Nils Daniel Kraiczy

Entrepreneurial Team Composition Characteristics and New Venture Performance: A Meta‐Analysis

Upper echelon theory highlights the importance of top management teams in large and established firms; however, effects are not always clear outside of this context. Due to the unique nature of new ventures, the composition of entrepreneurial teams and its effects on performance is worthy of investigation. Accordingly, we meta–analyze the effect of three characteristics of entrepreneurial team composition (i.e., aggregated, heterogeneity, team size) on new venture performance. Our meta–analysis, which includes 55 empirical samples and 8,892 observations, finds significant and unique effects of entrepreneurial team characteristics on new ventures. Based on our findings, we derive avenues for future research.

The relationship between top management team innovation orientation and firm growth: The mediating role of firm innovativeness

Upper echelon theory and research on innovation have considered top management teams and their behaviour and characteristics as important factors that positively influence innovativeness and organizational outcomes. Yet, innovation research has mostly focused on individual new product projects, and their performance and impact on firm performance. Recent research has started to apply a more holistic view in terms of innovation, by considering firm-wide innovation instead of single new products. Upper echelon research has concentrated on direct relationships between top management team characteristics and organizational outcomes. But recent research calls for mediating effects of the relationship between top management team characteristics and organizational outcomes. Hence, this study introduces firm innovativeness as a mediator between top management team innovation orientation and firm growth. Focusing on small and medium-sized firms, which often represent highly innovative firms, results show that firm innovativeness fully mediates the relationship between top management team innovation orientation and firm growth. Implications and future research are discussed.

Storytelling and cultural family value Transmission : value perception of stories in family firms

This study analyses the transmission of cultural family values in family firms through storytelling. Specifically, we investigate whether cultural family values that are intended to be imparted by a story and its teller are also perceived accurately by listeners (i.e. the intended imparted value and the perceived value are congruent). We use a mixed-methods design including a qualitative phase, which identifies stories told in three German family firms, and a quantitative phase, which analyses the value perception (i.e. subjective cognition) of 226 individuals from outside the firm for a selected number of six stories. Results indicate that the intended values of the selected stories are perceived accurately by the individuals. Hence, stories might describe a useful means for transmitting cultural family values in family firms.

Family Firm Brands, Perceptions of Doing Good, and Consumer Happiness:

This research examines how and why family firm brands (compared to nonfamily firm brands) affect consumers. We argue that a brand’s family firm status acts as a signal to consumers who share category-based beliefs about family firms doing good due to preserving their socioemotional wealth. This perception in turn is a fair and positive appraisal in the mind of consumers (in the sense of indirectly benefiting others with their spent financial resources) that elicits happiness. In an experimental study, we show that family firms are being perceived by consumers as acting more supportive towards internal and external stakeholders and that these perceptions in turn result in higher consumer happiness. In other words, our results indicate that communicating a brand’s family firm status might have a positive indirect influence on consumer happiness through the perception of doing good. On the other hand, our results suspect that a brands family firm status might also trigger beliefs (not part of our study) with more negative indirect effects on consumer happiness.

Applying Person-Environment Fit Theory to Identify Personality Differences between Prospective Social and Commercial Entrepreneurs: An Explorative Study

Research has started to investigate personality traits of social entrepreneurs because such traits in commercial entrepreneurs have been found to affect new venture creation/success. In this exploratory study, we apply the person‐environment fit theory and analyze specific social entrepreneurial personality dimensions (i.e., altruism, empathic concern, personal distress, compassion), and classical entrepreneurial personality dimensions (i.e., need for achievement (nAch), entrepreneurial self‐efficacy (ESE), general self‐efficacy, risk‐taking propensity) to identify differences between prospective social and commercial entrepreneurs. Using a sample of 85 prospective entrepreneurs, results show that prospective social entrepreneurs differ from prospective commercial entrepreneurs in the personality dimensions of personal distress, nAch, ESE, and risk‐taking propensity.

Expatriates-Training = Expatriates-Einsatzerfolg? Eine Metaanalyse

ZusammenfassungDiese Studie untersucht im Rahmen einer Metaanalyse den Zusammenhang zwischen dem training und dem Einsatzerfolg von Expatriates. Bisherige Metaanalysen zu diesem Thema haben mehrheitlich Studien mit einem Fokus auf Soldaten, Ärzten und Schülern berücksichtigt. Um weitere Erkenntnisse auf Unternehmensebene zu gewinnen, berücksichtigt diese Metananalyse 28 Studien, die alle einen Fokus auf Managern haben. Die Ergebnisse zeigen einen positiven und signifikanten Effekt von Training auf die Arbeitszufriedenheit und das Commitment von Expatriates. Weiterhin zeigen die Ergebnisse, dass Training die Abbruchabsicht von Expatriates verringert. Betrachtet man Anpassung als Erfolgskriterium, so besteht kein signifikanter Zusammenhang zwischen Training und Arbeits- und Interaktionsanpassung. Hinsichtlich der kulturellen Anpassung zeigen die Ergebnisse lediglich einen schwachen Zusammenhang.AbstractIn order to prepare expatriates for assignments abroad, companies invest in expatriates training. Prior research on the effect of expatriate training on expatriate performance is inconsistent and has mostly focused on soldiers, medical doctors, and students. Hence, this study analyzes the relationship between expatriate training and expatriate performance on an organizational level by applying a meta-analysis including 28 studies with a focus on managers. Results show that expatriate training has a positive and significant effect on job satisfaction and commitment. Further, expatriate training decreases the intention of expatriates to leave the job. In contrast, applying facets of adjustment as performance indicator, results show no significant effect of expatriate training on work adjustment and interaction adjustment. The effect of expatriates training on cultural adjustment is marginal significant. The study discusses implications of the findings for research and management and develops avenues for future research.