill, this paper examined whether and how the relationship between an organization and its members can be repaired once damaged.
Abstract: Through a qualitative study of BP executives during and after the 2010 Gulf of Mexico oil rig explosion and spill, I examine whether and how the relationship between an organization and its members can be repaired once damaged. I found that the incident destabilized executives’ organizational identification, leading them to doubt the alignment between their own identity and BP’s, and generated feelings of ambivalence toward the organization and their role in it. This marked the onset of a process through which members reassessed their identification, leading them either to reidentify and repair their relationship with BP or to deidentify and sever that relationship. Executives resolved their ambivalence and strongly reidentified only when they had organizationally sanctioned opportunities, through working on BPs’ response to the incident, to enact the identity attributes of technical excellence and environmental consciousness that were threatened by the Gulf events, suggesting that full relationship repai...
TL;DR: In this article, the authors investigated the dynamic relationships between discretionary behaviors at work (voluntary tasks that employees perform) and internal self-criticism, using data from two experience-sampling studies.
Abstract: Using data from two experience-sampling studies, this paper investigates the dynamic relationships between discretionary behaviors at work—voluntary tasks that employees perform—and internal somati...
TL;DR: In this paper, non-market organizations play a supportive role in knowledge transfer and innovation domestically, but national differences between them can create barriers to cross-border knowledge transfer, which hinders knowledge transfer.
Abstract: Nonmarket organizations play a supportive role in knowledge transfer and innovation domestically, but national differences between them can create barriers to cross-border knowledge transfer. Inter...
TL;DR: This article examined how actors from diverse and competing social groups can come to identify as members of a common market rather than as agents of their discrete social groups using data on new-i...
Abstract: This study examines how actors from diverse and competing social groups can come to identify as members of a common market rather than as agents of their discrete social groups. Using data on new-i...
TL;DR: According to the World Wildlife Fund's 2014 report on our ‘‘ecological footprint,’’ humanity is currently using the earth's resources 50 percent faster than they can be replenished as mentioned in this paper.
Abstract: According to the World Wildlife Fund’s 2014 report on our ‘‘ecological footprint,’’ humanity is currently using the earth’s resources 50 percent faster than they can be replenished. In the United States, that rate is nearly 600 percent. And the best evidence suggests that we have only years, not decades, to restore the balance before we tip the planet’s natural systems into irreversible cycles that will wreak havoc on vast swathes of nature and on the lives of billions of people around the world. Klein’s book marshals evidence for this prognosis and offers a diagnosis and a strategy for responding, though her diagnosis is somewhat blurred. At some points, she claims that the root cause of this environmental crisis lies in the capitalist character of our economy. But at other points she indicts not capitalism as such but rather its neo-liberal variant, and at yet other points she attributes the crisis to an ‘‘extractivist mindset.’’ This blurred diagnosis is problematic because such different diagnoses point to very different remedies. Polanyi (2001) offers a theory of capitalism that helps us decide among the alternative diagnoses. Polanyi’s argument supports an indictment of capitalism as such rather than its currently dominant neo-liberal variant or an extractivist mindset. This radical-critical edge in Polanyi’s argument has been largely blunted as his work has been absorbed into management studies, in particular by the way our field has misunderstood his concept of embeddedness. Restoring that edge to Polanyi’s argument and then reading Klein’s book through these lenses leads us to a theoretically grounded diagnosis and from there to a possible remedy—along with some other, far darker possible scenarios for our future.
TL;DR: Examination of membership processes in groups operating in an uncertain environment that prevents them from fully predefining new members’ roles reveals role ambiguity’s hitherto unexamined beneficial consequences and provides a foundation for a contingency theory of new-member acquisition.
Abstract: This qualitative study examines membership processes in groups operating in an uncertain environment that prevents them from fully predefining new members’ roles. I describe how nine elite high-end, cutting-edge culinary groups in the U.S. and Europe, ranging from innovative restaurants to culinary RD otherwise the negotiated joining process is abandoned. Negotiated joining allows the aspirant and target group to learn if a mutually desirable role is likely and, if so, to construct such a role. In addition, the provisional roles in negotiated joining can support absorptive capacity by allowing novel role components to enter target groups through aspirants’ efforts to construct stable roles for themselves, while the internal adjustment involved in integrating newly validated role components can have the unintended side effect of supporting adaptation by providing opportunities for the groups to use these novel role components to modify their role structure and goals to suit a changing and uncertain environment. Negotiated joining thus reveals role ambiguity’s hitherto unexamined beneficial consequences and provides a foundation for a contingency theory of new-member acquisition.
TL;DR: Appelbaum and Batt as mentioned in this paper reviewed Private Equity at Work: When Wall Street Manages Main Street, a book about private equity at work, focusing on the private equity industry.
Abstract: Review of Eileen Appelbaum and Rosemary Batt: Private Equity at Work: When Wall Street Manages Main Street.