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This paper contributes to research in social entrepreneurship by introducing a typology that describes four distinct types of social entrepreneurs based on the nature of their lives and career experiences and the scope of their social engagement.

In order to build a typology of social entrepreneurs, inductive profile analysis and archival research design approaches were used. A large variety of social entrepreneur profiles that are available in prominent social entrepreneurship organizations such as Ashoka Foundation, Echoing Green, Schwab Foundation and Skoll Foundation were examined.

Using four types of social entrepreneurs from the typology, the authors developed a number of predictions as to how social entrepreneurs with an activist background may benefit more in the short term but possibly struggle in the long term given their attachment to their venture's “original” cause and lack of corporate/business experience.

By developing a typology of social entrepreneurs and discussing the implications of this typology for post-launch social venture performance, the paper advances the current understanding of social entrepreneurs and the performance of their ventures. Additionally, by focusing on social entrepreneurs as agents of social change, this paper sheds some light on who these entrepreneurs are, what kind of life and career experiences they had and what motivates them to engage in social entrepreneurship.

Despite an improved understanding of the role of top executives in declining firms, research is still needed to explore the role of environmental scanning and strategy formulation processes in an organizational decline context. Drawing from the attention‐based view and the literature on environmental scanning, the purpose of this paper is to examine the relationship among executive attention patterns, industry dynamism and corporate turnaround performance in declining firms.

In order to test theoretically‐driven hypotheses, data were collected from 70 US manufacturing firms that experienced serious performance decline and subsequent performance turnaround between 1990‐2000. The hypothesized relationships among market‐related, input‐related environmental scanning, industry dynamism and corporate turnaround performance were tested using a moderated regression analysis.

The findings indicate that declining firms operating in dynamic industry environments tend to improve their turnaround performance when executives focus their attention more on market‐related sectors (i.e. customer, competitor and technological sectors). Conversely, the findings also indicated that corporate turnaround performance of declining firms seems to be adversely affected by a disproportionate focus on input‐related sectors of the task environment (i.e. suppliers and creditors).

The paper's findings contribute to the ongoing corporate turnaround research by highlighting the important role executive attention patterns and selective perceptions play in improving the extent of corporate turnaround in declining firms. More importantly, the findings also indicate that environmental context (in this case dynamism) is a critical part of successful corporate turnaround since it dictates the impact of relevant external actors on the organization.

Executives of declining firms attempting turnaround may find it particularly useful, based on the paper's findings, to focus their attention and information search on specific aspects of the task environment in order to facilitate corporate turnaround. Such focus becomes especially necessary if the declining firm is operating in dynamic industries.

The paper contributes to the corporate turnaround literature by highlighting the importance of both executive attention patterns and environmental context in any successful turnaround attempt.

The purpose of this article is to examine the major determinants for adopting virtual integration strategy in organizations. The article also addresses the competitive implications of adopting virtual integration strategy.

The article proposes a theoretical model that shows the major internal as well as external factors for adopting virtual integration strategy. In addition, the article presents real‐world applications of this strategy to explain the adoption process.

Virtual integration is a viable strategy in industries characterized by rapid product innovations and a high degree of competition. Virtual integration enables information technology driven supply chain coordination.

Future research efforts in this area should focus on testing empirically the proposed relationships between adopting a virtual integration strategy and firm performance using different industry categories.

Executives in a highly competitive, innovative and increasingly varying market demand may benefit from adopting virtual integration strategy. By doing so, firms can integrate their processes using information technology to be more customer‐responsive and competitive.

This article identifies the value of adopting a virtual integration strategy and highlights the major factors affecting the adoption of this strategy in organizations. Managers at medium and high‐level positions in particularly dynamic industries will most likely benefit from this article.

The purpose of this study is to empirically examine the effect of top management team (TMT) characteristics on corporate turnaround performance in declining firms under conditions of environmental stability and turbulence.

Theoretical hypotheses were developed and tested using data collected from 98 US manufacturing firms that experienced performance decline and turnaround during the periods 1990‐1994 and 1995‐2000 respectively. Data were collected from the COMPUSTAT database and annual filings and analyzed using a moderated regression analysis.

The results of moderated regression analysis indicate an adverse effect of long organizational tenure on corporate turnaround, especially in turbulent environments. Hence, if was found that the effect of top team composition on corporate turnaround varies depending on the environmental context.

