SMS Berlin 2016 Cultural Perspectives on Strategic Management
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Strategic Management Society 2016 Conference Berlin, Germany Sunday, September 18 Session 253 - Cultural Perspectives on Strategic Management Track J Session Chair Joel Gehman, University of Alberta Krsto Pandza, University of Leeds Session Panelists Shahzad Ansari, University of Cambridge Rodolphe Durand, HEC-Paris Candace Jones, University of Edinburgh Business School Michael Lounsbury, University of Alberta Richard Whittington, University of Oxford This session aims to spark conversations between scholars at the intersection of strategic management and organization theory. In particular, we hope the event will generate awareness of, stimulate interest in, and set direction for research at the SM-OT interface. Especially, the panelists will address potential connections between perennial strategy topics such as resources, capabilities, innovation, competition, governance, nonmarket strategy and strategy process and practice and topics of central interest to organization theory such as institutional logics, organizational forms, legitimacy, creativity, framing and categories. Panellist will identify the most promising questions that could benefit from integrating strategy and organizational theory concepts as well as discussing possible challenges of such a theoretical bricolage.
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SMS Berlin 2016 Cultural Perspectives on Strategic Management
- 4. Our panelists Shazhad Ansari, University of Cambridge Rodolphe Durand, HEC Paris Candace Jones, University of Edinburgh Michael Lounsbury, University of Alberta Richard Whittington, University of Oxford
- 5. Cultural Perspectives on Strategic Management Shaz Ansari University of Cambridge SMS 2016 Berlin
- 6. Rich and growing body of work • Strategy about process • Strategy about practice • Strategy about temporal work • Strategy about leveraging logics as resources and managing institutional complexity • Strategy about managing stakeholders • Strategy about navigating paradoxes
- 9. Challenges of theoretical bricolage • Specialized reviewers and vocabularies • Discomfort with terminology from “other side” or with what is perceived to be presenting “old wine in new bottles” • Perceived novelty for scholars in both camps • Fusion versus intercalation of concepts
- 10. Our panelists Shazhad Ansari, University of Cambridge Rodolphe Durand, HEC Paris Candace Jones, University of Edinburgh Michael Lounsbury, University of Alberta Richard Whittington, University of Oxford
- 12. Strategy : performance; novation What if performance is not the right DV? What if novation is not the right IV? Durand R., Rao H., and Monin P. (2007) Code and Conduct in French Cuisine: Impact of Code-Changes on External Evaluations, Strategic Management Journal, 28 (5): 455-472 Durand R. and Vaara E. (2009) Causation, counterfactuals, and competitive advantage, Strategic Management Journal, 30: 1264-1284 Philippe D. and Durand R. (2011) The differentiated impacts of conforming behaviors on firm reputation, Strategic Management Journal, 32: 969-993 Durand R. and Vergne JP. (2015) Asset Divestment as a Response to Media Attacks in Stigmatized Industries, Strategic Management Journal, 36: 1205- 1223
- 14. In my view, every firm’s choice equals a selection-criterion choice that increases or relaxes the selective pressure on competitors. In other words, a Selection Preserving Choice maintains established rules of action and puts pressure on competitors to conform to the current model of competition, whereas a Selection Transforming Choice requires the firm’s competitors to react to new selective rules and criteria. Most markets are mediated (e.g. cultural, experience, hedonistic, financial products) and ribbed/filled with norms and categories
- 15. Durand R. (2012) Advancing strategy and organization research in concert: Towards an integrated model? Strategic Organization, 10 (3): 297-303. Vaara, E., & Durand, R. (2012). How to connect strategy research with broader issues that matter?. Strategic Organization, 10(3), 248-254 My recent research investigates the normative and cognitive pillars of strategic choices
- 16. OT into Strategy • What do performance and its measures mean really? How do firms strategically create markets and institutionalize metrics to measure their performance? Logics: Thornton, Jones, Lounsbury, Greenwood, Ansari…. Materiality: Mckenzie, Millo, …. Categories: Bowers, Chae, Pontikes, Porac, Smith… • Why and how do firms position themselves and participate in institutional processes, and how do their choices influence the conditions for their competitiveness? Movements: King, Soule, McAdam, McDonnel,… Institutionalization: Ansari, Hiatt, Patterson, Sine, …
- 17. Strategy into OT • Why, how and when do institutional and strategy factors drive an organization in selecting the use of its resources? And what are the consequences of these outcomes for those institutional orders and logics that prevail within the field or industry? • Systematic inclusion of both economic and institutional determinants of organizational conformity/deviance, and of their consequences.
