Stakeholder Knowledge and Behavioral Integration in Boards of Social Enterprises: A Team Production Approach
- PDF / 559,580 Bytes
- 14 Pages / 595.276 x 790.866 pts Page_size
- 4 Downloads / 165 Views
RESEARCH PAPERS
Stakeholder Knowledge and Behavioral Integration in Boards of Social Enterprises: A Team Production Approach Saskia Crucke1
•
Mirjam Knockaert1,2
Accepted: 3 October 2020 International Society for Third-Sector Research 2020
Abstract The social entrepreneurship literature increasingly acknowledges that the board of directors is of major importance in dealing with the multiple goal pursuit of social enterprises. Using a team production perspective, we study the relationship between stakeholder knowledge in the board and the engagement of the board in counseling and decisionmaking (i.e., board service performance) and subsequent organizational performance. The results of our study, using a sample of Flemish social enterprises, reveal that board stakeholder knowledge is positively related to board service performance. This relationship is moderated by board behavioral integration, which is strengthening the relationship in case of high stakeholder knowledge. Finally, while board service performance is positively related to social performance and, specifically, the social goal of hiring disadvantaged people, it is not significantly related to financial performance. Keywords Governance Social enterprises Board of directors Team production theory
& Saskia Crucke [email protected] Mirjam Knockaert [email protected] 1
Faculty of Economics and Business Administration, Ghent University, Tweekerkenstraat 2, 9000 Ghent, Belgium
2
Entrepreneurship Research Institute, Technical University Munich, Arcisstraße 21, 80333 Mu¨nchen, Germany
Introduction Social enterprises aim at solving ‘wicked problems,’ such as social exclusion or poverty (Mair et al. 2012; Santos 2012). They are described as hybrid organizations as they target social goals while striving for financial sustainability (Doherty et al. 2014; Pache and Santos 2013; Young and Lecy 2014). The combining of social and financial goals in decision-making is described as a major internal challenge in social enterprises (Battilana and Lee 2014; Dufays 2019). Particularly, social enterprises often lack a dominant stakeholder and face the challenge of aligning and incorporating the interests of a wide range of stakeholders, such as the beneficiaries of their social mission, their customers, funders and governments, in their decision-making (Ebrahim et al. 2014; Pache and Santos 2010). One way in which social enterprises could deal with this specific challenge is through the implementation of corporate governance mechanisms and particularly the establishment of a board of directors (Ebrahim et al. 2014; Mair et al. 2015; Spear et al. 2009; Wolf and Mair 2019). This is because boards do not only engage in a control role, but are also active in their service role, through which board members engage in (1) advice giving to the CEO and members of the management team on managerial issues and (2) strategic decision-making by initiating and for˚ berg et al. 2019). As such, boards may mulating strategy (A serve as a connection between the soc
Data Loading...
