Institutional Imprinting Research Articles

Institutional Imprinting as a Source of Managerial Attention Priority: A Behavioral Theory of Hybrid Organizations

Institutional Imprinting as a Source of Managerial Attention Priority: A Behavioral Theory of Hybrid Organizations

Institutional Imprints and Corporate Misconduct: Unravelling the Interplay of Economic History and Firm Choices on Earnings Manipulation in an Emerging Economy

This study investigates the impact of firms’ legacy institutional imprints on its engagement in corporate misconduct. We discover that a closed economic regime’s protectionist policies inscribe imprints in the form of opaque organizational routines and cause incumbent firms to develop competitive limitations. Utilizing the theoretical principles of the organizational imprinting theory, this research attests to the endurance of corruptive routines and argues that the degree of closed economy imprints increases firms’ engagement in income-increasing earnings management in the post-liberalization period. Furthermore, we find that the impact of imprints is weakened by firms’ choices on international exposure and internal innovation. By utilizing the historical data on Indian economic policies from 1956 to 1991 and analyzing a sample of 18,432 firm-year observations for 2,396 listed Indian manufacturing firms from 1997 to 2007, we find support for our hypotheses.

Socialist imprints and innovation strategies in a transition economy

ABSTRACT This paper contributes to research at the intersection of institutional theory and the emerging literature on institutional imprinting by studying how the persistence and decay of founding institutional imprints affect network-based innovation strategies in small firms during later stages of economic transition. In do so, we are able to investigate both the extent of imprints and the boundary conditions that serve to strengthen or weaken their persistence. We situate our study in a fast-growing but under-studied transition economy, Vietnam, applying multiple estimation methods on a multilevel panel sample of 2644 small entrepreneurs over 6 years. Our major findings are, firstly, that firms launched before transition are influenced by socialist imprints and rely more on small and concentrated informal social networks, while firms launched after transition rely more on newer formal market institutions to generate innovations, and, secondly, that management and industry experience strengthens network-based innovation strategies and, thus, amplifies the persistence of socialist imprinting in firms established prior to transition.

Institutional Imprints and Corporate Misconduct: Unravelling the Interplay of Economic History and Firm Choices on Earnings Manipulation in an Emerging Economy

Institutional Imprints and Corporate Misconduct: Unravelling the Interplay of Economic History and Firm Choices on Earnings Manipulation in an Emerging Economy

Origin matters: Institutional imprinting and family firm innovation in China

During the early 1990s, a swathe of small state-owned enterprises (SOEs) was privatized as family businesses in China. This paper examines whether and how the origin (i.e., restructured vs. entrepreneurial) of family firms affects corporate innovation. Using the data of Chinese family firms from 2009 to 2018, we find that restructured family firms generate fewer patents generally than entrepreneurial family firms, but create more high-quality patents than their entrepreneurial counterparts. This effect is more pronounced for those family firms which had formerly been SOEs for a more extended period, without generational succession, and previously controlled by governments entirely. Further mechanism tests show that restructured family firms have a higher likelihood of hiring professional managers, are subject to less intervention from family members, and have fewer informal hierarchies, providing direct evidence for the institutional imprinting channel. Our findings suggest that the institutional imprint underlying the origin of family firms can be critical to their innovation decisions.

A comparative analysis of Indian and Chinese FDI into Africa: The role of governance and alliances

This paper adopts and extends the theoretical lens of institutional imprinting to international business research. It analyses a secondary data set on Indian and Chinese foreign direct investment (FDI) flows to Africa, compiled for the period ranging from 2008 to 2018, to highlight the distinctiveness of Indian FDI. It argues that Indian FDI streams into better governed host countries with controlled corruption and high standards of accountability. This is in striking contrast with Chinese FDI, which is impervious to host country governance standards in its geopolitical quest for gaining economic supremacy in the region. India’s membership of the Commonwealth (CW) plays a vital role in the location and volume of its investments to Africa, whereas the Chinese Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) wields no influence on the location of its investment.

