Bulletin of Miscellaneous Information (Royal Gardens Kew)· 2018
The Concept of Fit in Strategy Research: Towards Verbal and Statistical Correspondence
- 2,059citations
- 2018year
Short summary
This paper identifies six distinct perspectives of 'fit' in strategy research (moderation, mediation, matching, gestalts, profile-deviation, covariation), each requiring specific analytical schemes, yet researchers often use them interchangeably, weakening the link between theory and testing.
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Key points
- Identifies six distinct perspectives of 'fit' in strategy research: moderation, mediation, matching, gestalts, profile-deviation, and covariation.
- Each 'fit' perspective implies different theoretical meanings and necessitates specific analytical schemes for testing.
- Researchers often use these 'fit' perspectives interchangeably, leading to a mismatch between theoretical propositions and empirical testing.
- This practice weakens the critical link between theory development and theory testing in strategic management.
AI-generated from the title and abstract; the full text is not read.
Abstract
Strategic management relationships are increasingly specified by invoking a general conceptualization of 'fit' (alternately termed as contingency, congruency, coalignment, consistency, etc.), but with inadequate correspondence between theoretical statements and operationalization schemes.This paper identifies six different perspectives --fit as moderation; fit as mediation; fit as matching; fit as gestalts; fit as profile-deviation; and fit as covariation --each implying distinct theoretical meanings and requiring the use of specific analytical schemes.This highlights the isomorphic nature of the correspondence between a particular conceptualization and its testing scheme(s), but, it appears that researchers have used these perspectives interchangeably, often invoking one perspective In the theoretical discussion and employing another within empirical research.Since such a research practice considerably weakens the critical link between theory-development and theory-testing, this paper argues for increased explicit linkage between the verbalization of theoretical propositions and their operational tests in strategic management research.
The authors' abstract, as published at the source. Bulletin of Miscellaneous Information (Royal Gardens Kew), 2018 · DOI ↗
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Field: Organizational Behavior and Human Resource Management
Organizational Behavior and Human Resource ManagementBusiness, Management and Accounting