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Upper echelons research in marketing

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Abstract

Marketing scholars have recently embraced the study of the corporate upper echelons—the executives and board members atop the organizational hierarchy. However, management scholars have researched the upper echelons for decades, with frequent forays into the marketing strategy domain. As a result of progressing in two separate disciplines, the literature on marketing strategy and the upper echelons is fragmented and disjointed. We develop an organizing framework to review extant research and assess and synthesize the knowledge in the upper echelons marketing strategy domain. Our review covers the 14 most influential marketing and management journals from 1984 through February, 2020. Given the relative newness of this research within marketing, we develop a conceptual model fusing existing theory in the upper echelons and marketing strategy literatures, and use this to identify key blind spots and underdeveloped areas of knowledge caused by the two fields’ independent evolutions. Finally, we also examine challenges associated with conducting research in this area and provide recommendations to help researchers and reviewers navigate these challenges to advance theory and practice.

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Notes

  1. As the upper echelons deal with firms’ strategic choices, exploration of UE phenomenon in marketing to-date has been almost exclusively in the marketing strategy sub-domain of the marketing field.

  2. Rounding may cause some percentages to sum to more or less than 100%.

  3. An exception is Garg and Eisenhardt’s (2017) recent study employing case-based research to examine how CEOs resolve the resource versus power tradeoff in the strategy-making process.

  4. Table 1 is an organizing framework lens used in reviewing the literature while Figure 1 is an outcome of the review that illuminates the nature of the variables that have been studied and opportunities for future study.

  5. For example, the Net Promoter Score, a widely used metric of firm goals and TMT compensation, has been criticized (e.g., Safdar and Pacheco 2019). What roles do the board, CEO, and TMT (CMO) play in shifting brand-related goals and performance targets?

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Marketing, University of Virginia Darden School of Business, 100 Darden Boulevard, Charlottesville, VA, 22903, USA

    Kimberly A. Whitler

  2. Kelley School of Business, Indiana University, 1309 E. 10th Street, Bloomington, IN, 47405, USA

    Ben Lee

  3. Department of Management, Entrepreneurship, and Leadership Neeley School of Business, Texas Christian University, Fort Worth, USA

    Ryan Krause

  4. Kelley School of Business, Indiana University, HH 2100 1309 E. 10th Street, Bloomington, IN, 47405, USA

    Neil A. Morgan

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Whitler, K.A., Lee, B., Krause, R. et al. Upper echelons research in marketing. J. of the Acad. Mark. Sci. 49, 198–219 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11747-020-00724-4

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