Supply-side inducements and resource redeployment in multiunit firms

Abstract

We examine to what extent and when multiunit firms internally redeploy managers between units. While theory has emphasized how changes in demand conditions affect redeployment, we argue that optimal internal resource allocation involves consideration of both demand and each unit's resource supply. We formalize this argument, showing how redeployment arises from “supply-side inducements”—return advantages in new over existing resource uses resulting from changes in resource supply. Empirical tests using manager deaths as an exogenous, supply-side shock to firms' resource stocks support our arguments, showing that firms frequently redeploy resources away from better-endowed and toward negatively affected units. Incorporating supply-side inducements into redeployment theory implies additional value-creation opportunities from redeployment and carries novel predictions for the direction of intra-firm resource flows.