A Study Of The Impact Of Top Management Team Overseas Background On Firm Innovation Performance

Despite the focus on the advantage of top management team (TMT)'s overseas background in existing literatures, little is known about the mechanism behind the effect of TMT's overseas background on firm innovation performance and the conditions under which this effect is realized. With a view to the fusion of executives with overseas background and local environment, this study draws on upper echelons theory, conflict theory, knowledge-based view (KBV), social capital theory and relational demography analysis method to investigate the impact of the configuration of TMT's overseas background on innovation performance and the moderating effect of overseas executives'managerial ties based on the panel data from 2005-2014 of Chinese A-share listed companies in computer, communications and other electronic equipment manufacturing industry from a comprehensive perspective of internal governance and external governance.In the aspect of internal governance, this study investigates the relationship between the proportion of executives with overseas background in TMT and firm innovation performance firstly, then focuses on the configuration of TMT's overseas background and analyzes the impacts of the differences between executives with overseas background and local executives in age, gender, tenure and education. The empirical results show that the proportion of executives with overseas background in TMT is positively correlated to the number of patent filings. Moreover, the differences between executives with overseas background and local executives in age, tenure and education positively affect the number of patent filings, the differences in age and tenure show negative impacts on ROE, and the difference in education shows positive impact, however, the difference in gender shows no significant impact on both the number of patent filings and ROE.In the external governance, this study examines the moderating effect of managerial ties on the relationship between TMT's overseas background and firm innovation performance under the condition of transition economies. We find that the political ties and commercial ties of executives with overseas background negatively moderate the relationship between the proportion of executives with overseas background in TMT and the number of patent filings, and overseas executives'political ties and commercial ties have an inverted u-shaped moderating effect on the relationship between the proportion of executives with overseas background in TMT and ROE.