Stratified Executive Influence on Corporate Strategy Implementation: Evidence from Soft Drink Manufacturers in Kenya
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Abstract
Despite extensive theorisation of the upper echelon perspective, empirical evidence on the relative weight of different top management team (TMT) characteristic clusters in driving corporate strategy implementation remains limited, particularly within Sub-Saharan African fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG) contexts. This study introduces the Stratified Executive Influence Model (SEIM), a novel framework that reconceptualises TMT characteristics as operating across three hierarchical strata: a boundary stratum (demographic characteristics), an operational stratum (cognitive characteristics), and a dispositional stratum (psychological characteristics). Drawing on a quantitative cross-sectional survey of 58 top managers across eight soft drink manufacturers in Kenya, the study employs descriptive statistics, Pearson correlation analysis, analysis of variance, and multiple linear regression to test four hypotheses. Results show that psychological characteristics are the sole statistically significant predictor of strategy implementation success (β = 0.525, p = 0.009), while cognitive characteristics approach significance (β = 0.218, p = 0.093). Demographic characteristics exert no direct effect (β = 0.132, p = 0.520) but operate as boundary conditions that constrain the expression of higher-order traits. The combined model explains 28.3% of the variance in implementation success (Adjusted R² = 0.283, F = 8.504, p < 0.001). These findings validate the hierarchical logic of the SEIM and extend upper echelon theory by demonstrating that not all TMT characteristics exert equivalent influence on execution outcomes. The study further identifies severe gender homogeneity within Kenyan FMCG leadership (91.4% male) as a structural constraint on TMT diversity, with implications for talent management policy. The SEIM offers a portable analytical tool for TMT research in emerging market contexts where psychological and dispositional qualities of executives remain under-examined.
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