A Configurational Approach for Exploring Corporate Governance Practices and Firm Performance in Different Organizational Life Cycles

This study explores corporate governance practices in different organizational life cycles that can lead firms' better performance. We propose a configurational approach to explore how different causal conditional effects are interdependent in explaining firms' performance. Using fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis, we find that no single causal condition is sufficient for firms achieving high performance. Instead ownership structure and the role of board of directors (in combination with country specific factors' strength of formal institutions) configurational conditions that lead firms' higher performance amongst different organizational life cycles. Moreover, the causal factors configure in different ways for firms growth, maturity and declining trends. This study demonstrates the value of using a configurational analytical approach to explore both the firm and country specific corporate governance practices (together) that engage firms to achieve the desired level of performance