Organizational Imprinting and Response to Institutional Complexity: Evidence from Publicly-Traded Chinese State-Owned Firms in Hong Kong
研究组织印记如何影响企业对制度复杂性的回应，以香港上市的中国国有企业为例，发现成立时的市场逻辑主导期和中央机构背景会影响董事会中非国有董事的比例。
ABSTRACT This study seeks to answer the following question: What are the organizational attributes that influence organizational responses to institutional complexity? Building on core ideas of organizational imprinting, I argue that organizational response is influenced by the imprint from the dominant logic of organizing during the founding period and from the institutional position an organization possessed at founding. Empirically, I examine the variation in board composition of Chinese state-owned firms listed in the Hong Kong Stock Exchange market. It is found that state-owned firms founded in the market logic dominant period tend to have more non-state directors on the board in that they were organized around the prescription of the market logic and more responsive to shareholders’ demands for legitimacy reasons. Besides, state-owned firms founded by central government agencies tend to have fewer non-state directors because they were born at the center of the socialist system to accomplish strategic goals of the central government and non-state directors may challenge the vested interests. This study contributes to the organizational imprinting and institutional literature and resonates with the contemporary call for a more systematic examination of organizational attributes that influence organizational responses to institutional complexity.