A Literature Review of Top Management Team Dynamics: Based on the Process Model of Upper Echelon Theory

Wang Jin’ai; Li Danmeng

doi:doi:10.16538/j.cnki.fem.2017.10.004

Abstract

As the most influential group in companies, top management team is the makers and executors of firm strategic decisions. Most of existing studies elaborate the effect of top management team on corporate strategy based on static team composition or structure, and more ambiguously understand the behavior process of top management team. This paper extends top management team process model in upper echelon theory, integrates team composition, structure, and process into unified generalized top management team dynamics model, and then makes a literature review of top management team dynamics. Current research on top management team dynamics places too much emphasis on single-dimensional static structural characteristics, so this paper deeply explores the process and mechanism of top management team dynamics from the perspectives of dynamic process and integrity, to deepen the understanding of firm strategic decision-making behavior, and then discusses future research opportunities and directions in top management team dynamics.