IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/jbrese/v175y2024ics0148296324000523.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Failure Escape: The role of advice seeking in CEOs’ awareness of financial difficulties and corporate restructuring

Author

Listed:
  • Achbah, Rachid
  • Vitanova, Ivana
  • Fréchet, Marc

Abstract

This study investigates CEOs’ advice-seeking behavior in small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and its influence on managing the financial difficulties these firms face. Grounded in the attention-based view of firms, our framework posits that CEOs’ advice seeking plays a sequential role in shaping a firm’s response to financial distress, by influencing CEOs’ awareness of financial difficulties and, subsequently, the restructuring process. We differentiate between advice sought from formal and informal advisors and consider top management team (TMT) functional diversity as a moderator. We test these hypotheses using a proprietary dataset of 407 financially distressed SMEs in France. Our results indicate that advice seeking significantly enhances CEOs’ decision to proceed to restructuring and this effect is mediated by the heightened financial awareness of CEOs. Furthermore, our research highlights the moderating role of the functional diversity of TMT members in the relationship between advice seeking and the restructuring decision.

Suggested Citation

  • Achbah, Rachid & Vitanova, Ivana & Fréchet, Marc, 2024. "Failure Escape: The role of advice seeking in CEOs’ awareness of financial difficulties and corporate restructuring," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 175(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:jbrese:v:175:y:2024:i:c:s0148296324000523
    DOI: 10.1016/j.jbusres.2024.114548
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0148296324000523
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.jbusres.2024.114548?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Danny Miller, 1991. "Stale in the Saddle: CEO Tenure and the Match Between Organization and Environment," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 37(1), pages 34-52, January.
    2. Ucbasaran, Deniz & Westhead, Paul & Wright, Mike & Flores, Manuel, 2010. "The nature of entrepreneurial experience, business failure and comparative optimism," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 25(6), pages 541-555, November.
    3. Vincent L. Barker , III & George C. Mueller, 2002. "CEO Characteristics and Firm R&D Spending," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 48(6), pages 782-801, June.
    4. Kristina Dahlin & L. Weingart & P. Hinds, 2005. "Team diversity and information use," Post-Print hal-00480406, HAL.
    5. Dvorkin, Maximiliano & Sánchez, Juan M. & Sapriza, Horacio & Yurdagul, Emircan, 2022. "Improving sovereign debt restructurings," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 139(C).
    6. Pol Herrmann & Deepak K Datta, 2002. "CEO Successor Characteristics and the Choice of Foreign Market Entry Mode: An Empirical Study," Journal of International Business Studies, Palgrave Macmillan;Academy of International Business, vol. 33(3), pages 551-569, September.
    7. Mark K. Fiegener, 2010. "Locus of Ownership and Family Involvement in Small Private Firms," Journal of Management Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 47(2), pages 296-321, March.
    8. Morten T. Hansen, 2002. "Knowledge Networks: Explaining Effective Knowledge Sharing in Multiunit Companies," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 13(3), pages 232-248, June.
    9. Mark Kroll & Bruce A. Walters & Peter Wright, 2008. "Board vigilance, director experience, and corporate outcomes," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 29(4), pages 363-382, April.
    10. Crick, Florence & Eskander, Shaikh M.S.U. & Fankhauser, Sam & Diop, Mamadou, 2018. "How do African SMEs respond to climate risks? Evidence from Kenya and Senegal," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 108(C), pages 157-168.
    11. Gilson, Stuart C., 1989. "Management turnover and financial distress," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 25(2), pages 241-262, December.
    12. Stewart Thornhill & Raphael Amit, 2003. "Learning About Failure: Bankruptcy, Firm Age, and the Resource-Based View," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 14(5), pages 497-509, October.
    13. Urban, Daniel, 2019. "The effects of culture on CEO power: Evidence from executive turnover," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 104(C), pages 50-69.
    14. Choi, Seungho & Xu, Jing, 2022. "What do boards consider in CEO performance evaluation? Evidence from executive turnover," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 50(C).
    15. Agarwal, Vineet & Taffler, Richard, 2008. "Comparing the performance of market-based and accounting-based bankruptcy prediction models," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 32(8), pages 1541-1551, August.
