My dissertation examines in three essays how firms utilize exploitation and exploration strategies, independently and in combination, for competitive advantage. The first essay examines whether firms can gain competitive advantage by the simultaneous pursuit of exploitation and exploration (i.e., an ambidextrous strategy). Utilizing a cross-industry survey of marketing executives, I demonstrate that ambidextrous firms outpace non-ambidextrous ones across several performance dimensions. Importantly, implementation of an ambidextrous strategy at the marketing function level mediates the relationship between a firms ambidextrous strategy and its performance. Finally, differences in the mediating relationship between manufacturing and services firms are found. Essay two conceptualizes exploitation and exploration as capabilities. Drawing on longitudinal objective data from publicly-traded pharmaceutical companies, this study examines how firms maintain exploitation and exploration capabilities over time. Stochastic frontier estimation is used to create capability measures for exploitation and exploration for each firm in each period. The capabilities are then linked to historical and forward-looking performance, as measured by Return on Assets and Tobins q respectively. The results show that firms with stronger exploration capabilities have higher Tobins q values. Stronger exploitation capabilities, however, negatively affect Tobins q. In contrast, exploitation has a positive effect on historical performance while exploration has no effect. Surprisingly, firms that have stronger capabilities in both exploitation and exploration gain no significant performance advantage. Finally, given the difficulty of managing exploitation and exploration, the third essay investigates how firms can improve their focus on these strategies. Specifically, it examines customer divestment, or strategically terminating relationships. Research notes that most customers offer little or no value to a firm. This means that a firms investments in exploitation and exploration are potentially greatly misapplied. I use archival data to explore the prevalence of customer divestment across industries. I then investigate the customer divestment concept with managers and customers, yielding a broad framework of key relationships. Finally, an experiment is used to begin to empirically test key relationships. The results demonstrate that it is better for managers not to provide a warning prior to divestment as it creates more negative attitudes toward the firm.

Computer security has become increasingly important to organizations as the number of security incidents skyrockets. While many technical means are used to secure corporate systems, individual employees remain the last line and frequently the weakest link in organizational defenses. When individuals choose to disregard security policies and procedures meant to protect the organization, they leave the organization at risk. How, then, can organizations motivate their employees to follow security guidelines? Using organizational control and the fear of crime as the lens, we build a model to examine this research question. The research model examines the relationship between the elements of control (specification, evaluation, and reward), risk elements and risk antecedents (direct experience, indirect experience, and risk) and precautions that can be taken at the individual level which are typically motivated by organizational policies and procedures. The model also introduces the concept of mandatoriness which is generally not specifically highlighted in extant literature. The specific hypotheses are developed and tested using a field survey. An organization was identified for data collection and 1,738 total responses were collected from a population of approximately 3,500. The model was tested using PLS analysis after examination of the data, scale reliability, and item validity. The results from the analysis suggest that the acts of specifying a policy and evaluating behaviors are effective in convincing individuals that security policies and procedures are mandatory. The perception of mandatoriness, in turn, is effective in motivating individuals to take security precautions. Likewise, both direct and indirect experience have a significant positive effect on perceptions of risk, but risk perceptions do not have any effect on the level of precautions taken by individuals. The findings highlight the need for management to clearly specify computer security policies and procedures and to evaluate individual employee compliance with those policies. The findings also indicate that the perceived impact of specific scenarios is more likely to affect individual precaution taking behaviors than statistics indicating the likelihood that they will be affected. Additionally, managers need to address the problems of apathy as it relates to security and bolster individuals efficacy as it relates to computers.

The purpose of this dissertation is to provide a foundation for grounded theory to be built regarding the way in which successful entrepreneurs in high tech ventures make decisions and explore the unique team-focused adjustments that must be made to achieve the goal of a successful venture. Thus, the product of this paper will be the development of propositions that can be used in the initiation of new theories regarding entrepreneurial team building. The goal of this research is to help entrepreneurs with different levels of managerial and technical expertise build teams that will help them increase the likelihood of launching a successful venture. Such teams exceed what is normally understood as a top management team (TMT), and instead consist of TMT members, board members, and investors (Venture Capitalists and Angels), as well as outsider advisors who help plan and execute the strategy of an entrepreneurial venture. This research adds to the literature because a new venture team is a particular type of top management team that is largely neglected by the literature.