Chinese Management Studies: A Matched-Samples Meta-Analysis and Focused Review of Indigenous Theories

The field of Chinese management studies has grown tremendously over the past four decades. Management theories originating from the United States have remained dominant in the analysis of Chinese firms, prompting the question of how powerfully these Western lenses explain management practices in non-Western contexts. Through a matched-samples meta-analysis, which integrates matching techniques into meta-analysis, we compare the mean effect sizes for five classic Western management theories—institutional theory, resource dependence theory, the resource-based view, agency theory, and transaction cost theory—on 452 matched samples drawn from 1,028 U.S. and Chinese studies. Surprisingly, as compared to their U.S. counterparts, Chinese firms (a) are less responsive to coercive and mimetic pressures yet more subject to normative pressures, (b) establish fewer business relations when faced with resource dependencies and transaction costs, (c) extract more profit from managing generic strategic resources, and (d) are more sensitive to pay incentives and private blockholders. To understand the specificities of Chinese management practices, we furthermore conduct a focused review of the emerging literature on China-endemic explanations: political institutional imprinting theory, state-driven sustainable development, and China-endemic corporate governance. We conclude that indigenous theories effectively complement Western perspectives when accounting for Chinese management practices.

Impact of stronger intellectual property rights regime on innovation: Evidence from de alio versus de novo Indian bio-pharmaceutical firms

We examine the impact of a stronger intellectual property rights (IPR) regime through the adoption of Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) on innovation by Indian firms in the bio-pharmaceutical industry. We find that differences in the IPR regime at the time a firm was founded led to subsequent differences in firms’ propensity to innovate and their nature of innovations. Building on institutional change theory, we argue that firms created under the pre-TRIPS regime, which we refer to as de alio firms, have a lower propensity to innovate and have a focus on process innovations. De novo firms, which are firms created under TRIPS, have a greater propensity to innovate and have a focus on product innovations. Further, we study how international technology alliances have helped Indian bio-pharmaceutical firms to overcome their limitations arising due to institutional imprints and to improve their innovation capabilities. Data on 164 Indian bio-pharmaceutical firms from 1995 to 2018 is used to empirically test our hypotheses.

Innovative search post performance shortfall: the effects of institutional imprinting

Integrating insights from the organizational imprinting theory with the problemistic search literature, we inquire how historical environments of firms affect the adaptive process of innovative search by firms from emerging economies during periods of performance shortfall. Utilizing the context of institutional transitions in the emerging economy of India, we surmise that imprints inscribed by the inhibitory and protectionist policy environment in the pre-liberalization period deter firms from focusing on innovation and precludes the development of innovation routines, which impedes innovative search by firms facing performance shortfall in the post-liberalization era. Additionally, we postulate that firms' strategic choices and exogenous conditions of active and passive technological exposure, respectively, attenuate the effects of imprints stamped by the pre-liberalization institutional epoch on the relationship between performance shortfall and innovative search. We test and find considerable support for our predictions on a large dataset of 9088 firm-year observations belonging to the Indian manufacturing industry during 1995 – 2010. Our findings unravel the salience of historical institutional environments in explaining the innovative search behavior of emerging market firms facing performance shortfall.

Assessing and Extending the Unique Contributions of Chinese Management Studies

The field of Chinese management studies has grown tremendously over the past four decades. Despite an increasing interest in uniquely Chinese phenomena, Western management theories have long been the dominant perspectives for understanding Chinese firms and managers. Yet, the explanatory potential of our current theoretical toolkit remains unelucidated in non-Western contexts. Through a matched-samples meta-analysis, which integrates matching techniques into meta-analysis, we compare the mean effect sizes for five classic Western management theories (i.e. institutional theory, resource dependence theory, the resource-based view, agency theory, transaction cost theory) on 452 matched samples drawn from 1,028 U.S. and Chinese studies. Results show that, contrary to popular belief, Chinese firms (a) are less responsive to coercive and mimetic pressures yet more subject to normative forces, (b) are less focused on establishing relational ties when faced with resource dependencies and transaction costs, (c) are better at managing strategic resources for profit, and (d) respond better to pay incentives than their U.S. counterparts. To understand the specificities of Chinese management practices, we furthermore conduct a focused review of the emerging literature on China-endemic explanations: political institutional imprinting theory, a specifically Chinese take on sustainable development, and a China-specific theory of corporate governance.

