Do Owners Care About Stakeholders? Owner Identities and Stakeholder Orientation
Type
conference paper
Date Issued
2024
Author(s)
Abstract
This study investigates owner identity as important determinant of stakeholder orientation. We develop hypotheses based on the owners` relationship with the firm and their access to infor-mation. Examining individual owners, including families, founders, and lone entrepreneurs, alongside institutional investors categorized based on their investment time horizon, we identify distinct degrees of stakeholder orientation. Institutional investors demonstrate a heightened stakeholder orientation, driven by their responsiveness to external demands for transparency. In contrast, individual owners, who benefit from private information and maintain informal stake-holder ties, exhibit a lower level of stakeholder orientation. Empirical testing validates these find-ings and reveals nuanced variations in stakeholder orientation within specific owner sub-classes, such as high turnover and low turnover institutional investors, as well as distinctions between families and other individual owners. This research contributes to the existing literature on stake-holder orientation, advances the new stakeholder theory, and expands upon the literature on owner heterogeneity.
Language
English