Hostname: page-component-669899f699-7tmb6 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2025-04-28T08:53:51.374Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Exploring the relationship between strategic attention breadth and performance: The role of corporate social responsibility

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  18 October 2024

Vivien E. Jancenelle Open the ORCID record for Vivien E. Jancenelle [Opens in a new window]
Vivien E. Jancenelle*
Affiliation:
College of Business, University of Houston-Clear Lake, Houston, TX, USA
*
Email: [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

The attention-based view contends that executives possess limited attentional capabilities that must be carefully allocated across different strategic issues. Although many scholars contend that narrow strategic attention breadth leads to better performance, others argue that broad strategic attention breadth may be more beneficial due to better opportunity scanning. We posit that the relationship between strategic attention breadth and performance will be inverted U-shaped, where strategic attention breadth is positively related to firm performance up to an optimal point, after which firms will see declining benefits due to executive cognitive overload. Furthermore, we propose that executives’ assessment of strategic opportunities will be influenced by the firm’s corporate social responsibility perspective, as the firm’s environmental and ethical commitment may mitigate executive blind spots and enhance opportunity selection. We support our hypotheses with multiple measures of firm performance and a content analysis of annual reports corresponding to a 5-year longitudinal sample of 2,245 S&P 500 firms.

Keywords

attention-based viewstrategic attention breadthCSRcurvilinear relationshipfirm performance
Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of Management & Organization , Volume 31 , Issue 1 , January 2025 , pp. 330 - 345
Copyright
© The Author(s), 2024. Published by Cambridge University Press in association with Australian and New Zealand Academy of Management.