Impact of institutional imprinting on the persistence of superior profits: A study of regulatory punctuation in India

Drawing upon the literature on organizational imprinting, we examine how a firm’s history impacts its performance in subsequent periods. By considering the emerging market context of India, we present evidence that the degree of imprinting of the pre-liberalization era is negatively related to the persistence of superior performance in the post-liberalization period. Furthermore, we investigate the role of imprinting attenuators and find that a firm’s listing status, international exposure, and knowledge spillovers from foreign firms weaken this baseline relationship. Empirical results based on a large unbalanced panel data set of 18,201 firm-year observations of Indian firms during the period 1991–2005 provide robust support for our conceptual model. Complementing the growing literature on the impact of contemporaneous institutional changes on performance, this study sheds light on the important role of the institutional history of firms from emerging economies.

Institutional Imprints, Entrepreneurial Orientation, and Growth of Firms in a Transition Economy

Entrepreneurial orientation is a key determinant for the performance of firms where a range of internal and external factors that affect the EO behaviour of the firms have been examined. Yet, there is no examination of the potentially important role that founding imprints may play in shaping EO. We examine how the past founding institutional environment, i.e. regulatory and market imprints, constrains the EO behaviour by deterring the growth of incumbent firms founded under the past non-market environment in a transition economy. Using the data from a cohort of 153 firms founded under a non-market environment in Myanmar, the current study demonstrates that both founding non-market regulatory and market imprints attenuate EO behaviour, and that EO promotes firms’ growth. The findings also indicate that EO serves as an essential intervening mechanism that dismantles the transmission of negative influences of institutional imprints on the growth attainment of firms established under a non-market system.

Honing Makes the Sharp Edge:Dynamic Institutional Imprinting and Firm Innovation in Chinese Manufacturing

Draw on imprinting theory and dynamic institution-based view, this study focuses on how the speed of institutional change at founding influences innovation through inducing firms to develop innovation capabilities which were subsequently institutionalized and persisted. We introduce the concept of dynamic institutional imprinting, identifying an important process whereby a firm develops characteristics that reflect prominent dynamic features of institutional change. Using a longitudinal dataset of Chinese manufacturing firms from 2008 to 2018 in the context of market- oriented reforms, our findings show that firms’ dynamic institutional imprint positively affects innovation. Moreover, while the imprint’s strength is weakened by family influence during imprint genesis, TMT’s R&D background and external innovation intensify its strength by acting upon the mechanisms underlying imprint persistence. Our study contributes to a better understanding of imprinting, the implications of dynamic institutional imprint, and firm innovation.

Impact of Institutional Imprinting on the Persistence of Superior Profits: A Study of Indian Firms

Drawing upon the literature on organizational imprinting, we examine how a firm’s history impacts its performance in subsequent periods. In an emerging market context of India, we argue and find support that the degree of imprinting of the pre-liberalization era is negatively related to the persistence of superior performance in the post-liberalization period. Furthermore, we investigate the role of imprinting attenuators and we find support that firm’s listing status and its degree of internationalization weaken this base-line relationship. Empirical results based on a large unbalanced panel data set of 18,202 firm-year observations of Indian firms during the period of 1991-2005 provide robust support to our conceptual model. Complementing the growing literature examining the impact of contemporaneous institutional changes on performance, this study aims to bring attention to the important role of institutional history of the firms from the emerging economies.

