Top management team international experience and strategic decision making

Purpose – This study aims to explore the influence of top management team international experience on international strategic decision-making rationality and, subsequently, its effect on decision effectiveness (decision performance). Design/methodology/approach – This analysis is based on survey data of small- and medium-sized international Pakistani firms operating in the IT industry. Findings – Results show that top management team international experience is positively related to international strategic decision-making rationality, and the latter partially mediates the international experience – decision effectiveness relationship. Research limitations/implications – The study is based on data collected from a single industry and focuses on an international decision that occurred within a time-frame of previous four years. Practical implications – Findings suggest that international firms, when composing their top management teams, should favor the inclusion of internationally experienced managers. Originality/value – The study of the influence of international experience on the decision-making process in general and decision-making rationality in particular has been largely neglected in extant literature. This paper highlights one way through which the international experience of the top management team as a whole relates to the effectiveness of international decisions. The paper also advances emergent managerial cognition literature focusing on the top management team and not individual decision makers.