Building interfirm leadership: a relational identity perspective

Hao, Bin; Feng, Yanan; Ye, Jiangfeng

Abstract

While leadership has been recognized as an approach to facilitating network orchestration, little is known about the mechanism through which a hub firm enhances interfirm leadership. Grounded on the theory of social identity and network orchestration, we develop a framework of the enhancement of interfirm leadership, proposing that the tendency of building leadership rests on the hub firm’s ability to shape the partners’ relational identity. We identify three types of role-adoption that indicate seven actions a hub firm might take to establish such an identity. We suggest that the mechanism through which leadership emerges is contingent on relationship duration, dependence asymmetry, and competition intensity.

Citation

Hao, B., Feng, Y., & Ye, J. (2017). Building interfirm leadership: a relational identity perspective. European Management Journal, 35(5), https://doi.org/10.1016/j.emj.2017.03.010

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Acceptance Date: Mar 22, 2017
• Online Publication Date: Apr 1, 2017
• Publication Date: Oct 1, 2017
• Deposit Date: May 2, 2017
• Publicly Available Date: Apr 2, 2019
• Journal: European Management Journal
• Print ISSN: 0263-2373
• Electronic ISSN: 1873-5681
• Publisher: Elsevier
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 35
• Issue: 5
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.emj.2017.03.010
• Keywords: network orchestration, interfirm network, hub firm, interfirm leadership, relational identity
• Public URL: https://nottingham-repository.worktribe.com/output/885211
• Publisher URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0263237317300555
• Contract Date: May 2, 2017