The Justification of Organizational Performance

Staw, Barry M.; McKechnie, Pamela I.; Puffer, Sheila M.

doi:10.2307/2393010

Cited by 457 publications

(381 citation statements)

References 21 publications

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“…Previous studies have found this self-serving bias to be most relevant to statements explaining firm performance-managers attribute positive organizational outcomes to internal causes and negative outcomes to external causes (Bettman and Weitz, 1983;Staw, McKechnie, and Puffer, 1983;Salancik and Meindl, 1984). However, more recent work suggests that these attribution patterns may represent biases in the sense-making process, not conscious attempts at impression management (Huff and Schwenk, 1990;Clapham and Schwenk, 1991).…”

Section: Data Sourcesmentioning

confidence: 98%

Environmental context, managerial cognition, and strategic action: an integrated view

Nadkarni

Barr

2008

Strategic Management Journal

508

466

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This study addresses an apparent disconnect between two views of strategic action: the ‘economic view,’ which contends that industry structure is the primary influence on strategic action, and the ‘cognitive view,’ which suggests that managerial cognition drives strategic action. We argue that this disconnect has created artificial boundaries between the two perspectives and has limited our ability to develop holistic explanations of strategic action. In response, we develop an integrated model that answers two questions: 1) Does industry context affect managerial cognition? 2) Does managerial cognition mediate the relationship between industry context and strategic responses to environmental changes? To examine these questions, we study the relationship between industry velocity, the structure of top management's cognitive representation of the environment, and the speed of response to environmental events. We find that industry velocity influences the structure of cognitive representations, which in turn influence the speed of response to environmental events. These results support our contention that both industry and cognition variables are critical in developing explanations of strategic actions. These results have implications for our understanding of the development of top managers' beliefs, the relationship between beliefs and action, and the nature of the complex relationship between industry context, managerial cognition, and strategic action. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

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Section: Data Sourcesmentioning

confidence: 98%

Environmental context, managerial cognition, and strategic action: an integrated view

Nadkarni

Barr

2008

Strategic Management Journal

508

466

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“…Researchers have shown how impression management is a central part of legitimation (Elsbach and Sutton 1992, Elsbach 1994, Arndt and Bigelow 2000, Brown and Jones 2000. Scholars have demonstrated that organizational spokepersons use specifics tactics to establish legitimacy (Staw et al 1983, Elsbach and Sutton 1992, Elsbach 1994. They have also illustrated how discursively established legitimacy is linked with identity construction and stakeholder relations (Hardy and Phillips 1998).…”

Section: Legitimation In Organizational Analysismentioning

confidence: 99%

A Recursive Perspective on Discursive Legitimation and Organizational Action in Mergers and Acquisitions

Vaara

Monin

2010

Organization Science

257

282

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This paper challenges the predominant view that legitimation is merely a specific phase in merger or acquisition processes. We argue that a better understanding of postmerger organizational dynamics calls for conceptualization of discursive legitimation as an inherent part of unfolding merger processes. In particular, we focus on the recursive relationship between legitimation and organizational action. We have two objectives: to outline a theoretical model that helps one to understand the dynamics of discursive legitimation and organizational action in postmerger organizations, and to examine a revealing case to distinguish the inherent risks and problems in discursive legitimation. Our case analysis focuses on the merger between the French pharmaceutical companies BioMérieux and Pierre Fabre. We adopt a critical multimethod approach and distinguish specific discursive dynamics and pathological tendencies in this case. The analysis highlights the unintended consequences of discursive legitimation, the central role of sensegiving and sensehiding in discursive legitimation, the inherently political nature of legitimation and the risks associated with politicization, the special problems associated with fashionable discourses and the role of the media, the use of specific discursive strategies for legitimation and delegitimation, and the crucial role of actual integration results. This analysis adds to the existing research on mergers and acquisitions by treating discursive legitimation as part of the merger dynamics. In particular, our case analysis provides a new explanation for merger failure. We also believe that the recursive model connecting discursive legitimation and delegitimation strategies to concrete organizational action makes a more general contribution to our understanding of organizational legitimation.

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“…Second, previous success can encourage persistence because "organizations code outcomes into successes and failures and develop ideas about causes for them" (Levinthal and March 1993: 97). Stemming from their own cognitive biases, entrepreneurs often believe that their successes result from their own actions whereas failures are caused by bad luck (Staw et al 1983). Attribution theory scholars (e.g., Shaver et al 2001) argue that people often try to internalize success-believing that any success is the result of their own efforts-and externalize failure.…”

Section: Prior Organizational Successmentioning

confidence: 99%