1,721,009 research outputs found
Drivers of Supply Chain Resilience in Family Firms: An Exploratory Study
No full textThis study explores the drivers of supply chain resilience in family-owned small and medium enterprises (SMEs). Using a microfoundational perspective on dynamic capabilities, the paper investigates how cognitive capabilities and governance incentives shape resilience strategies in family firms. A multiple case study approach, involving interviews with supply chain managers, family business owners, and suppliers, reveals that long-term relationships, trust-based governance, and socio-emotional wealth preservation are central to fostering resilience. Findings highlight that while relational capital enhances collaboration and agility during crises, over-reliance on legacy relationships can expose firms to risks. The integration of dynamic capabilities—such as sensing, seizing, and transforming—with family-centric governance structures enables family firms to adapt and innovate effectively in complex supply chains. By bridging family business and supply chain resilience research, this study provides novel insights into the unique mechanisms driving resilience in family SMEs
Investigating the Social-Symbolic Work of Organizational Repurposing
No full textExisting studies of organizational purpose have predominantly taken a backward view, highlighting how leaders uphold the existing, historical purpose of the organization. However, relatively little work investigates how purpose can intentionally shift, thereby incorporating novel moral imperatives that connect ethical aims with everyday practices. To address this gap, we introduce the notion of radical purpose adaptation, wherein an established organization consciously and substantially revises its purpose to align with broader societal obligations. Our analysis draws on a longitudinal, single-case study of a business school undergoing a process of strategic change. Using a social-symbolic work perspective, we conceptualize purpose as a social-symbolic object and examine how leaders actively construct the new purpose while aligning internal and external stakeholder. We find that while leaders’ efforts can indeed enact major change, they also produce unintended effects: some organizational members become distanced from the new purpose, resulting in what we term “precarious bridging.
Navigating the politics of innovation in family firms: The role of political capital
Full text linkIn family firms, innovation poses distinct challenges due to the social complexity resulting from the intertwining of the family and business systems. While prior research has focused primarily on the powerful role of the dominant family coalition in leadership positions, much less attention has been paid to middle managers who must navigate the social complexity in family firms to implement management innovations. Through a multicase study of two highly innovative family firms, we theorize and demonstrate how middle managers engage in coalition building to address the social complexity in family firms when pursuing management innovation by creating a new organizational unit dedicated to managing innovation at the corporate level. Our study shows that middle managers change the social evaluation of the transfer of political capital from the dominant family coalition through enforcement and detachment. Subsequently, they convert, invest, and then mobilize different sources of political capital to gain power through pragmatic persuasion and altruistic evangelizing. Finally, we find that the dominant family coalition employs two distinct modes of political stewardship with respect to family and nonfamily middle managers
Bridging Moral Aspirations and the Mundane Reality: A Grounded Study of the Process of Radical Purpose Adaptation in a Business School
Full text linkIn previous research, scholars have often highlighted the important role of leaders in defending and protecting a historical organizational purpose. However, adopting such a ‘backward-looking’ perspective, researchers have devoted much less attention to understanding how an organizational purpose can be deliberately changed and leveraged to justify novel moral commitments, thereby bridging the moral and the mundane. We theorize these activities as a process of radical purpose adaptation, whereby an established organization deliberately and radically changes its purpose to align with its commitment to society. We draw on a single, longitudinal case study of a business school as it engaged in the process of changing its organizational purpose. Adopting a social-symbolic work lens, we conceptualize purpose as a social-symbolic object and theorize purpose work, which captures leaders’ efforts to establish new organizational aspirations. We find that proactive purpose work leads to the unintended emergence of self-reinforcing, competing demands that threaten the new purpose, which are tackled through reactive purpose work. Thus, a recursive process emerges in which proactive and reactive purpose work operate in tandem: proactive work generates novel aspirations and tensions, while reactive work contains and redirects them, enabling organizations to stabilize new commitments without abandoning their transformative intent
A Grounded Study of Organizational Repurposing in a Business School
No full textExisting studies of organizational purpose have predominantly taken a backward view, highlighting how leaders uphold the existing, historical purpose of the organization. However, relatively little work investigates how purpose can intentionally shift, thereby incorporating novel moral imperatives that connect ethical aims with everyday practices. To address this gap, we introduce the notion of radical purpose adaptation, wherein an established organization consciously and substantially revises its purpose to align with broader societal obligations. Our analysis draws on a longitudinal, single-case study of a business school undergoing a process of strategic change. Using a social-symbolic work perspective, we conceptualize purpose as a social-symbolic object and examine how leaders actively construct the new purpose while aligning internal and external stakeholder. We find that while leaders’ efforts can indeed enact major change, they also produce unintended effects: some organizational members become distanced from the new purpose, resulting in what we term “precarious bridging.”
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Towards Integration between Corporate Purpose and Strategic Renewal Research: A Literature Review
No full textPurpose as a Management Innovation: The Role of External Change Agents in Embedding Corporate Purpose within Organizations
No full textResearch on corporate purpose has assumed that conveying an organization’s purpose is the primary task of leaders. However, this stream of research has downplayed the process of construction of corporate purpose by external change agents, like consulting firms, which can play a key role in embedding of purpose in organizations. In this scenario, purpose becomes a "management innovation" defined as "the invention and implementation of a managerial practice, process, structure or technique that is new compared to the state of the art and intended to promote organizational goals". Through an exploratory, multiple case study
design, we find that external change agents integrate corporate purpose in organizations by performing three main theorization actions: justification, contextualization, and implementation. Respectively for each action, we identify three tensions: tension of expertise, tension of autonomy, and tension of standardization
A Management Innovation Perspective on the Role of External Change Agents in Integrating Corporate Purpose
No full textResearch on corporate purpose has assumed that conveying an organization’s purpose is the primary task of leaders. However, this stream of research has downplayed the process of construction of corporate purpose by external change agents, like consulting firms, which can play a key role in embedding of purpose in organizations. In this scenario, purpose becomes a "management innovation" defined as "the invention and implementation of a managerial practice, process, structure or technique that is new compared to the state of the art and intended to promote organizational goals". Through an exploratory, multiple case study design, we find that external change agents integrate corporate purpose in organizations by performing three main theorization actions: justification, contextualization, and implementation. Respectively for each action, we identify three tensions: tension of expertise, tension of autonomy, and tension of standardizatio
Phoenix Rising: The Owner's Journey of Family Business Sale and Revival through Ownership Competence
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