Framing conflicting demands and strategies for managing hybridity in social enterprises

Abstract

Research has shown that social enterprises must constantly balance conflicting demands between their social and economic goals. However, little is known about the factors that shape managers’ strategic choices in response to the tensions associated with social enterprises’ hybrid nature. To address this issue, we conducted a case study analysis of six work integration social enterprises that draws on insights from previous literature on organisational hybrids and managerial frames. This study identifies two distinct cognitive frames that managers adopt to interpret the hybrid condition of their organisation, balancing and integrative, each of which is associated with different types of strategies for managing hybridity, defensive and exploratory, respectively. Additionally, we unveil the mechanisms through which these frames shape hybrid strategies, namely, through the representation of the environment, representation of agency, and capability to integrate conflicting prescriptions. These results underscore the individual agency of managers and their idiosyncratic cognitive processes as important explanatory factors for the wide array of strategic responses observed in the management of social enterprises.