Chief Strategy Officers in Top Management Teams: A Contingency Analysis

Drawing upon contingency theory, we analyze the antecedents and performance consequences of chief strategy officer (CSO) presence in top management teams (TMTs) for the first time. We argue that environmental uncertainty, organizational complexity, and TMT heterogeneity affect the decision to have a CSO in the TMT, as well as its impact on firm performance. Results for a large sample of S&P 500 firms over a five-year period provide some support for this contingency perspective in explaining CSO presence and its performance effects. Specifically, we find that industry dispersion, firm size, unrelated diversification, and TMT functional heterogeneity are positively associated with CSO presence. We also find that CSO presence is not advantageous per se, however, that firms with acquisition activity may benefit from having a CSO.