Imprinting Effects of Founding Core Teams on HR Values in New Ventures

Using the upper echelon perspective and imprinting arguments as key theoretical lenses, this paper examines how characteristics of new venture core teams influence internal consistency and distinctiveness of human resources (HR) values at the early-growth stage of the firm. We found that shared organizational experience among founding core team members positively predicts internal consistency and distinctiveness of the dominant HR values, whereas functional diversity positively predicts distinctiveness of these values. Contrary to our prediction, when the levels of both prior shared organizational experience and functional diversity are high, positive effects turned negative, indicating more complex interaction effects between the two team characteristics.