We examine how organizations can challenge institutions that are coercively protected by powerful elites—guarded institutions—when they are unable or unwilling to advocate publicly against them. To do so, we draw on an in-depth qualitative study of efforts to combat child marriage in Indonesia. We explore how an international children’s rights organization worked alongside local nongovernmental organizations and activists to disrupt the institution of child marriage through two discrete strategies: the crafting of an alter ego that takes the appearance of a social movement that has emanated from the grassroots but is actually highly organized, and the use of this alter ego to support the incubation of public dissent by means of a high-stakes event. We contribute to the literature by developing a theorized account of how organizations can challenge guarded institutions when they cannot speak out—an important organizational problem that has received limited attention. We also challenge the theoretical distinction that has been drawn between the organizational mobilization of activists, often referred to as astroturfing, and seemingly organic mobilization that is said to emerge at the grassroots level.
参考文献：Claus, L. (2019). “Making Change from Behind a Mask: How Organizations Challenge Guarded Institutions by Sparking Grassroots Activism.” Academy of Management Journal 63(4): 965–996.
Formal hierarchical differentiation is a cornerstone of the organizing process. Prior research has focused primarily on pyramid-shaped formal hierarchies, despite documented limitations of the pyramid structure. We adopt a multi-method approach to consider the utility of alternative hierarchical shapes. First, we identify six“pure type”formal hierarchies that teams might employ. Next, we develop three propositions explaining the effects of hierarchy on team members’cognition and behavior. We use the propositions to parameterize an agent-based computational model in which formal hierarchical differentiation influences team performance by creating power imbalances that affect team members’perspective-taking motivation, and by influencing members’social identification with the team. The modeling results reveal how the effects of the six hierarchies are contingent upon task characteristics that influence team members’ perspective-taking accuracy (e.g., task variety), and enable us to craft an expanded, team-level theory of the association between formal hierarchical differentiation and team performance. A field study of 68 clinical nursing shifts in five mid-sized hospitals supports a key theoretical prediction. Specifically, we find that a negatively skewed (inverse pyramid–shaped) formal hierarchy enhances team performance relatively to a positively skewed (pyramid-shaped) hierarchy when task variety is high, but not when task variety is low.
参考文献：Wellman, N. (2019). “Beyond the Pyramid: Alternative Formal Hierarchical Structures and Team Performance.” Academy of Management Journal 63(4): 997–1027.
While prior work has shown that a firm’s market performance affects the loyalty of its board, little is known about how corporate social responsibility affects directors’ willingness to serve. In this project, we shed light on this question by exploring how social movement boycotts that challenge a firm’s social responsibility affect board turnover. We find that boycotts provoke a significant increase in turnover at targeted firms, and that directors are especially likely to leave after boycotts that signal that the firm’s social values conflict with their personal values. Specifically, we find that an ideological match between a board member and the activist challengers predicts exit: liberals are more likely to leave after liberal challenges and conservatives are more likely to leave after conservative challenges. Moreover, we show that turnover is consistent with the rigidity of the right hypothesis in political psychology: conservatives, as compared to liberals, are more prone to entrenchment when their firms face challenges from the opposition. Our study offers strong evidence that corporate social performance matters to corporate directors, and provides insights into the manner in which contentious crises affect the motivation of corporate insiders.
参考文献：McDonnell, M. H. and Cobb, J. A. (2019) “Take a Stand or Keep Your Seat: Board Turnover after Social Movement Boycotts.”Academy of Management Journal 63(4): 1028–1053.
The physical and material aspects of space, such as geographical distance or boundaries, have social and symbolic consequences that impact how people influence and are influenced by institutions. Social actors can, however, contest how space is conceived, perceived, and lived, thus making space a crucial lever in the disruption and defense of institutions. However, we lack understanding of the spatial aspects of such institutional struggles. In exploring how space is leveraged in institutional work, our study foregrounds the sociopolitical nature of space, building on and expanding the theorization of Henri Lefebvre. We draw on an in-depth longitudinal analysis of the material, social, and symbolic aspects of the spatial dimensions of disruptive and defensive institutional work over the past 20 years in Venezuela’s art world. Following the start of the Bolivarian Revolution in the late 1990s, the incoming government transformed the organization of the national cultural landscape, resulting in a prolonged period of institutional disruption and defense. Analyzing data relating to Venezuela’s art world during this time, we demonstrate that actors use the material, social, and symbolic dimensions of space to challenge and maintain their key values and practices—and that these three dimensions are intertwined.
参考文献：Rodner, V. et al. (2019). “Making Space for Art: A Spatial Perspective of Disruptive and Defensive Institutional Work in Venezuela’s Art World.”Academy of Management Journal 63(4): 1028–1053.
Past research has shown that new firms can facilitate resource mobilization by signaling their unobservable quality to prospective resource providers. However, we know less about situations in which firms convey multiple signals of different strengths—that is, signals that are more- or less-correlated with unobservable firm quality. Building on a sociocognitive perspective, we propose that prospective resource providers respond differently to signals of different strengths and that the effectiveness of signals, especially weak signals, will be contingent on the media attention new firms receive. Empirically, we conduct a longitudinal analysis examining the ability of new private equity firms to raise a follow-on fund. Consistent with our theory, we find that unrealized performance, a relatively weak signal, positively influences fundraising. However, we fail to find statistical evidence that its effect is weaker than that of realized performance, a relatively strong signal. Further, media attention strengthens the relationship between unrealized performance and fundraising, but media attention exerts less impact on the relationship between realized performance and fundraising. Taken together, our findings deepen our understanding of how new firms can mobilize resources with signals of different strengths and of how the media—as a key information intermediary—differently impacts their effectiveness.
