Unpacking The Search Process: The Role of Managerial Experience

Organizational search is central to the creation of new strategies, development of new products, and pursuit of promising opportunities. Yet models of the underlying process of search are relatively limited. We offer a conceptual model identifying search intensity (degree of response to stimulus), search decline (decline of search over time), and search duration (time to reversion to pre-stimulus levels) as defining characteristics of the search process. To demonstrate the value of the model, we then take a cognitive perspective on the offline and online search process and use our model to offer theory around the role of managerial experience in organizational search behaviour. Our core suggestion is that more experienced managers both have high quality ex ante theories that direct search and are more willing to engage in search when the need arises, leading to specific search behaviour in terms of intensity, decline, and duration. We demonstrate the overall model of search and validate our theory using data on 376 changes of teams’ resource configurations (player trades, injuries, and returns from injury) in the National Basketball Association. Our study contributes to the burgeoning literature on the process of search and to a theoretical perspective on the role of managerial experience in the search process.

Zoom link: https://eur-nl.zoom.us/j/93492310311?pwd=OURUZHdpeEp3V1dmS3pjK2czeCt0QT09&from=addon

Meeting ID: 934 9231 0311