Opening the Black Box: Boards of Directors, Competitive Aggressiveness, and Firm Performance

Abstract Although it is widely accepted that entrepreneurial orientation (EO) improves firm performance, scholars have advised that particular attention should be paid to the context. In this research, we investigate a less explored context of franchising where business systems and procedures are usually dictated to franchisees by franchisors. Therefore, whether a franchisor should allow franchisees to pursue EO (innovativeness, proactiveness, risk-taking, competitive aggressiveness, and autonomy) is not clear. In the context of franchising, the majority of prior studies have mainly focused on the employment of EO as a unidimensional construct and at the franchisor level. In this research, we take a bottom-up perspective and evaluate the impact of different dimensions of EO on franchisees’ performance. Our analysis of a multi-group of 183 restaurant franchisees located in Sweden and Iran reveals that only the pursuit of proactiveness and competitive aggressiveness improves a franchisee’s performance and other dimensions do not play a significant role in improving performance in this context.

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Board gender diversity: performance and risk of Brazilian firms

Gender in Management An International Journal ◽

10.1108/gm-06-2019-0088 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽

Author(s):

Mauro Mastella ◽

Daniel Vancin ◽

Marcelo Perlin ◽

Guilherme Kirch

Keyword(s):

Firm Performance ◽

Boards Of Directors ◽

Gender Diversity ◽

Ordinary Least Squares ◽

Firm Risk ◽

Content Type ◽

Study Approach ◽

Female Presence ◽

Board Gender Diversity ◽

The Impact

Purpose This study aims to intend to check if female board representation affects performance and risk and to analyse the evolution of the demographic aspects of the presence of women on boards in Brazil. Design/methodology/approach The authors used a sample of 150 Brazilian publicly traded companies from 2010–2018, with different measures of firm performance, firm risk and women’s presence on the board. The study approach is based on a set of ordinary least squares, quantile and panel data regressions. Findings The presence of women on the board has a positive effect on all of our accounting and market performance measures. However, the result of the impact on risk is not conclusive. The study also found that the number of females on the board has a more significant effect at the lower levels of firm performance measured by return on equity, but at the higher levels when measured by Tobin’s Q. Regarding return on assets, the more significant effect happened on the extremes of the performance distribution. The study findings point that market investors place more value in female presence on the board than in director positions. Originality/value By estimating the impact of women’s presence on the boards of directors in firm performance and risk, this study aimed to verify this impact in different aspects of the company. In addition, the authors did so in a sample with many years, making it possible to evaluate the historical evolution of the feminine presence in the boards of administration as well as in the groups of directors, assisting Brazilian legislators with new evidence about the possible impacts of Draft Law 7179/2017.

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The decrease in diversification and corporate governance: evidence from Japanese firms

Corporate Ownership and Control ◽

10.22495/cocv6i4p3 ◽

2009 ◽

Vol 6 (4) ◽

pp. 28-39

Author(s):

Hidetaka Aoki

Keyword(s):

Firm Performance ◽

Capital Market ◽

Firm Value ◽

Boards Of Directors ◽

Manufacturing Firms ◽

Business Units ◽

Unrelated Diversification ◽

Japanese Firms ◽

Bubble Economy ◽

Main Bank

This paper analyzes the effects of firm performance and governance factors on the decrease in diversification of Japanese firms in the 1990s. We focus on the cases of the decrease in diversification, because many previous studies proved that diversification caused firm value discount. Adjusting an excessive unrelated diversification would be an important topic, because the problems of low synergy between business units, inefficiency in management and so on were more serious in this type of diversification. The findings of this study are as follows. In the first half of the 1990s, immediately after the collapse of bubble economy, lower firm performance and main bank relationship encouraged firms to decrease the level of diversification of their businesses. On the other hand, in the latter half of the 1990s when the decrease in diversification itself was activated, higher performing non-manufacturing firms and manufacturing firms with lower profitability but facing higher growth in their main business tried to decrease diversification in order to strengthen the competitiveness in main businesses. Also, this kind of decrease in diversification was supported by the governance characteristics such as insider majority smaller boards of directors and the pressure from capital market.

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Using Causal Mapping to Uncover Cognitive Diversity within a Top Management Team

Causal Mapping for Research in Information Technology ◽

10.4018/978-1-59140-396-8.ch009 ◽

2005 ◽

pp. 203-232 ◽

Cited By ~ 4

Author(s):

David P. Tegarden ◽

Linda F. Tegarden ◽

Steven D. Sheetz

Keyword(s):

Firm Performance ◽

Top Management Team ◽

Black Box ◽

Top Management Teams ◽

Management Team ◽

Top Management ◽

Cognitive Diversity ◽

Causal Mapping ◽

And Cluster Analysis ◽

Cognitive Factions

The cognitive diversity of top management teams has been shown to affect the performance of a firm. In some cases, cognitive diversity has been shown to improve firm performance, in other cases, it has worsened firm performance. Either way, it is useful to understand the cognitive diversity of a top management team. However, most approaches to measure cognitive diversity never attempt to open the “black box” to understand what makes up the cognitive diversity of the team. This research reports on an approach that identifies diverse belief structures, i.e., cognitive factions, through the use of causal mapping and cluster analysis. The results show that the use of causal mapping provides an efficient and effective way to identify idiosyncratic and shared knowledge among members of a top management team. This approach allows the cognitive diversity of the top management team to not only to be uncovered, but also to be understood.

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