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From CEO passion to exploratory and exploitative innovation: the moderating roles of market and technological turbulence

Wenjun Cai (School of Management, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, China)
Jianlin Wu (School of Management, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, China)
Jibao Gu (School of Management, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, China)

Management Decision

ISSN: 0025-1747

Article publication date: 2 December 2020

Issue publication date: 2 July 2021

875

Abstract

Purpose

Innovation has been identified as a critical element to achieve firms' growth. The purpose of this study is to investigate the impact of chief executive officer (CEO) passion on firm innovation, including exploratory and exploitative innovation and examine the moderating roles of market and technological turbulence.

Design/methodology/approach

This study adopts the methodology of survey and uses multisource and time-lagged data of 146 firms in China. Seemingly unrelated regression (SUR) is used to test the hypotheses of this study.

Findings

This study finds that CEO passion promotes exploratory and exploitative innovation. Results also indicate that market turbulence strengthens the effect of CEO passion on exploratory and exploitative innovation, whereas technological turbulence weakens such an effect.

Originality/value

CEO passion is an important, positive affect which inspires CEOs to work for firms, but it has not yet received enough attention in the innovation literature. This study contributes to examining the impact of CEO passion on firm innovation and contributes to the contingency under which CEO passion influences firm innovation. Furthermore, this research finds that the moderating effects of market and technological turbulence are different in the relationship between CEO passion and firm innovation.

Keywords

Acknowledgements

This study was supported by (1) National Natural Science Foundation of China, under grant number 72072168, (2) Anhui Provincial Natural Science Foundation, under grant number 1808085MG223, and (3) New Liberal Arts Foundation of University of Science and Technology of China, under grant number XWK2019032. The three foundations provided support for the authors to contact firms and collect empirical data.Disclosure statement: no potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Citation

Cai, W., Wu, J. and Gu, J. (2021), "From CEO passion to exploratory and exploitative innovation: the moderating roles of market and technological turbulence", Management Decision, Vol. 59 No. 6, pp. 1363-1385. https://doi.org/10.1108/MD-02-2020-0233

Publisher

:

Emerald Publishing Limited

Copyright © 2020, Emerald Publishing Limited

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