Journal article
The Top Management Team: Conceptualization, Operationalization, and a Roadmap for Scholarship
Journal of management, Vol.48(6), pp.1548-1601
07/01/2022
DOI: 10.1177/01492063211072459
Abstract
Who constitutes the top management team (TMT)? What are the boundary conditions that distinguish the TMT from other managers? Despite nearly four decades of TMT research, the concept of the TMT remains poorly defined and often goes undefined in empirical TMT research. We conducted a review of the TMT literature to better understand how the TMT construct is conceptualized and operationalized, to identify gaps in alignment and consistency, and to develop a roadmap for scholars to improve both aspects of the literature. We review all TMT-related papers published in Financial Times 50 (FT50) journals between 1984 and 2019. Our analysis reveals (1) a wide discrepancy in conceptual definitions of the TMT among the minority of studies actually providing a conceptual definition, (2) operationalizations seemingly based more on data availability rather than alignment with a conceptual definition, and as a result, (3) an overall lack of coherence in understanding of the TMT phenomenon. We explore these challenges, develop a definition of the TMT that integrates insight from the academic and practitioner communities, and build a roadmap for future TMT and upper echelons research.
Details
- Title: Subtitle
- The Top Management Team: Conceptualization, Operationalization, and a Roadmap for Scholarship
- Creators
- Ryan Krause - Texas Christian UniversityJoseph Roh - Texas Christian UniversityKimberly A. Whitler - University of Virginia
- Resource Type
- Journal article
- Publication Details
- Journal of management, Vol.48(6), pp.1548-1601
- DOI
- 10.1177/01492063211072459
- ISSN
- 0149-2063
- eISSN
- 1557-1211
- Number of pages
- 54
- Language
- English
- Date published
- 07/01/2022
- Academic Unit
- Management and Entrepreneurship
- Record Identifier
- 9984936840002771
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