These papers are working drafts of research which often appear in final form in academic journals. The published versions may differ from the working versions provided here.
SSRN Research Paper Series
The Social Science Research Network’s Research Paper Series includes working papers produced by Stanford GSB the Rock Center.
You may search for authors and topics and download copies of the work there.
Strategic Management in High-Technology Firms: An Exploratory Study
This paper reports the findings of an exploratory study, examining strategic management tasks and practices of ten electronics firms in Northern California. These firms confront two significant challenges: first, their operating environment is…
The High Earners Scale at Twenty Years Out
This paper reports results of a High Earners Scale for a sample of theStanford MBA class of 1962 at 20 years out of school. The coefficient of correlation was .44, significant at the .01 level of confidence for 54 men. There were few women in the…
The Uniqueness Paradox in Organizational Stories
Organizational cultures, and in particular stories, carry a claim to uniqueness - that an institution is unlike any other. This paper argues that a culture’s claim to uniqueness is, paradoxically, expressed through cultural manifestations, such…
Strategic Goals, Power, and Environmental Perceptions: Correlates of Performance in Volatile Environments (1)
The relationship between environmental volatility and various domain navigation behaviors was studied among top managements of 20 non-diversified firms. The findings suggest that attempts to avoid true environmental uncertainty, to seek high…
Strategy Implementation: Five Approaches to an Elusive Phenomenon
The traditional textbook approach to strategy implementation was to treat “implementation” an activity following “formulation.” Usually, the topic was treated as a question of organization design, where systems and structures were manipulated in…
Strategy Making of Internal Coporate Ventures: Findings on the Interplay of Content and Process
This paper describes the genesis of strategy in two internal corporate ventures. The comparision of archival and interview data suggests that content and process are intrinsically intertwined in the early stages of strategy-making. Strategic…
Double Jeopardy: Why Some Women and Minorities Object to Affirmative Action Programs
There is now strong evidence to suggest that a significant percentage of women and minorities oppose current Affirmative Action policies. This dissatisfaction probably arises from an understanding of the treatment accorded to employees identified…
Achieving Styles in Men and Women: A Model, an Instrument, and Some Findings
Abstract not available.
Careers of Women, Minority and White Male MBAs
Questionnaires were sent in 1978 to Stanford Graduate School of Business alumni from the classes of 1973-75. Questions were included on career progress and on the earnings of spouse or partner. The response rate was 77% of domestic graduates to…
Organizational Legends
Research on anthropological myths, sagas, and organizational stories is theoretically integrated with cognitive research on scripts. This integrative theoretical model is then used to define the characteristics of narratives most relevant to…
Pay Inequality and the Perception of Injustice: A Relative Deprivation Perspective
Fraternal deprivation research has attempted, and often failed, to find a strong positive association between system characteristics, such as economic or racial inequality, and behavior, such as riot participation. This research has relied on…
The Development of Knowledge Structures
The present research examines the process of the development of knowledge structures concerning events. Abelson (1976) suggested that one type of knowledge structure, a script, would move, as similar events were encountered, through three levels…
The Fairness of Earnings Differentials: An Experimental Study of the Perceptions of Blue Collar Workers
Blue-collar pay levels are chronic sources of dispute between labor and management. When such disputes are not resolved satisfactorily, the results, such as strikes and turnover, can be costly to both of the parties concerned, and even the…
Careers of Stanford MBAs With and Without Engineering Undergraduate Degrees
Abstract not available.
MBAs Move into Managing Small Companies
Abstract not available.
Some Consequences of Organizational Demography: Potential Impacts of an Aging Work Force on Formal Organizations
Abstract not available.
The Effects of Level of Abstraction of a Script on Accuracy of Recall, Predictions, and Beliefs
Abstract not available.
An Organizational Failures Framework
The paper begins with an explication of Oliver Williamsons market failures framework, which describes the conditions under which market transactions will be replaced by formal organizations. It then applies the central ideas of that framework to…