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Article purchase

Temporarily unavailable

References

Allen, F. (1993). Strategic management and financial markets. Strategic Management Journal, 14, 11–22.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Allison, P. D. (2005). Fixed effects regression methods for longitudinal data using SAS. Austin: SAS Institute.Google Scholar
Bansal, P., Jiang, G. F., & Jung, J. C. (2015). Managing responsibly in tough economic times: Strategic and tactical CSR during the 2008–2009 global recession. Long Range Planning, 48(2), 69–79.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brown, L. D., & Caylor, M. L. (2006). Corporate governance and firm valuation. Journal of Accounting and Public Policy, 25, 409–434.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Carpenter, M. A. (2002). The implications of strategy and social context for the relationship between top management team heterogeneity and firm performance. Strategic Management Journal, 23, 275–284.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Carroll, A. B. (1999). Corporate social responsibility: Evolution of a definitional construct. Business & Society, 38(3), 268–295.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chadwick, C., Super, J. F., & Kwon, K. (2015). Resource orchestration in practice: CEO emphasis on SHRM, commitment‐based HR systems, and firm performance. Strategic Management Journal, 36(3), 360–376.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cho, T. S., & Hambrick, D. C. (2006). Attention as the mediator between top management team characteristics and strategic change: The case of airline deregulation. Organization Science, 17(4), 453–469.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Connor, T. (2003). Managing for competitiveness: A proposed model for managerial focus. Strategic Change, 12(4), 195–207.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Copeland, T. E., & Weston, J. F. (1988). Financial theory and corporate policy. Reading: Addison-Wesley.Google Scholar
Dahlsrud, A. (2008). How corporate social responsibility is defined: An analysis of 37 definitions. Corporate Social Responsibility and Environmental Management, 15(1), 1–13.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Danneels, E. (2003). Tight–loose coupling with customers: The enactment of customer orientation. Strategic Management Journal, 24(6), 559–576.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Durand, R., & Jacqueminet, A. (2015). Peer conformity, attention, and heterogeneous implementation of practices in MNEs. Journal of International Business Studies, 46(8), 917–937.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Duriau, V. J., Reger, R. K., & Pfarrer, M. D. (2007). A content analysis of the content analysis literature in organization studies: Research themes, data sources, and methodological refinements. Organizational Research Methods, 10(1), 5–34.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Eklund, J. C., & Mannor, M. J. (2021). Keep your eye on the ball or on the field? Exploring the performance implications of executive strategic attention. Academy of Management Journal 64(6), 1685–1713.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fehre, K., & Weber, F. (2019). Why some are more equal: Family firm heterogeneity and the effect on management’s attention to CSR. Business Ethics: A European Review, 28(3), 321–334.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Funk, R. J. (2014). Making the most of where you are: Geography, networks, and innovation in organizations. Academy of Management Journal, 57(1), 193–222.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Galbreath, J., Lucianetti, L., Tisch, D., & Thomas, B. (2022). Firm strategy and CSR: The moderating role of performance management systems. Journal of Management & Organization, 28(1), 202–220.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
G&A Survey. (2023). Sustainability Reporting In Focus. Governance and Accountability Institute. Retrieved May 15 , 2024, from https://www.ga-institute.com/research/ga-research-directory/sustainability-reporting-trends/2023-sustainability-reporting-in-focus.htmlGoogle Scholar
Guthrie, J. (2001). The management, measurement and the reporting of intellectual capital. Journal of Intellectual Capital, 44, 180–190.Google Scholar
Haans, R. F., Pieters, C., & He, Z. L. (2016). Thinking about U: Theorizing and testing U‐and inverted U‐shaped relationships in strategy research. Strategic Management Journal, 37, 1177–1195.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Harness, D., Ranaweera, C., Karjaluoto, H., & Jayawardhena, C. (2018). The role of negative and positive forms of power in supporting CSR alignment and commitment between large firms and SMEs. Industrial Marketing Management, 75, 17–30.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hausman, J. A. (1978). Specification tests in econometrics. Econometrica, 46, 1251–1271.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Huselid, M. A. (1995). The impact of human resource management practices on turnover, productivity, and corporate financial performance. Academy of Management Journal, 38, 635–672.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jancenelle, V. E., Wei, S., & Ang, T. (2020). Market orientation heterogeneity and new joint venture formation announcements: Creating value for parent firms. Journal of Strategy and Management, 13(3), 433–451.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Joseph, J., & Wilson, A. J. (2018). The growth of the firm: An attention‐based view. Strategic Management Journal, 39(6), 1779–1800.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kaplan, S. (2011). Research in cognition and strategy: Reflections on two decades of progress and a look to the future. Journal of Management Studies, 48(3), 665–695.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kiessling, T., Isaksson, L., & Yasar, B. (2016). Market orientation and CSR: Performance implications. Journal of Business Ethics, 137(2), 269–284.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kiss, A. N., Libaers, D., Barr, P. S., Wang, T., & Zachary, M. A. (2020). CEO cognitive flexibility, information search, and organizational ambidexterity. Strategic Management Journal, 41(12), 2200–2233.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lant, T. K., Milliken, F. J., & Batra, B. (1992). The role of managerial learning and interpretation in strategic persistence and reorientation: An empirical exploration. Strategic Management Journal, 13(8), 585–608.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lattin, J. M., Carroll, J. D., & Green, P. E. (2003). Analyzing multivariate data. Pacific Grove: Brooks/Cole.Google Scholar
