Shaping the Future: Past, Present, and Future Avenues for Research on Market Shaping

Abstract

An emerging stream of behavioral strategy research has examined how firms can engage in shaping strategies to alter the competitive landscape of a market such as by altering the market (Pontikes & Rindova, 2020) or payoff structure (Gavetti, Helfat, & Marengo, 2017). This stream of work has shown that firms often shape the competitive landscape by introducing new products, building ecosystems, and sculpting consumer preferences. Despite the pervasiveness of firms’ shaping strategies, empirical answers to when and how firms engage in shaping and what capabilities lead to successful shaping remain rare. We contend that this gap arises from both theoretical and empirical challenges to delineate shaping from adapting, shaping intentions from shaping outcomes, and the specific role of different stakeholders. Given these fundamental challenges, this symposium seeks to bring together a group of scholars from diverse theoretical and methodological backgrounds to share their expertise on market shaping to facilitate future research on this important yet understudied topic. Specifically, this symposium will shed light on ways to: (i) differentiate between adaptive and shaping strategies, (ii) examine the capability antecedents of shaping firms, (iii) identify the role of various stakeholders in determining the success of focal firms’ shaping strategies, and (iv) understand how new markets and ecosystems emerge from the dynamics of shaping processes.