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The purpose of this paper is to study the self and vicarious learning patterns of organizations through operational success and benchmark failure experiences. The study is specific to the Indian telecom sector.

This study uses published data of four major telecom firms in India reported by Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) and analyzed the influence of aspiration performance discrepancy on organizational learning by hypotheses testing. Feasible generalized least square model with year fixed effects is used to run panel data regression.

In the case of operating experience for performance above aspiration, firms fail to learn from their own experience as well as from others’ experiences. For benchmark failure experience under positive discrepancy, firms learn from their own experience. For performance below aspiration, no significant result was found. These insights allow managers to reconfigure their learning orientation and to develop an effective mechanism for absorbing crucial knowledge from themselves and peer firms.

Practitioners should take into account that their knowledge repertoire is essential for learning in good times. This study also motivates managers involved in operating activities to make use of publicly disclosed reports, engage in vicarious learning or form a coalition for developing coping mechanism under negative discrepancy scenarios.

This paper presents a unique context by studying operational success, and failure experiences of telecom sector in India wherein benchmark for failure was decided by the governing regulatory body, TRAI, unlike other studies where success and failures reference points are intrinsically selected.

The purpose of this paper is to synthesize the diverse literature on board demographic diversity and to provide avenues for future research.

The study provides a comprehensive literature review of theoretical and empirical studies published in leading management journals from 1989 to 2015.

The literature review revealed several aspects that are related to board demographic diversity. These aspects have been classified into: definitions and types of board diversity, dimensions of board demographic diversity, measurement and outcomes of board diversity, reasons for existing conflicting empirical findings about the relationship between board diversity and firm dynamics, and research on mediators and moderators.

Issues pertaining to board demographic diversity identified in this paper have theoretical and practical implications, and include avenues for future research.

In the wake of inconsistent findings between board diversity and firm performance, the purpose of this paper is to advance the research by examining the linear and non-linear nature of the relationship between board demographic diversity (gender, age, tenure, and education) and firm performance in Indian knowledge-intensive firms (KIFs).

This study uses a panel data set of top KIFs in India that is listed in National Stock Exchange’s Top-200 list for the period 2010-2014.

Results indicate that there exists a positive linear relationship between the overall board demographic diversity index (board gender, age, tenure, and education) and firm performance. Among the effects of individual board diversity variables, the authors have found that board age diversity positively whereas education diversity negatively influences firm performance. Furthermore, gender diversity and tenure diversity do not significantly influence the firm performance.

This study is based on the following demographic factors: gender, age, tenure, and level of education. The authors did not include other demographic variables such as nationality and language.

This research would help knowledge-intensive companies in designing their corporate boards. The results indicate that companies should have more diverse boards to enhance firm performance.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first research to examine the effect of the overall board diversity index and individual board demographic diversity indices (gender, age, education, and tenure) on firm performance in the context of KIFs in India.

There is a preponderance of evidence in the established literature that declining firms have lower levels of organizational slack when compared with surviving firms. To further advance the current literature, the purpose of this paper is to examine whether or not organizational slack in its various forms differ in declining firms and in surviving firms. Additionally, this study examines whether there is a change in the extent of slack in the declining firms in the years immediately preceding bankruptcy filing.

–t-tests and panel regressions with random effects are performed.

Available slack, potential slack and total slack of bankrupts significantly differ from that of survivors in each year. However, recoverable slack levels do not differ in bankrupts and survivors. Available slack of bankrupts reduces significantly over the last five years before bankruptcy. Recoverable slack, potential slack and total slack conditions do not drastically deteriorate for the bankrupts over the last few years prior to bankruptcy.

Not confirming to prior evidences, the results of this study suggest that not every type of organizational slack is in a worse condition within a declining firm than in a surviving firm.

Among all the slack types, what differentiates bankrupts from survivors is the amount of available slack. Decreasing available slack within declining firms should forewarn managers of further likely deteriorations.

The results of this study questions the prevailing wisdom that financial resource levels, especially the levels of organizational slack is in a significantly lower level in declining firms than in surviving firms.