Multinational Enterprise Organizational Structures and Subsidiary Role and Capability Development: The Moderating Role of Establishment Mode

Multinational enterprises (MNEs) develop structural configurations for managing their geographically dispersed and disaggregated activities. These structures can be classified as (a) simple headquarters configurations (involves corporate, regional, divisional headquarters and mandated units) involving few direct reporting relationships; (b) network organizations involving no direct reporting relationships; and (c) matrix configurations involving multiple reporting relationships. While these structures are built for handling various complexities and purposes, it is unclear how they influence subsidiary role and capability development. We hypothesize how these structures influence subsidiary development and propose a moderating role of MNE establishment mode on the direct structure-subsidiary development relationship. Based on data from 429 foreign subsidiaries in New Zealand, our results show that subsidiary development varies across the structures such that simple headquarters configurations experience the least opportunities to develop. While the matrix and network structures as complex configurations offer distinct paths to subsidiary development, subsidiaries managed under the former are more likely to follow the developmental path of networking and interunit learning, and the subsidiaries managed under the latter are more likely to follow the path of autonomy and innovation. Furthermore, the positive association of network structure with subsidiary initiatives and autonomy is stronger for greenfield subsidiaries, whereas the positive association of matrix structure with subsidiary mandates is stronger for acquired subsidiaries.

Moments of Meaningfulness and Meaninglessness: A Qualitative Inquiry Into Affective Eudaimonia at Work

Meaningful work (MW) is an important topic in psychological and organizational research with theoretical and practical implications. Many prior studies have focused on operationalizing MW and distinguish between the attributes of a job that make it meaningful, such as task variety or significance, and the affective experience of meaning during work, such as the feeling that what one does at work is meaningful. However, most empirical research focuses on the former definition and utilizes quantitative scales with deductive questions that omit what people find important in their experiences. To address this, we conduct a qualitative investigation of psychological narratives focusing in-depth on the quality and content of feelings of meaningfulness and meaninglessness during experiences at work—crucially, without any framing around task attributes. We introduce the term affective eudaimonia to describe these experiences. Overall, our results corroborate many existing thematic findings in the MW literature, such as the importance of connecting and contributing to others and avoiding confinement. We also offer new findings: Although the way that people give language to meaningless narratives is more descriptive, vivid, and experiential in tone than meaningful narratives, meaningless narratives are also more structurally static and constrained. We use these results to inform practical suggestions to promote day-to-day experiences of meaning at work and provide a basis for further academic discussion.

The Behavioral Agency Model and Innovation Investment: Examining the Combined Effects of CEO and Board Ownership

The Behavioral Agency Model (BAM) offers a behavioral account of executive incentives, according to which the perceived threats to CEO wealth, that is, CEO risk bearing, influence a CEO’s propensity to undertake innovation investments. While examining stock options extensively, the extant BAM research devotes relatively scant attention to other forms of incentives, such as stock ownership, that are conducive to one source of risk bearing, that is, employment risk. Furthermore, with an emphasis placed on the CEO, much BAM research neglects the interactive risk preferences of the CEO and the board. This study refines the BAM and empirically explores the countervailing forces exerted by the CEO and board ownership. It elucidates that while CEO ownership exhibits an inverted U-shaped relationship with innovation investment, board ownership weakens that relationship. An exploratory test on a sample of 108 Italian manufacturing firms provides support for the hypothesized effects. The refined BAM sheds further light on executive incentives through a behavioral lens, by elucidating the role of stock ownership and the interactive risk preferences of the CEO and the board.

