Growth and Learning

Oliver Gottschalg () and H. Singh
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Oliver Gottschalg: GREGH - Groupement de Recherche et d'Etudes en Gestion à HEC - HEC Paris - Ecole des Hautes Etudes Commerciales - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique

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Abstract: This study looks at the contingencies of the experience-performance relationship at the organizational level from a Penrosean perspective. It distills propositions regarding the efficiency of the growing firm from Penrose's "Theory of the Growth of the Firm" (1959). The resulting conceptual framework points to the level of firm growth as a crucial contingency of the experience-performance relationship. Propositions are then tested in the context of the private equity industry, analyzing growth, experience and performance of 285 pairs of funds that have been managed by the same private equity firm. The analysis provides strong support for all three hypotheses derived from Penrose's theory: First, the results confirm the positive performance impact of additional task experience. Second, we find ceteris paribus a negative performance impact of growth. Finally, (excessive) growth is shown to adversely impact performance because it prohibits learning.

Keywords: Growth; Learning (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2006
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Published in 2006

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:hal:journl:halshs-00125921

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