参考文献：Vanacker, T. et al. (2019). “Signal Strength, Media Attention, and Resource Mobilization: Evidence from New Private Equity Firms.” Academy of Management Journal 63(4): 1082–1105.
Existing theory and research has documented the benefits of facing high expectations and the perils of encountering low expectations. This paper examines the performance effects of underdog expectations, defined as individuals’perceptions that others view them as unlikely to succeed. Integrating theory and research on self-enhancement with psychological reactance, I predict that underdog expectations have the potential to boost performance through the desire to prove others wrong when others’credibility is in question. Studies 1 and 2 provide support for the positive relationship between underdog expectations and performance. Study 3 reveals support for the positive effect of underdog expectations on performance through the desire to prove others wrong. Study 4 demonstrates that these effects depend on the perceived credibility of observers: when observers’ expectations are seen as more credible, underdog expectations undermine performance (consistent with the Golem effect and self-fulfilling prophecy), but when observers’ expectations are viewed as less credible, underdog expectations boost performance (demonstrating the underdog effect). My theory and results challenge the assumption that perceiving low expectations from others is always detrimental, and offer meaningful insights into why and when underdog expectations increase versus inhibit performance.
参考文献：Nurmohamed, S. (2019). “The Underdog Effect: When Low Expectations Increase Performance.”Academy of Management Journal 63(4): 1106–1133.
As work and organizational realities become increasingly “post-bureaucratic,” the conventional and stable bases of a person’s authority—their position, their expertise, or the acquiescence of a subordinate—are eroding. This evolution calls us to revise our understanding of authority, and to consider more deeply how it is achieved in contexts that are both fluid and fragmented. Building on a six-month autoethnography of a consulting assignment, we show that authority is a practical, relational, and situated performance. It exists in a tension between two mirroring processes—activation and passivation—through which relations are either leveraged or downplayed to shape the situation and steer collective action. Our study also reveals that the performance of authority involves not just people, but also a broader range of actants, including artifacts and abstract entities. In line with current research on performativity in organizations, our findings contribute to the relational program on authority and the revelation of its sociomaterial dimension. Thus, we provide an action-based understanding of authority that is better suited for the study of post-bureaucratic organizing.
参考文献：Bourgoin, A. (2019).“And Who Are You? A Performative Perspective on Authority in Organizations.” Academy of Management Journal 63(4): 1134–1165.
We develop theory to explain how CEOs’ observable personality traits influence market perceptions of firm risk and shareholder returns. Using a linguistic tool to measure nearly 3,000 CEOs’ personality traits, we find that CEOs’observed levels of conscientiousness, neuroticism, and extraversion have important consequences for the perceived riskiness of the firm, as reflected in stock volatility. We also find that these traits alter the relationship between stock risk and returns. Whereas financial economic theory generally posits a positive relationship between risk and returns, on average, we find that this relationship may be either positive or negative for a specific firm depending upon the observed personality of its CEO. Our theory and findings extend upper echelons research by showing that CEOs’ personality traits not only affect market perceptions of the firm but also how those perceptions translate into value creation.
参考文献：Harrison, J. S. (2019). “Perception Is Reality: How CEOs’ Observed Personality Influences Market Perceptions of Firm Risk and Shareholder Returns.” Academy of Management Journal 63(4): 1166–1195.
In this study, we track long-term patterns of continuity and change in the organizational identities of four nonprofits. Our findings reveal two trajectories, explained by the different means–ends structure of identity claims at each organization’s founding and the different pattern of identity work that they subsequently carry out. Our observations suggest that not all the attributes members use to make and give sense of “who we are” as an organization are equally consequential for members’decisions. Claims used to define organizational ends are more likely to shape long-term patterns of identity change and continuity than are claims used to define the means used to pursue these ends, because they affect members’ relative compulsion to conform to categorical expectations as well as the latitude of their pursuit of opportunities for growth.
参考文献：Cloutier, C. and Ravasi, D. (2019). “Identity Trajectories: Explaining Long-Term Patterns of Continuity and Change in Organizational Identities.” Academy of Management Journal 63(4): 1196–1235.
We have long known that organizational reputation is consequential. While highlighting the effects of a reputation for good behavior, however, prior work has largely overlooked the possibility that a reputation for bad behavior is qualitatively distinct. In addition, we know that organizational reputation is multidimensional. Although this is conceptually intriguing only if different types of reputation produce different effects, concurrent tests of such differences are rare. In response, we study the effects of multiple reputations for bad behavior on the media coverage of a serious error by a firm. Due to the need for the news to be new, we predict the media is more likely to cover errors that supplement a firm’s general character reputation, but will likely ignore errors that are redundant given a firm’s specific capability reputation. We test this theory in the context of 113 major oil spills in the United States, from 1985 to 2016. Results confirm the theorized contrasting effects. Counterintuitively, we also find the media is even less likely to cover repeat offenders that cause larger spills. We conclude that, at least for media coverage of oil spills, being bad can have its benefits for firms.
参考文献：Chandler, D. et al. (2019). “When is it Good to be Bad? Contrasting Effects of Multiple Reputations for Bad Behavior on Media Coverage of Serious Organizational Errors.” Academy of Management Journal 63(4): 1236–1265.
