Abstract

This article presents a study which examines the influence of several environmental and organizational factors on managerial attitudes. The study presents some empirical data obtained from the responses of 186 corporate chief executives (CEO's) to a questionnaire on managerial thinking. The questionnaire was mailed to the CEO's of 400 randomly selected companies drawn from the 1970 edition of Poor's Register of Corporations, Directors, and Executives. Most writers trying to revise the theory of the firm tend to assume that the separation of management from ownership causes management to think that the firm is independent of its stockholders. This is evident in the literature in the fields of economics, organizational theory, and accounting. The literary feud between entity theorists and proprietary theorists in business and accounting often rests on the hypothesis that managers in large companies are more likely to perceive the firm as an independent unit than are managers in small companies who are more likely to associate the firm with the shareholders.