Interfaces of Strategic Leaders: A Conceptual Framework, Review, and Research Agenda

Interfaces are of growing importance for theorizing and testing the influence of strategic leaders on firm behavior and actions. But despite their relevance and ubiquity, the lack of a commonly accepted definition and unifying framework has hindered researchers’ ability to take stock, synthesize, and systematize extant knowledge. We first develop an encompassing definition and organizing framework to review 122 prior studies across three decades. We then chart promising directions for future research around three concepts central to the framework and review: (1) Why do interfaces occur? (2) What happens at these interfaces? and (3) What are the impacts of interfaces? Together, the encompassing definition, framework, review, and specific directions for future research provide the much needed platform to agglutinate research and advance strategic leader interfaces as the next frontier of strategic leadership research

(Meta-)framing Strategic Entrepreneurship

In this essay, we seek to focus scholarly discourse on the conceptual identity, boundaries, and precision of strategic entrepreneurship as an organizational construct. To give a “face” to a construct, lines must be drawn, marking off what it encompasses and what it does not. We, thus, first frame and assess prior conceptualizations from a construct clarity perspective. Our intent here is not to exhaustively catalogue all the varied conceptualizations available, but rather to map in lieu of burrow the content domain of strategic entrepreneurship as a theoretical construct, illuminate points of convergence and divergence, and reveal potential blind spots and ambiguities in extant definitions. Then, we advance a meta-framework for stimulating discourse around the key construct parameters. We say “meta-framework” because we do not seek to offer a “silver bullet” but rather advance a core set of questions to view strategic entrepreneurship with greater clarity and precision. We conclude with a set of suggestions for guiding and stimulating future research

Transformational Leadership's Role in Promoting Corporate Entrepreneurship : Examining the CEO - TMT Interface

International audienceResearch about transformational CEOs' impact on firm-level outcomes, particularly corporate entrepreneurship, has been equivocal, partially because the underlying mechanisms remain largely unexplored. Given that the individuals most closely influenced by a firm's CEO are its top management team (TMT) members, we focus on the CEO-TMT interface as a salient intervening mechanism. We posit that transformational CEOs influence TMTs' behavioral integration, risk propensity, decentralization of responsibilities, and long-term compensation and that these TMT characteristics impact corporate entrepreneurship. Data from 152 firms supported most of our hypothesized links, underscoring how the CEO-TMT interface helps explain transformational CEOs' role in promoting corporate entrepreneurship.<br/

The role of an entrepreneurially alert information system in promoting corporate entrepreneurship.

The literature has suggested that an entrepreneurially alert information system may be a salient driver of corporate entrepreneurship, even though this role has been neither theoretically articulated nor empirically substantiated. Building upon the organizational learning, information orientation, and entrepreneurial awareness literatures we identify three key elements of a firm&apos;s entrepreneurially alert information system, and then develop a parsimonious model that examines the impact of these elements on corporate entrepreneurship. Using both single-and multi-source survey data from 495 small-to medium-sized firms, we test our model and find that each element individually and collectively imparts significant positive influence on corporate entrepreneurship

Entrepreneurial opportunity recognition: Building and testing an information asymmetries model

Although opportunity recognition (OR) is a pivotal concept in entrepreneurship, extant research on it is fragmented and a parsimonious predictive model has yet to emerge. Toward that end, this paper develops and then tests a model of firm level OR behavior. Informed by literatures on entrepreneurship, strategic management, the Austrian school of economics, and information systems, it is theorized that information asymmetries with respect to opportunities yield differing levels of OR, and that these asymmetries are influenced, in part, by the firm\u27s information capabilities and, in part, by information load of the firm\u27s industry. OR, in turn, is expected to influence organizational performance, serving as the conduit by which antecedents of information asymmetries influence organizational performance. Analyses of data drawn from 371 small-to-medium size firms using structural equation modeling confirm the proposed model.

Designing Scholarly Introductions as Jobs to Be Done

This is the first editorial commentary in a three-part series that addresses introductions, implications, and interestingness. The first, focusing on the introduction design, is about what the beginning of a paper should look like. The second, focusing on practice implications, is about what the end of a paper should look like. The third discusses how to develop and fit attention-grabbing ideas into the academic conversation in the literature. We hope this editorial series provides inspiration and ideas about publishing papers that people want to engage with

When do CEOs versus top management teams matter in explaining strategic decision-making processes?:Toward an institutional view of strategic leadership effects

Theory on strategic leadership effects gives short shrift to the institutional context in establishing the impact of chief executive officers (CEOs) and top management teams (TMTs) on strategic decision making processes. In this article we develop the argument that the institutional context of the country in which they are embedded centrally shape the extent to which CEO or TMT characteristics provide more accurate predictions of strategic decision-making processes. We develop a set of exemplary propositions to substantiate this thesis and trace its implications for theory and testing on strategic leadership effects on the firm.</p