Revisiting the “matching managers to strategy” argument in the context of a firm’s internationalisation strategy

Abstract

Purpose This paper aims to revisit the long-standing in the management literature argument of “matching managers to strategy” in the new empirical context of the top management team (TMT) and firm internationalisation. The purpose of this paper is to examine the consequences of matching nationalities of the TMT members to the multinational corporations’ (MNC) countries of operation. Design/methodology/approach This research is based on the quantitative methods. The authors use the traditional regression analysis, with the ordinary least squares estimation, in the moderated multiple regression models. Findings The study findings point to the importance of the asset-based exposure to international environments for the benefits of the TMT nationality matching to materialise. They re-affirm the critical remarks on the early “matching managers to strategy” frameworks, which indicated that the effectiveness of matching is underpinned by the detailed specification of the matching contingencies that influence the matching process. Originality/value The measure of matching the TMT foreign nationals to the MNCs’ host countries constitutes a novel way of capturing the TMT internationalisation, as opposed to measuring the incidence of foreigners on the TMTs or the TMT nationality diversity variable. It therefore underlines the aspect of matching in terms of the cultural fit between the TMT nationalities and countries of MNCs’ operations.

Board gender diversity and firms' internationalization speed: the role of female directors' characteristics

“…Because rapid international expansion is a double-edged sword, it can either give firms a first-mover advantage or cause them to face time-compression diseconomies. Therefore, firms need to increase or decrease board gender diversity to better match the board to firms' internationalization strategy (Kaczmarek and Nyuur, 2021). For example, increasing board diversity is a more appropriate choice for firms that are expanding internationally too quickly, and vice versa.…”

Strategic leaders in multinational enterprises: A role-specific microfoundational view and research agenda

“…Indeed, research in this area has inter alia drawn on the notion of matching managers to strategies to explore how MNEs match their strategic leaders' experience and capabilities to the international scope of their operations. For example, Kaczmarek and Nyuur (2021) found that MNE performance is likely to be higher when the (foreign) nationalities of strategic leaders match the MNE's regional scope of operations. Similarly, Ruigrok, Georgakakis and Greve (2013) showed that strategic leaders at MNE headquarters with intra-regional experience are more likely to realize high performance when the MNE operates mainly within its home region.…”