Doing Organizational Identity: Earnings Surprises and the Performative Atypicality Premium
研究提出组织成员与外部受众互动会动态产生身份，称为表演性非典型性，并发现其导致分析师评价溢价但引发负面盈利意外，对理解企业如何平衡趋同与差异化有启示。
How do organizations reconcile the cross-pressures of conformity and differentiation? Existing research predominantly conceptualizes identity as something an organization has by virtue of the products or services it offers. Drawing on constructivist theories, we argue that organizational members’ interactions with external audiences also dynamically produce identity. We call the extent to which such interactions diverge from audience expectations performative atypicality. Applying a novel deep-learning method to conversational text in over 90,000 earnings calls, we find that performative atypicality leads to an evaluation premium by securities analysts, paradoxically resulting in a negative earnings surprise. Moreover, performances that correspond to those of celebrated innovators are received with higher enthusiasm. Our findings suggest that firms that conform to categorical expectations while being performatively atypical can navigate the conflicting demands of similarity and uniqueness, especially if they hew to popular notions of being different.