Influência da discrição gerencial dos CEOs no desempenho social corporativo: uma análise nas empresas listadas na B3

Abstract

The Upper Echelon Theory argues that executives make decisions in organizations based on their interpretation of reality, this interpretation being derived from their beliefs, values, personality traits and cognitive processes. Their personal characteristics, therefore, can affect the performance of companies, including corporate social performance, in view of the strategic choices made. Such influence, however, can be enabled or limited because of the organization's task environment and internal environment, as well as the CEO's own individual characteristics. In this sense, this thesis aims to verify which factors of managerial discretion of CEOs influence the corporate social performance of companies listed on B3. For this purpose, the Standardized Financial Statements, Reference Forms, Sustainability and/or Annual Reports, published by the companies, from 2016 to 2020, were used in order to collect, through content analysis, data related to performance corporate social and, later, in order to generate a multidimensional index, exploratory factor analysis was used. In order to test the hypotheses related to managerial discretion, regression analysis was used with robust fixed effects panel data. The research results show that, considering the task environment factor, only market growth influences corporate social performance, but in a negative way; from the organizational environment, the variables size and age of the company were statistically significant, in a positive way; and CEO characteristics, duality showed a positive relationship with corporate social performance. It was also found that all CEO demographic variables influence corporate social performance, with sex and education being positive, and age and experience being negative. This thesis aims to contribute to the literature of the Theory of Upper Echelons, managerial discretion and corporate social responsibility, not only in the scope, but also internationally.