    16. Alessandro Lomi & Dean Lusher & Philippa E. Pattison & Garry Robins, 2014. "The Focused Organization of Advice Relations: A Study in Boundary Crossing," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 25(2), pages 438-457, April.
    17. Gertner, Robert & Scharfstein, David, 1991. "A Theory of Workouts and the Effects of Reorganization Law," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 46(4), pages 1189-1222, September.
    18. Qing Cao & Zeki Simsek & Hongping Zhang, 2010. "Modelling the Joint Impact of the CEO and the TMT on Organizational Ambidexterity," Journal of Management Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 47(7), pages 1272-1296, November.
    19. Dimitrios Georgakakis & Winfried Ruigrok, 2017. "CEO Succession Origin and Firm Performance: A Multilevel Study," Journal of Management Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 54(1), pages 58-87, January.
    20. Blazy, Régis & Martel, Jocelyn & Nigam, Nirjhar, 2014. "The choice between informal and formal restructuring: The case of French banks facing distressed SMEs," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 44(C), pages 248-263.
    21. Kim Klyver & Benson Honig & Paul Steffens, 2018. "Social support timing and persistence in nascent entrepreneurship: exploring when instrumental and emotional support is most effective," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 51(3), pages 709-734, October.
    22. Liu, Yiran & Li, Yong & Hao, Xiling & Zhang, Yuli, 2019. "Narcissism and learning from entrepreneurial failure," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 34(3), pages 496-512.
    23. Alexiev, Alexander S. & Volberda, Henk W. & Van den Bosch, Frans A.J., 2016. "Interorganizational collaboration and firm innovativeness: Unpacking the role of the organizational environment," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 69(2), pages 974-984.
    24. Sergei A. Davydenko & Julian R. Franks, 2008. "Do Bankruptcy Codes Matter? A Study of Defaults in France, Germany, and the U.K," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 63(2), pages 565-608, April.
    25. Mooradian, Robert M, 1994. "The Effect of Bankruptcy Protection on Investment: Chapter 11 as a Screening Device," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 49(4), pages 1403-1430, September.
    26. Constance E. Helfat & Margaret A. Peteraf, 2015. "Managerial cognitive capabilities and the microfoundations of dynamic capabilities," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 36(6), pages 831-850, June.
    27. Sophie Pommet & Jean-François Sattin, 2019. "How Well Do Owner–Managers Forecast Potential Future Bankruptcy? Assessing Fear of Failure Using Employment Insurance for SMEs," Post-Print halshs-01656326, HAL.
    28. Mathew L. A. Hayward & Dean A. Shepherd & Dale Griffin, 2006. "A Hubris Theory of Entrepreneurship," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 52(2), pages 160-172, February.
    29. Ciaran Heavey & Zeki Simsek, 2015. "Transactive Memory Systems and Firm Performance: An Upper Echelons Perspective," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 26(4), pages 941-959, August.
    30. Soo Hong Chew & Wei Huang & Xiaojian Zhao, 2020. "Motivated False Memory," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 128(10), pages 3913-3939.
    31. Tan, Yingxian & Luo, Pengfei, 2021. "The impact of debt restructuring on dynamic investment and financing policies," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 102(C).
    32. Carla D. Jones & Marianna Makri & Luis R. Gomez–Mejia, 2008. "Affiliate Directors and Perceived Risk Bearing in Publicly Traded, Family–Controlled Firms: The Case of Diversification," Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, , vol. 32(6), pages 1007-1026, November.
    33. Achim Schmitt & Sebastian Raisch, 2013. "Corporate Turnarounds: The Duality of Retrenchment and Recovery," Journal of Management Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 50(7), pages 1216-1244, November.
    34. Antonio Molina-García & Julio Diéguez-Soto & M. Teresa Galache-Laza & Marta Campos-Valenzuela, 2023. "Financial literacy in SMEs: a bibliometric analysis and a systematic literature review of an emerging research field," Review of Managerial Science, Springer, vol. 17(3), pages 787-826, April.
    35. Cacciotti, Gabriella & Hayton, James C. & Mitchell, J. Robert & Allen, David G., 2020. "Entrepreneurial fear of failure: Scale development and validation," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 35(5).
