Now showing 1 - 8 of 8
  • Publication
    When Does Customer-Oriented Leadership Pay Off? An Investigation of Frontstage and Backstage Service Teams
    (Sage Periodicals Press, 2017-06-19) ;
    De Luca, Luigi
    ;
    Miceli, Gaetano “Nino”
    ;
    Morgan, Robert E.
    ;
    The service literature highlights the importance of organizational leaders in creating an organization-wide customer orientation (CO). Yet some open questions remain regarding this relationship: Are organizational leaders from different hierarchical levels equally effective in creating a CO? Does the functional role of employees affect the importance of certain leaders? More generally, when does customer-oriented leadership really pay off? To address these questions, we investigate how senior managers’ and direct supervisors’ CO affects the CO climate and effectiveness of both frontstage and backstage service teams. Analyzing multisource data from 575 employees and their supervisors from 110 teams in a retail bank, we find that the effect of perceived senior manager CO on team CO climate and team effectiveness is stronger in backstage teams while perceived direct supervisor CO has a greater influence in frontstage teams. Moreover, team CO climate consensus moderates the effect of team CO climate on team effectiveness. These results suggest that, contrary to past theorizing, customer-oriented leadership does not per se increase team CO climate and team effectiveness; rather, the correct coupling of leadership source and degree of customer contact needs to be achieved. Service managers should use these findings and appoint the correct leader to implement CO, to make the organization-wide CO diffusion more efficient and effective.
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    Scopus© Citations 11
  • Publication
    A Meta Analysis of the Antecedents and Consequences of Strategic Flexibility
    (Academy of Management, 2014-08-01) ;
    Morgan, Robert E.
    ;
    Volberda, Henk W.
    It is axiomatic that strategic flexibility is a key success factor in generating competitive advantage. Despite this maxim, often peddled in the normative literature, empirical studies have produced inconsistent results for the strength and direction of this relationship. We synthesize these results and provide empirical support for a general, moderate, and positive effect of strategic flexibility on firm performance. Moreover, we find that strategic flexibility indirectly affects financial performance through its positive effects on innovation capability and superior market position, and that strategic flexibility has a negative direct effect on financial performance. Importantly, the meta-analytic evidence also indicates that the strategic flexibility-performance relationship depends on measurement methods, the research context, and certain environmental characteristics. Exploratory analyses regarding the antecedents of strategic flexibility reveal many meaningful differences to the predominant expectations in prior research. Overall, our results provide the necessary nuance to discerning the specific antecedent and consequential effects of strategic flexibility, thereby providing valuable implications for managers, and outlining a research agenda for future inquiries.
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  • Publication
    A Meta Analysis of the Antecedents and Consequences of Strategic Flexibility
    (Academy of Management, 2014-08-04) ;
    Morgan, Robert E.
    ;
    Volberda, Henk W.
    It is axiomatic that strategic flexibility is a key success factor in generating competitive advantage. Despite this maxim, often peddled in the normative literature, empirical studies have produced inconsistent results for the strength and direction of this relationship. We synthesize these results and provide empirical support for a general, moderate, and positive effect of strategic flexibility on firm performance. Moreover, we find that strategic flexibility indirectly affects financial performance through its positive effects on innovation capability and superior market position, and that strategic flexibility has a negative direct effect on financial performance. Importantly, the meta-analytic evidence also indicates that the strategic flexibility-performance relationship depends on measurement methods, the research context, and certain environmental characteristics. Exploratory analyses regarding the antecedents of strategic flexibility reveal many meaningful differences to the predominant expectations in prior research. Overall, our results provide the necessary nuance to discerning the specific antecedent and consequential effects of strategic flexibility, thereby providing valuable implications for managers, and outlining a research agenda for future inquiries.
    Scopus© Citations 2
  • Publication
    Diffusing Strategy Implementation Throughout the Organization: Adopting a Social Learning Lens
    (SMS Strategic Management Society, 2013-09-30) ;
    Morgan, Robert E.