When Are the Bigger Fish in the Small Pond Better Citizens? A Multilevel Examination of Relative Overqualification in Workgroups

In this study, we extend overqualification research to employees' social context of workgroup membership. Drawing upon social comparison theory and integrating with social exchange theory, we contend that employees' relative overqualification (ROQ, defined as individual overqualification relative to other group members' overqualification perceptions) is associated with their relative standing with their leader (measured as LMXSC, leader–member exchange social comparison), which in turn relates to employees' organizational citizenship behaviors (OCB). Furthermore, we assert that workgroup structural attributes and individual values (leader span of control and power distance orientation) influence the ROQ–LMXSC–OCB relationship. Multilevel modeling using data from 243 employees nested in 36 workgroups suggested patterns of moderated mediation where leader span of control and employee power distance orientation moderate the indirect link between ROQ and OCB through LMXSC. That is, the indirect relationship between ROQ and OCB is stronger in workgroups with a narrow leader span of control and for employees high in power distance orientation. Implications and directions for meso- and group-level research are discussed.

Perceived Support Profiles in the Workplace: A Longitudinal Perspective

This research examines how employee’s perceptions of three sources of support in the workplace (i.e., organization, supervisor, and colleagues) combine within specific profiles and the nature of the relations between these profiles and indicators of employees’ psychological health (i.e., stress, sleep problems, psychosomatic strains, and depression). Furthermore, this research examines the within-sample and within-person stability of the identified support profiles over the course of an 8-month time interval. Latent profile and latent transition analyses conducted on a sample of 729 workers indicated six identical profiles across the two measurement occasions: 1, moderately supported; 2, weakly supported; 3, isolated; 4, well-supported; 5, supervisor supported; and 6, highly supported. Profile membership was very stable over time for most profiles, with the exception of the isolated profile which was only moderately stable. Furthermore, the isolated and supervisor-supported profiles presented the lowest levels of psychological health, while the well-supported and moderately supported profiles presented the highest levels of psychological health. Of particular interest, results suggested that some risks might be associated with the highly supported profile, although this result could be a simple reflection of the women-dominant composition of this profile. This research has implications for theory and practice, which will be discussed in the article.

Are All Narcissistic CEOs Socially Responsible? An Empirical Investigation of an Inverted U-Shaped Relationship Between CEO Narcissism and Corporate Social Responsibility

We investigate the relationship between CEO narcissism and corporate social responsibility (CSR). We suggest an alternative to the current assumption of a linear relationship between CEO narcissism and CSR. Instead, we propose an inverted U relationship between the two. Although narcissistic CEOs may engage in CSR, we argue that highly narcissistic CEOs may be drawn to actions that would garner greater attention and they may be less inclined to engage in CSR. Based on a sample of Fortune 500 firms during the period 2006–2013, we find support for an inverted U relationship and support for our arguments that CEO power moderates the relationship between CEO narcissism and CSR.

Informal Hierarchy Strength Changes and Their Effect on Performance

Despite qualitative evidence suggesting that changes in informal hierarchy strength likely impact performance, informal hierarchy strength changes have received little theoretical or empirical attention. We address this by extending structural adaptation theory (SAT) to develop and test a theoretical model of why informal hierarchy strength changes and how those changes impact performance. Building on SAT’s principle that teams can become more ordered following stimulation, we propose that pressure subsequently increases informal hierarchy strength. In project teams where pressure starts low and increases at the midpoint, informal hierarchy should weaken early in project life and strengthen after the midpoint. We also extend SAT’s asymmetric adaptability principle to consider not just the direction but also the rate of the changes. We hypothesize that sharply strengthening informal hierarchy harms performance, but informal hierarchy strengthening gradually improves performance. SAT also implies that gradual change is promoted by inclusive discussions. Because most influential extraverts tend to squelch inclusive discussions where most influential neurotics tend to be inclusive, teams with most influential extraverts strengthen their informal hierarchy quickly where teams with most influential neurotics strengthen their informal hierarchy gradually. We find support for our theoretical model using longitudinal data and client performance ratings on self-managed project teams. Our results contribute to SAT by showing its application to informal, unplanned changes and introducing the rate of change to its asymmetric adaptability principle. Our findings also highlight the importance of shifting informal hierarchy strength research away from the predominant static approach and toward studying informal hierarchy strength changes.