Seminar (Dept. of Accounting)

Theme：Passing the Mic: Career and Firm Outcomes of Executive Interactions

Speaker：Yuan Zou, Assistant Professor, Harvard Business School

Time：2022-06-01 09:30

Address：Online Meeting

ABSTRACT:

We exploit a unique feature of conference calls to study one type of interaction among executives directly inviting colleagues to respond to analysts’ questions. We find that the frequency of initiating interaction is positively associated with an executive’s ability, but not associated with firm performance. When new CEOs initiate more interactions than their predecessors, interaction among the rest of the executive team also increases, suggesting a learning effect. Turning to the outcomes of this practice, we find that executives who initiate more interactions than their peers are twice as likely as the average executive to be promoted to CEO. What is more, appointing CEOs who initiate more interactions than their predecessors results in an average three-day abnormal return of 0.9% around the announcement of the appointment. Teams composed of executives who interact with each other more frequently also have greater retention. Lastly, firms in which new CEOs initiate more interactions than their predecessors experience higher growth in Tobin’s Q, a result that is concentrated among growth and R&D-intensive firms.

SHORT BIOGRAPHY:

Yuan Zou is an assistant professor in the Accounting and Management unit at Harvard Business School. She teaches Financial Reporting and Control (FRC) in the MBA required curriculum.

Professor Zou conducts theoretically-motivated empirical studies aimed at furthering the understanding of capital markets, with an emphasis on issues of practical relevance to practitioners and regulators. She is especially interested in understanding the economic link between disclosure, market efficiency, and corporate culture. Her research in this area has been cited in one SEC commissioner speech and one SEC proposed rule. Professor Zou also examines the interaction between different types of disclosures. Her work has been published in Journal of Accounting and Economics, Accounting Review, and Management Science.

Professor Zou earned a Ph.D. in Accounting from Columbia Business School, an M.S. in Finance from Syracuse University, and a B.S. in Finance from Xi’an Jiaotong University (XJTU).