TOP MANAGEMENT TEAM TENURE AND TOP MANAGER CAUSAL ATTRIBUTIONS AT DECLINING FIRMS ATTEMPTING TURNAROUNDS

Do members of long-tenured top management teams perceive organizationa l problems differently than members of shorter-tenured shorter-tenured teams? We examined this question using the reasons that chief executi ve officers and other top managers at firms attempting turnarounds off ered for their firms' performance declines. Drawing insights from soci al psychology and the literature on organizational decline and turnaro und, we predicted that top managers who were members of management tea ms where many top executives had been replaced would be more likely to attribute performance problems to causes that were internal to the fi rm, stable, and controllable than top managers from longer-tenured tea ms. The results confirmed our predictions and suggest that the composi tion of the top management team which can be altered through the repla cement of executives, is strongly associated with the perception of pr oblems at firms attempting to recover from firm-threatening performanc e declines.