IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/finlet/v57y2023ics154461232300658x.html

Happiness and executive team stability

Author

Listed:
  • Zhu, Haitao
  • Zhang, Yi
  • Bai, Ruobing
  • Sun, Xu

Abstract

Happiness is not only the main pursuit of people's lives but also an important factor that influences people's behavior. This study tests the impact of happiness on the stability of corporate top management team (TMT). We find that higher happiness at the corporate level is significantly associated with a more stable corporate TMT. We also document the mediating role of enterprise value between happiness and the stability of the executive team. Additional analyses suggest that happiness enhances the stability through three channels: increasing employee productivity, decreasing employee risk-taking, and reducing talent migration.

Suggested Citation

  • Zhu, Haitao & Zhang, Yi & Bai, Ruobing & Sun, Xu, 2023. "Happiness and executive team stability," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 57(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:finlet:v:57:y:2023:i:c:s154461232300658x
    DOI: 10.1016/j.frl.2023.104286
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S154461232300658X
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.frl.2023.104286?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to

    for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Carol Graham & Julia Ruiz Pozuelo, 2017. "Happiness, stress, and age: how the U curve varies across people and places," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 30(1), pages 225-264, January.
    2. Lin, Kun, 2023. "The impact of intellectual property protection on business performance of high-tech enterprises: The mediating effect of political-business relations," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 54(C).
    3. Huaxing Liu & Hong Gao & Qing Huang, 2020. "Better Government, Happier Residents? Quality of Government and Life Satisfaction in China," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 147(3), pages 971-990, February.
    4. Jose L. Groizard & Priya Ranjan & Antonio Rodriguez‐Lopez, 2015. "Trade Costs And Job Flows: Evidence From Establishment‐Level Data," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 53(1), pages 173-204, January.
    5. Daniel A. Ackerberg & Kevin Caves & Garth Frazer, 2015. "Identification Properties of Recent Production Function Estimators," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 83, pages 2411-2451, November.
    6. Kang, Jihye & Kim, Soyoung, 2022. "Government spending news and surprise shocks: It’s the timing and persistence," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 73(C).
    7. Claire E. Crutchley & Jacqueline L. Garner & Beverly B. Marshall, 2002. "An Examination of Board Stability and the Long-Term Performance of Initial Public Offerings," Financial Management, Financial Management Association, vol. 31(3), Fall.
    8. Mariassunta Giannetti & Guanmin Liao & Xiaoyun Yu, 2015. "The Brain Gain of Corporate Boards: Evidence from China," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 70(4), pages 1629-1682, August.
    9. James Levinsohn & Amil Petrin, 2003. "Estimating Production Functions Using Inputs to Control for Unobservables," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 70(2), pages 317-341.
    10. Söhnke M. Bartram & Gregory Brown & René M. Stulz, 2012. "Why Are U.S. Stocks More Volatile?," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 67(4), pages 1329-1370, August.
    11. Wooldridge, Jeffrey M., 2009. "On estimating firm-level production functions using proxy variables to control for unobservables," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 104(3), pages 112-114, September.
    12. Jiang, Fuxiu & Jiang, Zhan & Kim, Kenneth A. & Zhang, Min, 2015. "Family-firm risk-taking: Does religion matter?," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 33(C), pages 260-278.
    13. Deng, Xin & Gao, Huasheng, 2013. "Nonmonetary Benefits, Quality of Life, and Executive Compensation," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 48(1), pages 197-218, February.
    14. Weisbach, Michael S., 1988. "Outside directors and CEO turnover," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 20(1-2), pages 431-460, January.
    15. Dirk Jenter & Fadi Kanaan, 2015. "CEO Turnover and Relative Performance Evaluation," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 70(5), pages 2155-2184, October.
    16. Zhu, Juan & Jiang, Dequan & Shen, Yongjian & Shen, Yuxin, 2021. "Does regional air quality affect executive turnover at listed companies in China?," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 97(C), pages 428-436.
    17. Shih-Chi Chiu & Mark Sharfman, 2018. "Corporate Social Irresponsibility and Executive Succession: An Empirical Examination," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 149(3), pages 707-723, May.
    18. Andrew J. Oswald & Eugenio Proto & Daniel Sgroi, 2015. "Happiness and Productivity," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 33(4), pages 789-822.
    19. Coughlan, Anne T. & Schmidt, Ronald M., 1985. "Executive compensation, management turnover, and firm performance : An empirical investigation," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 7(1-3), pages 43-66, April.
