A Study in Studying Corporate Boards Over Time: Looking Backwards to Move Forwards
| Author | Annie Pye |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/1467-8551.00184 |
| Date | 01 March 2001 |
| Published date | 01 March 2001 |
Introduction
In the late 1980s, we interviewed chairmen and
chief executives and executive team members
in 12 large UK organizations including Hanson,
Marks & Spencer, Prudential and BTR (Mangham
and Pye, 1991). Some ten years later in 1998, we
received another ESRC award to follow up this
project. Our current study takes us back to
previous contributors (that is, the people) as
well as to those who currently occupy similar
roles in these organizations, as far as we are
able to identify them. Hence, we continue to
expand this database researching executive
teams, their conduct and performance over time
in a sample of UK organizations as well as
adding insights from those who have gone on
to take up non-executive portfolios. Consequently,
we have some unique data to contribute to
Pettigrew’s (1995) continuing call for in-depth,
longitudinal study of boards and their directors
as well as some valuable insights into and across
time.
This paper looks closely at the importance of
time in the design and analytical outcomes of the
British Journal of Management, Vol. 12, 33–45 (2001)
© 2001 British Academy of Management
A Study in Studying Corporate
Boards Over Time: Looking Backwards
to Move Forwards1
Annie Pye
School of Management, University of Bath, Bath BA2 7AY, UK
email: a.j.pye@bath.ac.uk
This paper is based on data collected in the late 1980s and again in the late 1990s from
interviews with chairmen, chief executives and board members in 12 large UK
organizations such as Hanson, Marks & Spencer, Prudential and Glynwed. Although
the primary focus is on theorizing and theory over time, this also leads us to question
matters of method and methodology. The first section considers some of the study
design issues raised by conducting this sequel study, noting that it was not possible to
‘repeat’ the first study for a number of important reasons. The second section observes
that while our earlier analytical metaphor of organizing as explaining endures, the
nature of the explanations has changed: ‘strategic focus’, ‘shareholder value’ and
‘corporate governance’ are now the contemporary watchwords although were unheard
of in our interviews a decade earlier. The following section develops on this, concluding
that in making judgements about future shareholder value, the primary evidence is
drawn from events already past and interpreted through current explanations. We
conclude on the importance of time to our theorizing, where there appears to be a
confluence between time and person, in part, created and in part, supported by
particular (judgements of) explanations of organizing prevailing at that time.
1The author is very grateful to the Economic and
Social Research Council for their continued funding of
this work, under grant number WF 2925 0020 (1987–89)
and R 000236868 (1998–00). In addition, she would like
to thank the contributors who generously gave of their
time and reflections on how they run their large
organizations. Ian Colville receives particular thanks
and acknowledgement for his insightful and unfailing
help in criticizing earlier drafts of this paper. The
author is also grateful for the comments of two
anonymous
British Journal of Management reviewers
which have helped to sharpen the focus of this final
version.
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