Theorizing with History: Lessons from the Study of Institutional Logics and Imprinting

History plays an indispensable but often underestimated role in the lives of institutions, organizations, and individuals. While many organizational theorists seem to be essentially ahistorical, or...

Institutional imprinting, entrepreneurial agency, and private firm innovation in transition economies

We study private firm innovation at an advanced stage of institutional transition in Central and Eastern Europe and the Commonwealth of Independent States. We adopt an integrated view, where the institution-based view of strategy is complemented by institutional imprints and entrepreneurial agency to argue that innovation at that stage of transition depends on private firm founding conditions earlier during the transition and on recent strategic initiatives to exploit specific opportunities, improving the innovation capacity of firms. In a ten-country sample of 2322 private firms, we find that firms founded earlier and those of larger size at inception are better at innovation because of imprints favoring network-based approaches. Innovation is even greater when these firms’ top manager has less industry experience, suggesting complementarity between network- and resource-based approaches. Additionally, firms that upgrade their management knowledge and improve their operational efficiency achieve higher innovation, and the effect of the former is augmented with a greater foreign market focus. Our findings also suggest that the role of entrepreneurial agency is stronger than that of institutional imprinting. These results have important implications for the institution-based view of strategy and private firm innovation in transition economies of CEE and CIS.

Understanding the Present by Examining the Past: Imprinting Effects On Supply Chain Outsourcing in a Transition Economy

Institutional transitions within emerging markets create significant challenges for effective supply chain management. This research investigates external pressures, internal strategic choices, and institutional imprinting influences on supply chain outsourcing and operational performance. Results of primary and secondary data from a sample of 769 firms in Russia demonstrate that industry competitor growth and decentralized outsourcing decision making encourage firms to outsource more supply chain activities. Interestingly, however, these influences are directly and indirectly thwarted within firms that have a strong imprint from the former Soviet centrally planned economy. Further, the positive impact on operational performance resulting from decentralized decision making and outsourcing becomes negative when firms have a strong Soviet imprint. This research underscores the significance of founding institutional imprints of emerging economies when considering supply chain decentralization and outsourcing decisions.

Institutional Imprints: The Enduring Effects of Past Political Regimes on CSR in China (WITHDRAWN)

This study explores how Chinese organizations are conceptualizing and responding to recent corporate social responsibility initiatives. While an established body of research has been devoted to unp...

Organizations And Institutional Complexity

The goal of this symposium is to provide a more systematic understanding of how being at the intersection of different institutional systems influences organizational behavior. Each paper examines important effects of institutional complexity at a different organizational life stage and as a result of changing external conditions. Three of the papers provide intra- organizational investigations to identify how institutional complexity affects organizations at different life stages. They examine, a) the effects of institutional imprinting of multiple logics at organizational founding; b) how the social legitimacy of different logics shift over time, which allows for the balance between logics inside an organization to evolve; and c) how a successful blended hybrid organization might eventually unfold into failure. The final paper, d) looks across organizations, and in particular how shifts in the broader external environment affect the influence of different types of institutional pressures. Thus, as a set, these papers cover effects of institutional complexity at a number of key organizational stages, from founding imprints, to evolution as society changes, to organizational failure; and finally as a response to shifting field conditions.

Dialectical tensions and path dependence in international joint venture evolution and termination

This paper identifies how dialectical tensions influence the conflicts in and unplanned terminations of international joint venture (IJV) relationships. The findings from case studies of two Finnish-Chinese JVs show how initial tensions and institutional imprints set the IJV processes in motion; how critical junctures influence perception of the IJV relationship and its evolution; and how a lack of efficient communication, interlinks between dialectical tensions, and insufficient movement of trust between cultural, organizational, and individual levels in the relationship lock in action patterns of confrontation which lead to the termination of the IJV. In essence, this study contributes to international business research by explaining the path-dependent nature of dialectical tensions in the evolution and survival of cross-cultural JVs.