Li, M., & Yang, J. (2023). CEO vigilance and hypercompetition: CEO attention in resource utilization and firm competitive aggressiveness. Management Decision, 61(11), 3255–3277.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Magretta, J. (2012). Understanding Michael Porter: The essential guide to competition and strategy. Harvard business press.Google Scholar
Manral, L. (2011). Managerial cognition as bases of innovation in organization. Management Research Review, 34(5), 576–594.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
McMullen, J. S., Shepherd, D. A., & Patzelt, H. (2009). Managerial (in) attention to competitive threats. Journal of Management Studies, 46(2), 157–181.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nadkarni, S., & Barr, P. S. (2008). Environmental context, managerial cognition, and strategic action: An integrated view. Strategic Management Journal, 29(13), 1395–1427.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Neuendorf, K. A. (2016). The content analysis guidebook. Thousand Oaks: Sage Publications.Google Scholar
Ocasio, W. (1997). Towards an attention‐based view of the firm. Strategic Management Journal, 18(S1), 187–206.3.0.CO;2-K>CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ocasio, W., & Joseph, J. (2005). An attention-based theory of strategy formulation: Linking micro- and macroperspectives in strategy processes. In Szulanski, G., Porac, J., & Doz, Y. (Eds.), Strategy process (Advances in Strategic Management (vol 22, pp. 39–61). Bingley: Emerald Group Publishing Limited.Google Scholar
Ocasio, W., & Joseph, J. (2018). The attention-based view of great strategies. Strategy Science, 3(1), 289–294.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Okafor, A., Adeleye, B. N., & Adusei, M. (2021). Corporate social responsibility and financial performance: Evidence from US tech firms. Journal of Cleaner Production, 292, .CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pencle, N., & Mălăescu, I. (2016). What’s in the words? Development and validation of a multidimensional dictionary for CSR and application using prospectuses. Journal of Emerging Technologies in Accounting, 13(2), 109–127.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Peters, R., Waples, E., & Golden, P. (2014). A real options reasoning approach to corporate social responsibility (CSR): Integrating real option sensemaking and CSR orientation. Business and Society Review, 119(1), 61–93.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rerup, C. (2009). Attentional triangulation: Learning from unexpected rare crises. Organization Science, 20(5), 876–893.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Richard, P. J., Devinney, T. M., Yip, G. S., & Johnson, G. (2009). Measuring organizational performance: Towards methodological best practice. Journal of Management, 35(3), 718–804.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Shepherd, D. A., Mcmullen, J. S., & Ocasio, W. (2017). Is that an opportunity? An attention model of top managers’ opportunity beliefs for strategic action. Strategic Management Journal, 38(3), 626–644.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Short, J. C., Broberg, J. C., Cogliser, C. C., & Brigham, K. H. (2010). Construct validation usingcomputer-aided text analysis (CATA): An illustration using entrepreneurial orientation. Organizational Research Methods, 13(2), 320–347.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Short, J. C., & Palmer, T. B. (2008). The application of DICTION to content analysis research in strategic management. Organizational Research Methods, 11(4), 727–752.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Simon, H. A. (1947). Administrative behavior: A study of decision-making processes in administrative organizations. Chicago, IL: Macmillan.Google Scholar
Srivastava, S., Sahaym, A., & Allison, T. H. (2021). Alert and Awake: Role of alertness and attention on rate of new product introductions. Journal of Business Venturing, 36(4), .CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Strampelli, G. (2020). Can BlackRock save the planet? The institutional investors’ role in Stakeholder Capitalism. Harvard Business Law Review, 11, 1–20.Google Scholar
Tripsas, M., & Gavetti, G. (2000). Capabilities, cognition, and inertia: Evidence from digital imaging. Strategic Management Journal, 21(10−11), 1147–1161.3.0.CO;2-R>CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Walsh, J. P. (1995). Managerial and organizational cognition: Notes from a trip down memory lane. Organization Science, 6(3), 280–321.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wang, H., Tong, L., Takeuchi, R., & George, G. (2016). Corporate social responsibility: An overview and new research directions: Thematic issue on corporate social responsibility. Academy of Management Journal, 59(2), 534–544.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wang, R., & Huang, Y. (2018). Communicating corporate social responsibility (CSR) on social media: How do message source and types of CSR messages influence stakeholders’ perceptions? Corporate Communications: An International Journal 23(3), 326–341.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wu, Y., Zhang, K., & Xie, J. (2020). Bad greenwashing, good greenwashing: Corporate social responsibility and information transparency. Management Science, 66(7), 3095–3112.CrossRefGoogle Scholar