The study contributes to the ongoing corporate turnaround research by examining the interplay between TMT characteristics and turnaround performance under different environmental contexts. Consequently, the findings of the study suggest that the environmental context in which declining firms operate matter just as much as the nature and characteristics of their top team in determining the success of their turnaround attempt.

The results of the study shed some light on corporate governance issues, specifically on the importance of matching top management change efforts in declining firms with the respective environmental context.

The study contributes to the corporate turnaround literature by addressing the recent call for research in the TMT‐turnaround relationship under environmental contingencies (i.e. environmental stability/turbulence).

The purpose of this paper is to empirically examine the relationship between chief executive officer characteristics and corporate turnaround performance of declining firms attempting turnaround.

A sample of 60 US manufacturing firms that experience severe performance decline and turnaround from 1985 to 2000 are selected from a population of declining manufacturing firms in the COMPUSTAT database. Data on leadership characteristics are collected and analyzed using ordinary least square regression analysis and ANOVA.

The general findings of the study provide empirical support for the upper echelons theory that emphasizes leadership characteristics as predictors of organizational outcomes. More specifically, the findings suggest the strong and adverse influence of long executive tenure on corporate turnaround performance. The findings also indicate that executives with output‐related functional background positively influence corporate turnaround performance in declining firms attempting turnaround.

The findings of this paper have important implications for corporate governance issues in declining firms attempting turnaround. In addition, the findings also lend further empirical support for the role of strategic leadership in shaping organizational outcomes especially under declining environmental conditions.

This paper contributes to the turnaround literature by providing empirical evidence on the role of strategic leadership in formulating and implementing turnaround strategies in declining firms. It also provides further support for the upper echelons perspective and strategic decision making.

The purpose of this paper is to empirically examine the relationship between founder-chief executive officers (CEOs) and firm performance. Specifically, the paper explores two opposing arguments on the performance implications of founder-CEO leadership. The first theoretical perspective argues that founder-CEOs positively contribute to firm performance since they bring passion, vision, and external legitimacy to the organization. The contrary resource-based perspective, argues that while founder-CEOs help in the early years of the firm, they become less effective as the firm evolves into a complex bureaucracy since they lack the necessary managerial skills.

In order to test these perspectives, the paper develops a matched sample of 82 US manufacturing firms and compared their performance using both accounting and market-based measures. Independent sample t-tests and analysis of variance were used to empirically test the opposing predictions. Data were obtained from the Mergent Online database as well as official proxy filings of sample firms.

The results of the data analysis indicate that there is a statistically significant performance difference between founder-led and non-founder led firms. Such performance difference is especially evident when the paper focusses on accounting-based firm performance measures such as return on assets and return on investment. Surprisingly, founder-led firms performed worse than those led by non-founder CEOs. The follow-up analysis indicates a significant difference in age and size among sample firms led by founders and non-founders such that founder-led firms tend to be younger and smaller in size.

Unlike other studies in the literature that found a strong positive impact of founder-CEOs, the findings of the study provided empirical support for the resource-based explanation of founder-CEO impact on firm performance. Specifically, the findings reported here contribute to understanding the role of founder-CEOs in the context of executive succession, strategy selection as well as organizational evolution.

This study makes original contribution to the on-going research on strategic leadership by exploring the performance effect of founder-CEOs and the corresponding alternative theoretical explanations. In addition, the inclusion of both accounting and market-based (Tobin's Q) dependent variables provide a broader measure of firm financial performance.

This study aims to contribute to the literature by addressing two research questions: is there a relationship between e-commerce adoption and performance of SMEs? And, more importantly, does the degree of entrepreneurial orientation moderate the relationship between e-commerce adoption and SME performance?

Data were collected from a sample of 55 manufacturing and service SMEs located in the state of Texas, USA, between 2008 and 2009 using a structured questionnaire. Customized questionnaires were mailed out to the owner-managers of 55 SMEs. A moderated regression analysis was conducted to test the two hypotheses.

