Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/230120 
Year of Publication: 
2020
Citation: 
[Journal:] Journal of Management Studies [ISSN:] 1467-6486 [Volume:] 57 [Issue:] 8 [Publisher:] Wiley [Place:] Hoboken, NJ [Year:] 2020 [Pages:] 1556-1588
Publisher: 
Wiley, Hoboken, NJ
Abstract: 
Consistent with social motivation theory, prior research on managerial motivation suggests that effort is contagious across management team members. In this study, we draw on belongingness theory to develop a model on important boundary conditions to social motivation theory in the management team context. The model predicts that new venture managers react to their teammates’ higher effort levels by investing higher effort levels themselves primarily when they are confronted with a threat – namely, low venture performance and high environmental hostility – but that effort is less contagious when managers face little threat. We test our model with a sample of 103 new venture managers nested in 51 management teams in a longitudinal setting capturing managerial effort over 26 weeks. While we do not find a direct relationship between teammates’ effort and a new venture manager’s subsequent effort, we find support for the crucial role of threat in triggering the contagion of managerial effort. We discuss the contributions of our study for research on management teams, performance feedback, and entrepreneurial effort in new ventures.
Subjects: 
entrepreneurial effort
entrepreneurial team
environmental hostility
firm performance
new venture management team
social motivation
Persistent Identifier of the first edition: 
Creative Commons License: 
cc-by-nc Logo
Document Type: 
Article
Document Version: 
Published Version

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