    36. Tanya Menon & Jeffrey Pfeffer, 2003. "Valuing Internal vs. External Knowledge: Explaining the Preference for Outsiders," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 49(4), pages 497-513, April.
    37. Ewa Larsson & Lisbeth Hedelin & Tommy Gärling, 2003. "Influence of Expert Advice on Expansion Goals of Small Businesses in Rural Sweden," Journal of Small Business Management, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 41(2), pages 205-212, April.
    38. Sonia Lombardi & Giacomo Santini & Giovanni Maria Marchetti & Stefano Focardi, 2017. "Generalized structural equations improve sexual-selection analyses," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 12(8), pages 1-20, August.
    39. Donald C. Hambrick & Richard A. D'Aveni, 1992. "Top Team Deterioration as Part of the Downward Spiral of Large Corporate Bankruptcies," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 38(10), pages 1445-1466, October.
    40. Theresa S. Cho & Donald C. Hambrick, 2006. "Attention as the Mediator Between Top Management Team Characteristics and Strategic Change: The Case of Airline Deregulation," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 17(4), pages 453-469, August.
    41. Philip Meissner & Torsten Wulf, 2016. "Debiasing illusion of control in individual judgment: the role of internal and external advice seeking," Review of Managerial Science, Springer, vol. 10(2), pages 245-263, March.
    42. Yasemin Y. Kor, 2003. "Experience-Based Top Management Team Competence and Sustained Growth," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 14(6), pages 707-719, December.
    43. Alexander S. Alexiev & Justin J. P. Jansen & Frans A. J. Van den Bosch & Henk W. Volberda, 2010. "Top Management Team Advice Seeking and Exploratory Innovation: The Moderating Role of TMT Heterogeneity," Journal of Management Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 47(7), pages 1343-1364, November.
    44. Cope, Jason, 2011. "Entrepreneurial learning from failure: An interpretative phenomenological analysis," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 26(6), pages 604-623.
    45. Tine Buyl & Christophe Boone & Walter Hendriks & Paul Matthyssens, 2011. "Top Management Team Functional Diversity and Firm Performance: The Moderating Role of CEO Characteristics," Journal of Management Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 48(1), pages 151-177, January.
    46. Gavin Cassar & Brian Gibson, 2007. "Forecast Rationality in Small Firms," Journal of Small Business Management, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 45(3), pages 283-302, July.
    47. Francesco Ciampi & Niccolò Gordini, 2013. "Small Enterprise Default Prediction Modeling through Artificial Neural Networks: An Empirical Analysis of Italian Small Enterprises," Journal of Small Business Management, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 51(1), pages 23-45, January.
    48. Shepherd, Dean A. & Wiklund, Johan & Haynie, J. Michael, 2009. "Moving forward: Balancing the financial and emotional costs of business failure," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 24(2), pages 134-148, March.
    49. Zeki Simsek & John F. Veiga & Michael Lubatkin & Richard N. Dino, 2005. "Modeling the Multilevel Determinants of Top management Team Behavorial Integration," Post-Print hal-02311805, HAL.
    50. Moses Acquaah, 2007. "Managerial social capital, strategic orientation, and organizational performance in an emerging economy," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 28(12), pages 1235-1255, December.
    51. Bonaccio, Silvia & Dalal, Reeshad S., 2006. "Advice taking and decision-making: An integrative literature review, and implications for the organizational sciences," Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Elsevier, vol. 101(2), pages 127-151, November.
    52. Vincent L. Barker III & Paul W. Patterson Jr & George C. Mueller, 2001. "Organizational Causes and Strategic Consequences of the Extent of Top Management Team Replacement During Turnaround Attempts," Journal of Management Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 38(2), pages 235-270, March.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Costa, Paula L. & Ferreira, João J. & Torres de Oliveira, Rui, 2023. "From entrepreneurial failure to re-entry," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 158(C).
    2. Li, Peng-Yu, 2018. "Top management team characteristics and firm internationalization: The moderating role of the size of middle managers," International Business Review, Elsevier, vol. 27(1), pages 125-138.
    3. Lars Schweizer & Andreas Nienhaus, 2017. "Corporate distress and turnaround: integrating the literature and directing future research," Business Research, Springer;German Academic Association for Business Research, vol. 10(1), pages 3-47, June.
