Browsing by Subject "Chief executive officers"
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Item I think I can, I think I can: a cognitive appraisal theory perspective on CEO external advice seeking and firm strategic change in response to poor firm performance(2003) McDonald, Michael Louis; Westphal, JamesThis dissertation considers factors that influence how top executives search for information in response to poor performance and how top managers’ information search behaviors, in turn, impact the level of firm strategic change they pursue. This research focuses on a particular kind of information search, specifically CEOs’ efforts to obtain advice from executives of other firms, and it considers contingencies which might determine the extent to which CEOs of poorly performing firms engage in restricted search in the form of high levels of advice seeking from friends or low levels of advice seeking from non-friends. The conceptual framework developed integrates insights from threatrigidity theory and contemporary psychological research on stress and coping, and its central thesis is that CEOs of poorly performing firms will be less prone to restricted search to the extent they are likely to be confident that they can effect performance-enhancing strategic change. Argument in support of specific hypotheses suggests that, because high CEO position tenure, high CEO industry experience, high CEO extra-industry experience, large organizational size, broad organizational product/service offerings, and low rival firm aggressiveness will increase CEO confidence, these factors will reduce CEOs’ tendencies to restricted information search in response to poor performance. These predictions are tested using a dataset that combines archival data on hospital characteristics with information on hospital CEOs and their advisors captured via an original survey. All of these predictions receive at least partial support. In considering how CEOs’ advice-seeking behaviors might, in turn, influence the level of strategic change that a firm pursues, this dissertation argues that restricted search (e.g., high levels of advice seeking from friends) will be associated with low levels of strategic change. The empirical results also support these predictions. This dissertation advances understanding of the processes that shape firm tendencies to persist in or change their strategies when they are performing poorly. It demonstrates how CEOs’ propensities to engage in strategic inertiapromoting patterns of information search in response to poor firm performance are reduced under conditions likely to increase their confidence in their abilities to effect performance-enhancing strategic change.Item The determinants of CEO compensation in regulated investor-owned electric utilities: an empirical analysis(Texas Tech University, 1994-05) De Berry, Thomas WayneThis writing summarizes in the following chapter a literature review relevant to the topic of CEO compensation. In this chapter, various studies which attempt to identify those factors which influence CEO compensation are examined. In addition, reasons for the controversy regarding CEO compensation are discussed in various articles, along with suggestions in some for controls and changes in this area. Various works regarding agency theory and market structure are also considered. Both multi-Industry and specific industry studies are examined, including a few studies whose specific-Industry sample was that of electric utility companies. This chapter also includes the results of personal contacts with an electric utility company CEO and with other electric utility company personnel knowledgeable concerning CEO compensation. These contacts were made to gain insights into what factors that electric utility company personnel themselves consider to influence CEO compensation in their industry.