Prior research suggests that members¡¯ ongoing participation in a community is influenced by their psychological identification with it, the community¡¯s internal structural dynamics, and characteristics of the communication exchanged within the community. However, most of this research has focused on characteristics of the individual members and the community under consideration, taking the existence of the community as a given and giving little attention to the larger context in which the community resides. This dissertation extends prior research by proposing an ecological perspective when studying community success, taking into account the ecological and structural context of individuals¡¯ interaction with an online community. Two empirical studies were conducted to test the impact of context on the ongoing interactions between individuals and communities. The first study develops a theory of online community ecology, focusing on the impact of competition created by other communities in the same niche. Analysis of a longitudinal sample of 241 Usenet newsgroups over 64 months implies that both internal characteristics and external context affect communities¡¯ capability to retain members. Specifically, competition - the extent to which a community shares content with other communities and the extent to which the community¡¯s members also participate in other communities - represents an external threat that leads to a lower likelihood of members to return in the following time period. The second study builds on the first to explore the impact of contextual factors on individual members¡¯ ongoing participation decisions in online communities. Applying social exchange theory, I propose to treat individuals¡¯ interaction with online communities as a series of social exchanges. In addition to the ecological context, individuals¡¯ prior exchanges with an online community are also expected to shape the ways they make decisions about ongoing interaction. A research model based on social exchange theory is proposed and tested, with participation data of 43,758 individuals in seven Usenet newsgroups. The results suggest that an individual¡¯s level of current participation, the prior exchange history with the online community, and the availability of other alternative communities all play a role in the individual¡¯s continuance decision.

Organizational social practices (e.g., corporate social responsibility and corporate citizenship practices), as well as their costs and the benefits companies accrue from undertaking them, have been widely described and analyzed in the business and society literature. However, the debate over the mechanisms that motivate such practices has yet to evolve. This study aims at contributing to the explanation of these mechanisms. Using the institutional framework and Scotts (2001) concept of institutional pillars, I present a theoretical framework that reconciles strategic, principled, institutional, and emotional mechanisms that motivate organizational social action. I propose that commitment, calculation, conformance, and caring mechanisms motivate organizations to adopt social practices. Analyzing social practices used by companies in their interaction with the stakeholder local community, this study examines the effects of environmental conditions and decision-maker orientation on the four motivation mechanisms.

This dissertation addresses the reasons why private companies that have decided to go public use the alternative reverse merger path instead of the traditional initial public offering. We test the importance of information asymmetry for the decision of domestic and foreign private company owners to go public in the US utilizing the reverse merger path. To measure information asymmetry we use size, profitability, development stage, expenses and financing variables. We conclude that private companies choosing the reverse merger path are highly information asymmetric since reverse merger deals require no offering to be conducted at the consummation of the deal making these companies less reliant on a wide public investor base. This dissertation consists of five Chapters: Chapter One reviews going public and cross-listing literature. Chapter Two presents our empirical findings of domestic reverse mergers-penny stock initial public offerings comparison. Chapter Three analyzes similarities and differences of domestic and foreign reverse mergers. Chapter Four expands our analysis to the international level. Chapter Five states our conclusions.

In this study, we use some relatively unique characteristics of the Brazilian stock market to test corporate governance, capital structure, and payout decisions hypotheses. In Chapter One, we find that a composite index (NM6) that proxy for the main governance practices targeted by Bovespas voluntary reform is statistically and economically related to higher market valuation. We also find that an investment strategy that bought stocks of better governed firms and sold stocks of poorly governed firms would have earned annual abnormal returns of 10.4 between 2001 and 2005. In Chapter Two, we examine how entrenchment is related to capital structure in a market characterized by closely held firms and significant separation between ownership and control. Our results support the hypothesis that entrenched insiders choose less levered capital structures to reduce the probability of bankruptcy or to elude external monitoring by debtholders. In Chapter Three, we examine the relation between firm characteristics and the choice of payout on equity. In Brazil, firms can distribute earnings to shareholders in the form of dividends or notional interest equity. Whereas dividends are not taxed at the personal level, the net tax effect of interest payments is lower because of their deductibility. Our results are consistent with the use of the notional interest on equity because of its tax deductibility despite the personal tax advantage of dividend payments.

This research addresses analyzing and responding to uncertainty in projects with stochastic task durations. First we examine the effect of contractor flexibility (or agility) on project completion times. We find that this impact can be significant depending on the size and the structure of the project network. Next we study a stochastic time-cost trade-off problem with penalties for exceeding a project deadline. In considering this problem, we take a contingency approach to decision making where crashing decisions are made dynamically throughout project execution. For serial projects we develop a dynamic programming algorithm as well as a variety of heuristic methods. Extending and modifying these methods for general projects allows us to deal with more complex network structures. Specifically, we propose hybrid dynamic programming/linear programming algorithms and simulation-based algorithms. We perform computational studies to assess the performance of each method and to compare the contingency approach with a static approach (where all crashing decisions are made before the project start time). Finally, we study the case with penalties, incentives, and overhead costs. We find that when the project cost function is not convex, the dynamic programming solution may become non-monotonic, which requires further modification of the methods. We show that the performance of our algorithms does not deteriorate with inclusion of additional parameters. In fact, the gaps between the case with perfect information and the methods presented herein seem to be smaller than in the penalty only case.

