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Using survey data from CEOs and other top managers at large and mid-sized public companies in the U.S., as well as from journalists, we explore how ingratiation, a fundamental means of building and maintaining one's social capital, may trigger behavior that damages the social capital of the person being ingratiated. Although ingratiation, such as flattery or opinion conformity, may elicit positive affect from its target, we suggest it can also elicit a specific form of negative affect toward the target, which in turn can trigger interpersonal harm-doing. Focusing on ingratiation by top managers toward the CEO, we find that ingratiating managers are likely to develop feelings of resentment toward the CEO and that ingratiation may be especially likely to elicit resentment among top managers when the CEO is a racial minority or a woman. We also find that negative affect from ingratiation can induce interpersonal behavior that has the potential to damage the social capital of the influence target, as feelings of resentment that result from ingratiatory behavior can trigger social undermining of the CEO in the manager's communications with journalists.

This study examines whether board interlock ties facilitate second-order imitation, in which firms imitate an underlying decision process that can be adapted to multiple policy domains, rather than imitating specific policies of tied-to firms (first-order imitation). Longitudinal analyses of archival data for a large sample of Forbes/Fortune 500 companies, as well as analyses of survey data on mimetic processes among these firms, show that network ties to firms that use imitation to determine a particular policy can prompt use of imitation by the focal firm in determining both that policy and a different policy. Firms that have board network ties to firms in other industries that imitate their competitors' business strategy are likely to imitate their own competitors' business strategy, as well as their competitors' acquisition activity and compensation policy. Thus, the findings reveal network effects that are not visible with extant perspectives on interorganizational imitation. We discuss implications for institutional theory and research on interorganizational networks.

In this study, we examine the determinants and consequences of impression management (IM) support in communications between CEOs and journalists, whereby CEOs of other firms provide positive statements about a focal CEO's leadership and strategy and/or external attributions for low performance at the focal CEO's firm. Drawing from social exchange theory, our theoretical perspective suggests how IM support may result from norms of reciprocity among corporate leaders. We consider the potential for direct and generalized reciprocity in the provision of IM support, including generalized reciprocity in which CEOs who received IM support previously pay the support forward to another third-party CEO, and a second form of generalized reciprocity in which CEOs reciprocate IM support to fellow CEOs whom they believe have given similar support to other CEOs in the past. We also draw from the social psychological literature on persuasion to suggest why IM support for another CEO may have a more positive influence on the tenor of journalists' coverage about the firm's leadership than impression management by the CEO about his or her own leadership and strategy. We test our hypotheses with data from large and mid-sized public U.S. companies from 1999 to 2007, including original survey data from a large sample of CEOs and journalists. The results supported our hypotheses, and additional findings suggested that the apparent effects of impression management by leaders and staff about their own firms following a negative earnings surprise may be partially attributable to the effects of IM support.