Marketing

Absorptive capacity

Communication

Neuroscience

Social psychology

Cognition

Computer science

Business

Database

Psychology

Leverage (statistics)

Sociology

Conflict management

Conceptual model

Knowledge management

Affect (linguistics)

Machine learning

Social science

International Journal of Innovation Management

Top management teams (TMTs) that work (not so) well together enhance (restrict) the ability of the firm to leverage capabilities, which affects outcomes such as innovation. Although internal team dynamics at this level have notable effects on the firm, much remains to be understood about how these effects occur. Therefore, we investigate TMT conflict (cognitive and affective) to understand how the firm-level knowledge capability of absorptive capacity (ACAP) is altered as a result of such types of conflict. Further, given that strategic orientations offer guiding principles for organisational behaviours, we suggest that the main effects of conflict are augmented by strategic orientations. Specifically, both entrepreneurial orientation and market orientation are posited to affect the relationship between conflict and ACAP, which expands understanding of the conditions in which TMT conflict affects ACAP. In all, a conceptual framework is developed to offer insight into how TMT conflict affects firm-level ACAP, highlighting differences that are dependent on whether team members collaborate via cognitive conflict or clash given affective conflict.

COLLABORATION OR CLASH? MAPPING THE EFFECTS OF TOP MANAGEMENT TEAM CONFLICT ON FIRM ABSORPTIVE CAPACITY