While integrating psychology insights into management research has a long history, it has gained momentum over the past decade. Scholars increasingly examine behavioral foundations of macro-management research, using cognitive, motivational and social psychology perspectives. A central impetus has been to understand top managers’ behavior to better explain why organizations act and perform in a certain way. In particular, scholars have identified heuristics (i.e., cognitive shortcuts) and consequent cognitive biases (i.e., systematic deviation from rational norms that may arise from cognitive shortcuts) as one of the most important psychological phenomena that influence management and organizations.

Because top managers play a pivotal role in shaping major organizational outcomes, it is highly relevant to understand how top managers’ heuristics and the potential consequent biases influence decisions and outcomes in organizations. Although the influence of heuristics and biases for management and organizations has been of particular interest within the strategy domain, recent research has shown that heuristics and biases are of major importance for decision making in entrepreneurship, innovation, international business, family firms, corporate governance, and leadership. Although the existing literature provides a basis for understanding the effects of top managers’ heuristics and biases, to further develop this important research stream, novel approaches and studies on this topic are needed.

Therefore, in this Special Issue (SI), we call for conceptual and empirical papers that advance research in management studies by examining how, when, and under which conditions top managers’ heuristics and their consequent cognitive biases affect decisions and subsequent organizational outcomes. The focus of this SI is on top managers’ heuristics and cognitive biases while embedding them in broader conversations related to management and organizations.

Submission Deadline: 29 February 2020

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