Shared Strategic Cognition And Top Management Team Performance

Along with the development of economic integration and international competition and requirement of integrative cooperation, the top management has met a new challenge. The Upper Echelons Theory presented by Hambrick and Mason in 1984 has appealed more and more researches on top management team performance, strategies and organizational revolutions. In addition, the Shared Cognition Theory has provided a new perspective on the study of top management teams.Based on the Upper Echelons and Shared Cognition Theory, this research studied the antecedents of shared strategic cognition among top management teams, and the relationship between shared cognition and team performance, we studied the effects of demographic diversity within top management teams, team processes on team performance as well. The data were collected with survey method from 36 top management teams in Hangzhou, Shanghai, Nanjing, and Jinan. Results of this research were showed as follows:(1) Demographic diversity within top management teams and team process played an important role in shaping a manager' s mental model of his/her firm' s strategy. But team process had no mediated effect on demographic diversity; demographic diversity could affect shared strategic cognition directly.(2) Demographic diversity within top management teams influenced team process, especially tenure diversity and age diversity.(3) Shared strategic cognition on futurity, aggressiveness, and activeness influenced team performance; while risk and analysis had noeffects on it. Also, team process had the most significant effect on team growth, team satisfaction and team development.(4) Shared strategic cognition had a mediated effect on team process and team demographic diversity within top management. Team process and team demographic diversity influenced team performance through shared strategic cognition.