In this dissertation I have three essays. In Essay 1 I focus on two main groups of stakeholders, the investor community and the customers of a firm. I view their interaction through the lens of a third group of stakeholders, managers. Managers, like other humans, have a limited amount of attention that can be applied to firm projects. When attention is spread thin for firms operating in many business segments then managers are unable to adequately address the needs of the investor community and customer stakeholder groups. A tradeoff between these two groups is necessary in this situation. However, when a firm is narrowly focused, doing business in only a few segments, then there is enough managerial attention and the firm should follow a dual emphasis. A firm that has achieved a dual emphasis in this scenario should be able to achieve higher long-term financial results compared to only pursuing customer or investor related projects. Essay 2 continues with the theme of researching multiple stakeholder groups. This essay investigates the interactions of society, the investor community, and the employees of a firm. A firm can address the needs of these groups through corporate social responsibility (CSR) acts, but how does CSR benefit or disadvantage investors? This essay uses signaling theory (Kirmani and Rao 2000) in four common situations to discern the extent that firms are advantaged or disadvantaged by CSR strengths and concerns. CSR signals are divided into external (e.g., environmental issues such as pollution) and internal (e.g., employee issues such as hiring practices) as well as strengths (exceeding legal standards) and concerns (running afoul of the law). These four types of CSR signals, in addition to information from annual reports, customer satisfaction, short-term financial measures, and industry concentration, only sometimes combine to provide strong signals to investors regarding a firms future prospects. Results from this essay show that the best results, from the investment community point of view, can be summarized in three points. First, externally focused CSR activities are assisted by managerial advertising to investors, do not compensate for low short-term financial outcomes, assist firms in concentrated industries, but are detrimental for firms in less concentrated industries. Second, internally focused CSR activities are worse for firms with high (vs. low) levels of customer satisfaction, low (vs. high) levels of industry concentration, and low (vs. high) levels of short-term financial outcomes. Third, internal CSR issues have little importance from an investor point of view. The third essay in my dissertation, once again centers on customers, but also investigates the role that managers and employees have on value creation for a firm. In order to investigate the interactions of these groups, two data sets were used. One was from the German retailing industry and the other from a US banking firm. This allows the results to be generalized to more industries and countries. Results show that 1) The effect of managerial (franchisee) satisfaction on customer satisfaction is fully mediated via employee satisfaction; 2) The effect of customer satisfaction on repurchase intention is strongly moderated by front-line employee satisfaction; and 3) Customer repurchase intentions affect firm revenues. These results suggest that firms seeking to enhance customer satisfaction, repurchase intentions, and profits should not only make direct investments in customer satisfaction, but also indirect investments in human resources, especially in improving satisfaction among front-line employees.

The Internet now hosts an ever-increasing collection of tools (e.g., list-servers, discussion groups, chat rooms, bulletin boards, social networking sites, and wikis) that help people connect, communicate, and collaborate. The development of these technological tools, together with the desire to capitalize on the collective efforts of like-minded individuals has led to the formation of a wide variety of online communities. While some community oriented ventures have been extremely successful (e.g., MySpace and Wikipedia), this is not the norm. Online communities are faced with significant challenges associated with attracting and maintaining a voluntary membership base and many fail to do so. The success and failure of these communities lies in their ability to attract and maintain a membership base of users that are willing to participate. A key to attracting and retaining members is to better understand how members join, and how their relationship with the community, impact their behavior in the community. The primary purpose of this dissertation research is to propose and test different aspects of community life that links how people join the community, and the bonds they form with the community, influence their participation in the community. A secondary objective is to expand the conceptualization of participation beyond traditional frequency of contribution constructs, to one that incorporates a wider range of community behaviors that need to be performed by a communitys members. Towards these objectives, this work examines how two different aspects of community life, joining and commitment, affect different aspects of participation, including content provision, content seeking, and informal moderation. The first study draws on literature of word-of-mouth from marketing and organizational recruiting to explain how community joining processes, specifically member referrals, can shape member participation behaviors. The second study, draws on the organizational commitment literature, to theorize how the member-community relationship impacts member participation. Data to test these models proposed in each study was collected from a large community. The community promotes itself as a general discussion community, with the goal of supporting social conversation amongst its members. This dissertation finds that member referrals and community commitment play an important role in members participation within online communities. These factors exert their influences at different stages of a members association with a community. Referrals appear to be most influential at the earliest stages of community life, facilitating the return of members after they join and the level of their participation in the short term. This may be useful in helping communities overcome initial judgments of members with respect to the potential value of the community, giving the community a chance. However, communities must also be able to develop committed members to sustain participation in the long term. The commitment that develops between a member and the community influences members participation, with the various types of commitment (continuance, affective, normative) leading members to participate in different ways. This may be useful in helping community administrators, who face the challenge of achieving an appropriate mix of participation to maintain the quality of the member-generated content pool over time. Taken together the results of the studies presented provide a theoretical foundation for linking relational models of community engagement and content contribution models. In doing so, expands the range of behaviors that should be considered by both researchers and practitioners, and provide a foundation for richer, more powerful, and potentially more useful models of behavior in online contexts.