    4. Stefan Schmid & Simon Mitterreiter, 2020. "International Top Managers on Corporate Boards: Dissimilarity and Tenure," Management International Review, Springer, vol. 60(5), pages 787-825, October.
    5. Alexander S. Alexiev & Justin J. P. Jansen & Frans A. J. Van den Bosch & Henk W. Volberda, 2010. "Top Management Team Advice Seeking and Exploratory Innovation: The Moderating Role of TMT Heterogeneity," Journal of Management Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 47(7), pages 1343-1364, November.
    6. Chen, Hsiang-Lan & Hsu, Wen-Tsung & Chang, Chiao-Yi, 2016. "Independent directors’ human and social capital, firm internationalization and performance implications: An integrated agency-resource dependence view," International Business Review, Elsevier, vol. 25(4), pages 859-871.
    7. Marko Reimer & Sebastiaan Doorn & Mariano L. M. Heyden, 2018. "Unpacking Functional Experience Complementarities in Senior Leaders’ Influences on CSR Strategy: A CEO–Top Management Team Approach," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 151(4), pages 977-995, September.
    8. Schmid, Stefan & Mitterreiter, Simon, 2021. "Understanding top managers’ careers: How does career variety impact tenure on the board?," European Management Journal, Elsevier, vol. 39(5), pages 617-632.
    9. Nina Engels & Denise Fischer-Kreer & Malte Brettel, 2022. "CHRO firm dinosaur versus CHRO role gorilla: the effect of CHRO company and role tenure on firms’ social performance," Journal of Business Economics, Springer, vol. 92(6), pages 929-954, August.
    10. Cui Zhang, 2017. "Top manager characteristics, agglomeration economies and firm performance," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 48(3), pages 543-558, March.
    11. Richard J. Arend, 2008. "Differences in RBV strategic factors and the need to consider opposing factors in turnaround outcomes," Managerial and Decision Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 29(4), pages 337-355.
    12. Stefan Mayr & Christine Duller & Matthias Baschinger, 2023. "Assessment of formal proceedings and out-of-court reorganisation: results from a survey among turnaround professionals in Austria," European Journal of Law and Economics, Springer, vol. 56(2), pages 325-367, October.
    13. Xue Wan & Stephen X. Zhang & Feng Wei, 2023. "CEO–TMT Congruence in Growth‐Need Strength and Firm Growth," Journal of Management Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 60(3), pages 722-751, May.
    14. Yan Ling & Michelle Hammond & Li-Qun Wei, 2022. "Ethical leadership and ambidexterity in young firms: examining the CEO-TMT Interface," International Entrepreneurship and Management Journal, Springer, vol. 18(1), pages 25-48, March.
    15. Amankwah-Amoah, Joseph & Adomako, Samuel & Berko, Damoah Obi, 2022. "Once bitten, twice shy? The relationship between business failure experience and entrepreneurial collaboration," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 139(C), pages 983-992.
    16. Khelil, Nabil, 2016. "The many faces of entrepreneurial failure: Insights from an empirical taxonomy," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 31(1), pages 72-94.
    17. Thomas Hutzschenreuter & Julian Horstkotte, 2013. "Performance effects of top management team demographic faultlines in the process of product diversification," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 34(6), pages 704-726, June.
    18. Srivastava, Smita & Sahaym, Arvin & Allison, Thomas H., 2021. "Alert and Awake: Role of alertness and attention on rate of new product introductions," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 36(4).
    19. Guoli Chen & Donald C. Hambrick, 2012. "CEO Replacement in Turnaround Situations: Executive (Mis)Fit and Its Performance Implications," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 23(1), pages 225-243, February.
    20. Jose L. Salmeron & Taha Mansouri & Mohammad Reza Sadeghi Moghaddam & Narjes Yousefi & Alireza Tayebi, 2023. "Startup’s critical failure factors dynamic modeling using FCM," Journal of Global Entrepreneurship Research, Springer;UNESCO Chair in Entrepreneurship, vol. 13(1), pages 1-18, December.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:jbrese:v:175:y:2024:i:c:s0148296324000523. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/jbusres .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.