How do managers’ time perspectives shape strategic choices and actions for born-global firms in the Covid-19 Era?

Abstract

While the general concepts of time and temporal perspectives have received growing attention in recent literature (e.g., Aeon & Aguinis, 2017; Kunisch, Bartunek, Mueller, & Huy, 2017; Reinecke & Ansari, 2015), their potential role and influence in how managers shape strategic choices and actions has not. For example, scholars have investigated dimensions of objective (measurable) time (e.g., Bluedorn, 2002) such as deadlines, schedules, and work pace. However, they have somewhat neglected subjective (psychological) time (for exceptions, see DesJardine & Shi, in press; Shipp, Edwards, & Lambert, 2009) and one of its key aspects: TP (i.e., the sum of the individual’s viewpoints of his psychological past and future existing at a given time; see Lewin, 1997: 222). In particular, scholars have not shed much light on how the valence (the positive value of a past-positive, present-hedonistic, and future TP; the negative value of a past-negative and present-fatalistic TP) of temporal experiences (past, present, and future) (i.e., the TP) impacts how managers shape strategic choices and actions for important strategic decisions such as international diversification and their performance implications in international markets. Factors, which are particularly exacerbated in these current Covid-19 times