The results suggest that e-commerce adoption has a significant, positive influence on SMEs' average sales growth rate and that adopters of e-commerce technology have significantly higher average sales growth rate than non-adopters. The results also indicate that e-commerce adoption positively affects SMEs' annual sales growth rate even more when the sample firms have higher level of entrepreneurial orientation. Overall, the results of this analysis indicate the importance of e-commerce adoption as well as SMEs' entrepreneurial orientation on the performance of SMEs.

The findings of this study can be useful for SMEs in general as a means of understanding how e-commerce adoption positively affects the firm's performance. Such a relationship suggests that e-commerce adoption is an important factor that can enhance firm's internal processes and ultimately performance. Therefore, e-commerce adopters should continue to utilize this technology while non-adopters should consider harnessing the potential of this technology to further streamline their operations and effectiveness.

This study contributes to the literature by providing empirical evidence on the role of e-commerce adoption and entrepreneurial orientation in small firm performance.

The purpose of this paper is to extend the current research on corporate philanthropy and organizational outcomes by empirically exploring two specific types of antecedents: board of director composition and industry membership.

A theoretical framework was developed based on the resource dependence and stakeholder theories which suggest that the extent that firms build relationship with certain stakeholders is closely tied to the personal and social background of board members, in turn influencing the allocation of resources to corporate philanthropy. Hierarchical multiple regression analysis as well as analysis of variance with post hoc comparisons was conducted using multi-year data philanthropic data from 104 US corporations.

The results provided empirical support for a positive relationship between the number of female board directors and the level of corporate philanthropy. In addition, the results showed significant inter-industry variations in the level of corporate philanthropy. This indicated that the rather aggressive role of philanthropy in mitigating reputational challenges associated with product-market dysfunctions. Contrary to the theoretical predictions, the results did not support a positive relationship between the proportion of outside directors and level of philanthropy.

The authors believe the empirical finding on the relationship between industry membership and corporate philanthropy is a significant contribution to the philanthropy literature. Accordingly, by empirically showing the disproportionately higher level of philanthropy by some prominent industries (such as gas and oil, financial services and chemical) than their counterparts, the authors contribute to the understanding of sector-level determinants of corporate philanthropy.

Since board of directors have a direct involvement in reviewing and approving major corporate initiatives, the choice of these directors is more likely to influence the amount of resources committed to philanthropic causes. Consistent with other studies in the larger corporate social responsibility research, the authors found that more women directors on the board are associated with greater philanthropic spending. Hence, a major implication of the study is that shareholders and the general corporate community need to pay close attention into who is elected to serve as director of business organizations as these directors’ background and experience could shape major social responsibility initiatives such as corporate philanthropy.

By empirically investigating the relationship between board composition and philanthropy, this study extends the scholarly discussion to focus on the role of the board in shaping the level of firm commitment in overall CSR. In addition, this study provides empirical evidence on the role of industry context in the level of commitment in corporate philanthropic activities.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the relationship between a chief executive officer (CEO)’s personal engagement in broader societal causes (CEO civic engagement) and firm’s social and environmental performance.

A theoretical framework was developed based on upper echelons and stakeholder theories to argue that CEOs’ professional background characteristics can be closely related to firm-level social and environmental performance. Hierarchical OLS analysis was conducted using data from 178 large, publicly traded large US firms between 2010 and 2013.

Overall, the findings suggest that firms led by CEOs with active civic engagement are more likely to support various philanthropic efforts. Additionally, the findings suggest that firms led by civic-minded CEOs are more likely to support an active corporate environmental engagement by investing significant resources in various environmental causes. Contrary to the authors’ predictions, the level of CEO civic engagement was not a significant predictor of firm level community engagement activities.

The findings extend current scholarly work on executive determinants of corporate social performance by highlighting the important role of CEOs’ personal engagement beyond studying CEOs’ demographic characteristics. Specifically, the findings that the CEO-civic engagements lead to higher degrees of corporate philanthropy and environmental performance show that CEOs’ civic engagement can go beyond what is considered symbolic executive actions.

The findings suggest that firms that seek to foster social and environmental performance in a meaningful way should recruit and retain CEOs that have a personal commitment to and engagement in various social and environmental issues and causes.

By empirically examining the effect of CEO civic engagement on corporate philanthropy, community involvement and environmental performance, this paper seeks to contribute to the scholarly conversation on the effects of CEOs in shaping the firm’s social and environmental engagement and addressing external stakeholder concerns.