- 18. Examples Durand R. and Jourdan J. (2012) Jules or Jim: Alternative conformity to minority logics, Academy of Management Journal, 55(6): 1295-1315 Durand R., Szostak B., Jourdan J. and PH. Thornton. (2013) Institutional logics as strategic resources, E. Boxenbaum and M. Lounsbury (eds), Institutional Logics in Action, Part A, Research in the Sociology of Organizations, Volume 39A, 165–201 Durand, R. and P-A Kremp (2016) Classical deviation: Organizational and Individual Status as Antecedents of Conformity, Academy of Management Journal, 59: 65-89 Paolella, L. and Durand R. (2016) Category Spanning, Evaluation, and Performance: Revised Theory and Test on the Corporate Law Market, Academy of Management Journal, 59: 330-351
- 19. Our panelists Shazhad Ansari, University of Cambridge Rodolphe Durand, HEC Paris Candace Jones, University of Edinburgh Michael Lounsbury, University of Alberta Richard Whittington, University of Oxford
- 21. Engineers Imitate & Substitute; Architects Reinvent & Extend Ingall’s Bldg 1903 Monadnock Bldg, Halobrid & Root, 1896 d House 1876, Chester NY 1, rue Danton, Paris. 1892. Hennebique. Unity Temple, 1909 du Rancy Perret, 1922 Fallingwater, Wright 1936
- 22. Our panelists Shazhad Ansari, University of Cambridge Rodolphe Durand, HEC Paris Candace Jones, University of Edinburgh Michael Lounsbury, University of Alberta Richard Whittington, University of Oxford
- 23. Cultural Perspectives on Strategic Management: Bridging Strategy and Organization Theory Michael Lounsbury SMS 2016, Berlin
- 24. Theoretical Prelude: Institutional Theory a la 1980s v Culture foregrounded in Institutional theory which asserted that firms aim to be similar to peers to gain legitimacy and avoid penalties associated with deviance (DiMaggio & Powell, 1983) v Isomorphism (corecive, normative, regulative) became the master theoretical frame for the study of diffusion through the 80s and 90s (Strang & Soule, 1998) v Many Critiques: v Depicted later adopters as passive and “a-rational” v Culture is everywhere, but unitary and dominating v By opposing rationalistic accounts, it maintained a false distinction between institutional (culture) and technical forces v Neglects Practice Variation and messiness of practice and action
- 26. Optimal Distinctiveness v The proliferation of isomorphism theory gave rise to a core paradox at the interface of strategy & organization theory: how do firms strategically manage competing pressures to be both “like” and “different from” organizational peers (Durand and Calori, 2006). v In contrast to isomorphism theory, strategy emphasizes firm difference by establishing valuable, rare and inimitable resources to gain competitive advantage (Barney, 1991) v Building on Brewer’s (1991) ideas about how individuals forge unique identities amidst strong normative pressures to conform, scholars have argued that firms need to engage in strategies that achieve optimal distinctiveness—the extent to which audiences perceive this tension to be appropriately reconciled. In turn, audience perceptions are theorized to affect performance outcomes (e.g., Deephouse, 1999; Lounsbury & Glynn, 2001—a core idea in the Cultural Entrepreneurship approach).
- 27. Institutional Theory & Optimal Distinctiveness Research in SMJ, 1980-2015
- 28. Optimal Distinctiveness v Research has highlighted how OD affects v financial performance (Deephouse, 1999) v resource acquisition (Lounsbury and Glynn, 2001) v corporate governance (Zajac and Westphal, 1994) v firm and stakeholder attention (Ocasio, 1997) v reputation (Basdeo et al., 2006) v The majority of OD publications in SMJ have been grounded in Deephouse’s (1999) idea of strategic balance, focusing on stable, institutionalized contexts and single OD points: v operationalized as an intermediate level of strategic deviation; he measured it as the degree of deviance from a mean industry attribute position (asset strategy of banks). He found a significant, curvilinear relationship between the mean deviation of commercial banks and their financial performance in the Twin Cities area.
- 29. Optimal Distinctiveness v Opportunity for a renewed approach to OD & engagement between Strategy & OT (Zhao, Fisher, Lounsbury & Miller, forthcoming SMJ). v In contrast to isomorphism, new developments such as the Institutional Logics Perspective (Thornton et, al., 2012) & the Cultural Entrepreneurship literature (Lounsbury & Glynn, 2001; Garud, Gehman & Giuliani, 2014; Pandza & Thorpe, 2009 have focused more explicitly on agency, heterogeneity, and dynamic social processes v Builds on the “toolkit” conceptualization of culture (Swidler, 1986) and engages practice approaches (e.g., Lounsbury & Crumley, 2007; Smets, Greenwood & Lounsbury, 2015; Seidl & Whittington, 2014; Whittington, 2006) v Although some markets may exhibit relatively static, single OD points, such cases may be rare, and many markets may bear multiple OD points because of multipoint competition (Fuentelsaz and Gómez, 2006), multiple strategic groups (Peteraf and Shanley, 1997), multiple logics etc. v A renewed approach to OD, and the OT/Strategy interface should focus on temporality (Gray, Purdy & Ansari, 2015 AMR), multiple audiences, and the active co-construction of varied OD points
- 30. Implications for Category Research v Category research is one of the highest growth areas at the interface of OT & Strategy, but most research has focused on the categorical imperative (isomorphism) and its scope conditions v We need more attention to OD & the social processes of categorization (see forthcoming RSO volume by Durand, Granqvist &Tyllström—From Categories to Categorization: Studies in Sociology, Organizations and Strategy at the Crossroads v How (and how much) can actors deviate from norms? v How and under what conditions is deviance rewarded? v How much variability in a category is acceptable? v How does intra-category variability lead to category change or new category creation?
- 31. Logics, Categories & Optimal Distinctiveness v Variability inside categories may be importantly shaped by logics connected to diverse actors and/or audiences v For example, Jones, Maoret, Massa & Svejenova (2012) showed how the logics of commerce, state, religion and family, associated with the clientele (audiences) of architects consequently shaped the formation of the “modern architecture” category v Plural logics & category expansion resulted in multiple conflicting exemplars within the category (e.g., minimalist functional vs. eclectic/organic) v A renewed OT/strategy research agenda might examine how these kinds of socio-cultural processes affect the construction and dynamics of different optimal distinctiveness points in a category
- 32. Our panelists Shazhad Ansari, University of Cambridge Rodolphe Durand, HEC Paris Candace Jones, University of Edinburgh Michael Lounsbury, University of Alberta Richard Whittington, University of Oxford