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Managerial ties, organizational learning, and opportunity capture: A social capital perspective

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Abstract

From a social capital perspective, this article investigates how entrepreneurs in new ventures utilize their managerial ties (consisting of ties with other firms and ties with government) to capture opportunity. We also explore the moderating role of organizational learning (via exploratory learning and exploitative learning) in this process. Drawing on a sample of 159 new ventures, we find that ties with other firms have a stronger positive effect on opportunity capture than ties with government. We also find that organizational learning moderates the relationship between managerial ties and opportunity capture. Overall, our contributions center on an integrated view of organizational learning, social relationships, and opportunity capture.

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Acknowledgements

We thank Nicole Coviello, David Deeds, Saul Estrin, and Alex McKelvie for help comments. This research is supported by Natural Science Foundation of China (71132006) and the Jindal Chair at UT Dallas.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Management, Xi’an Jiaotong University, Xi’an, 710049, Shaanxi, China

    Yuan Li & Haowen Chen

  2. Antai College of Economics & Management, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai, 200052, China

    Yuan Li & Yi Liu

  3. Jindal School of Management, University of Texas at Dallas, Box 830688, SM 43, Richardson, TX, 75083, USA

    Mike W. Peng

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  1. Yuan Li
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Correspondence to Yuan Li.

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Li, Y., Chen, H., Liu, Y. et al. Managerial ties, organizational learning, and opportunity capture: A social capital perspective. Asia Pac J Manag 31, 271–291 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10490-012-9330-8

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