Determinants of executive beliefs: Comparing functional conditioning and social influence

Executive beliefs influence strategic decision making in organizations, and thus they ultimately influence organization performance. The factors that might determine upper-echelon executive beliefs, however, have received sca nt empirical attention; certainly, little is known about their relative inf luence. In contrast to the oft-asserted influence of functional experiences , our results indicate that beliefs held by upper-echelon executives are be tter explained with art alternate theoretical model based on social influen ce. Our pattern of results indicates support for the argument that beliefs are socially reproduced through interaction among executives. Copyright (C) 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.