Continual Corporate Entrepreneurial Search for Long-Term Growth

Gaurab Bhardwaj (), John C. Camillus () and David A. Hounshell ()
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Gaurab Bhardwaj: Management Division, Babson College, 229 Tomasso Hall, Babson Park, Massachusetts 02457
John C. Camillus: Katz Graduate School of Business, University of Pittsburgh, 338A Mervis Hall, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania 15260
David A. Hounshell: Departments of History and Social and Decision Sciences, Carnegie Mellon University, Porter Hall 219G, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania 15213

Management Science, 2006, vol. 52, issue 2, 248-261

Abstract: This paper examines how established firms conduct continual entrepreneurial search for possibilities for long-term growth. Drawing on comprehensive internal documents of the DuPont Company over a 20-year period, we develop a search process that is a departure from frequent depictions of search as local or random. Longitudinal field data show that corporate entrepreneurs follow a "moving, anchored search" for growth possibilities. Employing this framework as lens, we develop propositions. We find that corporate entrepreneurs are more likely to conduct search in new domains following events that cause them to expect future performance to change significantly and lastingly. This is in contrast to the literature that has typically modeled the initiation of search as a response to poor past performance. Because new domains are unexplored territories for corporate entrepreneurs, they utilize transitional levers that they perceive will facilitate the move from existing domains to new ones. These perceived transitional levers, however, typically prove inaccurate or incomplete. Content within domains is searched using anchors whose locations and numbers change. The combination of search process and content searched influences the particular growth possibilities discovered and created. Search and pursuit of growth possibilities is accompanied by the creation of new knowledge and new capabilities.

Keywords: corporate entrepreneurship; opportunities search; long-term growth; search process (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2006
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (17)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:inm:ormnsc:v:52:y:2006:i:2:p:248-261

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