    20. Kaplanski, Guy & Levy, Haim & Veld, Chris & Veld-Merkoulova, Yulia, 2015. "Do Happy People Make Optimistic Investors?," Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 50(1-2), pages 145-168, April.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Zhang, Qiang & Lou, Mingyu, 2025. "Executive team faultlines, business diversification, and corporate substantive innovation," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 103(C).
    2. Zhong, Linfei & He, Yuanqiong, 2025. "The impact of rookie CEOs on corporate risk-taking," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 107(C).
    3. Wang, Wen & Han, Wang-Zhe, 2025. "Do industrial robots bring happiness? The moderating role of public trust," Economic Analysis and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 86(C), pages 380-398.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. (Jianqiu) Bai, John & Mkrtchyan, Anahit, 2023. "What do outside CEOs really do? Evidence from plant-level data," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 147(1), pages 27-48.
    2. Exadaktylos, Dimitrios & Riccaboni, Massimo & Rungi, Armando, 2024. "Talents from abroad. Foreign managers and productivity in the United Kingdom," International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 177(C).
    3. Huobao Xie & Weiwei Yang & Qingyuan Li, 2022. "Can New Private Shareholders Help Improve SOEs' Total Factor Productivity? Evidence from the Chinese Listed SOEs," Annals of Economics and Finance, Society for AEF, vol. 23(1), pages 23-62, May.
    4. Liu, Xiaohan & Liu, Jianmin & Wu, Haitao & Hao, Yu, 2022. "Do tax reductions stimulate firm productivity? A quasi-natural experiment from China," Economic Systems, Elsevier, vol. 46(4).
    5. Sun, Zhe & Zhao, Liang & Kaur, Puneet & Islam, Nazrul & Dhir, Amandeep, 2023. "Theorizing the relationship between the digital economy and firm productivity: The idiosyncrasies of firm-specific contexts," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 189(C).
    6. repec:ces:ceswps:_10716 is not listed on IDEAS
    7. Yuan, Li & Rao, Siqi & Yang, Shenggang & Dai, Pengyi, 2023. "Does equity market openness increase productivity? the dual effects of Shanghai-Hong Kong stock Connect program in China," Journal of International Financial Markets, Institutions and Money, Elsevier, vol. 88(C).
    8. Ioannis Bournakis & Mike Tsionas, 2024. "A Non‐parametric Estimation of Productivity with Idiosyncratic and Aggregate Shocks: The Role of Research and Development (R&D) and Corporate Tax," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 86(3), pages 641-671, June.
    9. Klaus S. Friesenbichler & Agnes Kügler, 2026. "Short and medium-term effects of intangible capital on firm growth: firm-level evidence from austrian microdata," Empirica, Springer;Austrian Institute for Economic Research;Austrian Economic Association, vol. 53(1), pages 113-148, February.
    10. Harald Dale-Olsen, 2021. "Do unions contribute to creative destruction?," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 16(12), pages 1-23, December.
    11. Lin, Jenny X. & Lincoln, William F., 2017. "Pirate's treasure," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 109(C), pages 235-245.
    12. Nick Jacob & Giordano Mion, 2024. "On the productivity advantage of cities," Journal of Economic Geography, Oxford University Press, vol. 24(5), pages 679-705.
    13. Axel Demenet, 2016. "Does Managerial Capital also Matter Among Micro and Small Firms in Developing Countries?," Working Papers DT/2016/12, DIAL (Développement, Institutions et Mondialisation).
    14. Tomasi, Chiara & Le, Quoc Thai & Nguyen, Thi Ngoc Lan, 2025. "Greasing or Grinding? Regulatory context and the productivity effects of corruption: Evidence from Vietnamese SMEs," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 89(C).
    15. Axel Demenet & Quynh Hoang, 2018. "How important are management practices for the productivity of small and medium enterprises?," WIDER Working Paper Series 69, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).
    16. Themann, Michael & Koch, Nicolas, 2021. "Catching up and falling behind: Cross-country evidence on the impact of the EU ETS on firm productivity," Ruhr Economic Papers 904, RWI - Leibniz-Institut für Wirtschaftsforschung, Ruhr-University Bochum, TU Dortmund University, University of Duisburg-Essen.
    17. Humphery-Jenner, M., 2011. "Internal and External Discipline Following Securities Class Actions," Discussion Paper 2011-044, Tilburg University, Center for Economic Research.
    18. repec:ces:ceswps:_10944 is not listed on IDEAS
    19. Phillip T. Lamoreaux & Summer Zhujun Liu & Nathan J. Newton & Min Zhang, 2026. "Auditor-provided nonpublic signals of misreporting and CFO dismissal," Review of Accounting Studies, Springer, vol. 31(1), pages 489-525, March.
    20. Charles Ackah & Holger Görg & Aoife Hanley & Cecilia Hornok, 2024. "Africa’s businesswomen – underfunded or underperforming?," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 62(3), pages 1051-1074, March.
    21. Yang, Guang & Huang, Ruixian & Shi, Yukun & Jia, Zhehao, 2021. "Does a CEO's private reputation impede corporate governance?," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 104(C).
    22. Zhang, Tingting (Grace) & You, Yu, 2021. "Scale or efficiency? Performance shortfall and engagement in production activities of foreign subsidiaries in China," Journal of International Management, Elsevier, vol. 27(1).

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:finlet:v:57:y:2023:i:c:s154461232300658x. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/frl .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.