Business failure pathways: Environmental stress and organizational response
比较1980至1986年间73家破产企业与73家未破产企业的行为，发现企业自身因素比行业环境更能解释失败，并识别出四种失败路径，其中债务驱动的强制增长策略无论行业增速如何都带来高风险。
This paper compares the failure of 73 firms that declared bankruptcy from 1980 to 1986 with the behavior of 73 matching firms that had not failed over the same period. We contrast the relative importance of environmental stress, measured by industry growth/decline, with organizational response, measured by asset and debt growth/decline. Firm effects dominate industry effects in explaining failure. Four distinctive business failure pathways based on firm and industry growth patterns are described. In particular, we conclude that debt-funded, forced-growth strategies create a high risk of failure regardless of industry growth rate.