School of Business

Founder versus agent CEOs: Effects of founder status and power on firm innovation and cost of capital

Document Type

Article

Abstract

How does CEO founding status combined with CEO power jointly influence organizational outcomes? While several studies have separately explored the role of founding status on firm performance, as well as the role of CEO power on organizational outcomes, few have addressed how founding status combined with CEO power might jointly influence both positive and negative organizational outcomes. Based on a sample of 3055 firm-year observations from 501 publicly traded high-tech managed by 777 CEOs over the sample period of 15 years (1996 to 2010), we find that powerful founder CEOs enhance an organization's innovation performance. However, having a powerful founder CEO is also likely to raise the firm's cost of capital, resulting in lower investment returns and detrimental consequences for firm performance. Our findings have several theoretical and practical implications for understanding the impact of CEO status and power on a firm's innovation and stock performance. © 2023 Elsevier Inc.

Publication Title

Journal of Business Research

Publication Date

11-2023

Volume

167

ISSN

0148-2963

DOI

10.1016/j.jbusres.2023.114180

Keywords

agent CEO, CEO power, cost of capital, founder CEO, innovation performance

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