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    De Luca, Luigi
    ;
    Well-formulated strategies only result in superior returns for an organization when they are implemented successfully. We examine the dissipative processes underlying the role of relationship quality (leader-member exchange and team-member exchange) through to the individual level of the strategy implementation process. We propose a contingent model based on social learning theory using data generated from a retail bank. Using hierarchical linear modeling, we find that social exchange relationships embedded in a work team setting influence individual employee's strategy implementation support. Namely, the higher an employee's leader-member exchange, the stronger is the positive relationship between supervisor modeling behavior and team member strategy support. Additionally, the higher an employee's team-member exchange, the stronger the positive relationship between work team strategy support and individual strategy support.
  • Publication
    Strategy Implementation as Social Exchange : A Processual Analysis of Multi-Level Exigencies
    (Academy of Management, 2013-08-09) ;
    Morgan, Robert E.
    ;
    De Luca, Luigi
    ;
    Well-formulated and appropriate strategies only result in superior returns for an organization when they are implemented successfully. Although a notable volume of literature has been published on the strategy implementation process, past research has neglected the role of relationship quality (leader-member exchange and team-member exchange) at the individual level of strategy implementation. We propose a contingent model based on social learning theory and examine the strategy implementation process within a retail bank. Using hierarchical linear modeling, we find that social exchange relationships embedded in a work team setting influence individual employee's strategy implementation support. Namely, the higher an employee's leader-member exchange, the stronger is the positive relationship between supervisor modeling behavior and team member strategy support. Additionally, the higher an employee's team-member exchange, the stronger the positive relationship between work team strategy support and individual strategy support.
  • Publication
    Strategic Flexibility as a Panacea or Pandora's Box? A Meta-Analytic Review
    (SMS Strategic Management Society, 2013-10-01) ;
    Morgan, Robert E.
    ;
    Volberda, Henk W.
    It is axiomatic that strategic flexibility (SF) is a key success factor in generating competitive advantage. Despite this maxim, often peddled in the normative literature, empirical studies have produced inconsistent results for the strength and direction of this relationship. We synthesize these results and provide empirical support for a general, moderate, and positive effect of SF on performance. Moreover, we find that SF indirectly affects financial performance through its positive effects on innovation capability and superior market position, and that SF has a negative direct effect on financial performance. Importantly, the meta-analytic evidence also indicates that the SF-performance relationship depends on measurement methods, the research context, and certain environmental characteristics. Overall, our results provide the necessary nuance to discerning the consequential effects of SF.
  • Publication
    New Product Creativity: Multi-Level Meta-Analytic Insights and Empirical Generalizations
    (EMAC European Management Association, 2013-06-04)
    Scedrova, Anna
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    Morgan, Robert E.
    ;
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    Andriopoulos, Costas
    The extant new product creativity (NPC) literature reveals the empirical equivocality with regards to antecedent explanada of NPC as well as the consequential effects of NPC on performance outcomes. This study proposes a multilevel conceptual model to investigate the interactive nature of the relationships between NPC, its antecedents, and consequences. By meta-analysing effect sizes obtained from 58 studies on NPC, the results indicate the overall positive relationship between team, organizational, and market characteristics and NPC, and identify a series of ‘dominant' predictors. Furthermore, our meta-analytic findings indicate that NPC significantly improves new product and firm performance. Finally, the results of a moderator analysis reveal a number of contextual and measurement factors that influence the strength of the NPC - performance relationship.
  • Publication
    Creating Strategic Options : The Mediating Role of Market-Focused Strategic Flexibility for Innovation Performance
    (EMAC European Marketing Association, 2011-05-24) ;
    Morgan, Robert E.
    This study examines the role of market-focused strategic flexibility in creating a competitive advantage and realizing superior performance. The authors propose that marked-focused strategic flexibility rather mediates than moderates the role of market orientation and technology orientation for innovation. Results from an empirical study of 300 managers from 218 business-to-business firms support this notion. Moreover, the assumption that firms could emphasize market-focused strategic flexibility and de-emphasize market orientation is contradicted. The findings of this study suggest that the two concepts are closely related and that managers have to mind this relationship in resource allocation decisions