Tommaso Ramus[1]
Catolica Lisbon School of Business and Economics
tommaso.ramus@ucp.pt
Matthew Lee
New York University Stern School of Business
mlee@stern.nyu.edu
Abstract
This study analyzes the 27-year growth trajectory of ALPI, an Italian workforce integration cooperative, to explore the process by which organizations embedded in multiple institutional domains pursue organizational growth.
We find that ALPI grew via multiple phases of specialization, each characterized by the alignment of ALPI’s internal structures with a different institutional domain and its corresponding logic.
A stock of versatile resources developed during periods of specialization enables transitions between them, as resources are reconceptualized, and internal structures adopted, to meet institutional demands associated with new growth opportunities.
Based on our findings, we conceptualize a model of “strategic drift” to describe how organizations faced with institutional pluralism pursue opportunistic, imbalanced, growth.