Greta Hsu
Associate Professor of Management
Research Expertise: Organizational behavior and identity, economic sociology, entrepreneurship
Consumers, producers, critics and other market actors rely on categories like “hedge fund,” “Napa Valley winery,” and “Western film” to understand products and producers in markets. Through her research, Associate Professor Greta Hsu develops understanding of how such categories are socially constructed, how they are used and strategically manipulated by market actors and how they shape market and competitive dynamics. Her current research focuses on how tobacco producers created and then manipulated consumers’ understandings of the category of “light cigarettes” to their strategic advantage. She is also studying genre spanning in the U.S. feature film industry, as well as patterns in perceptions of organizational identity across organizations and organizational roles
Hsu’s papers include “Evaluative Schemas and the Mediating Role of Critics” and “Identities, Genres, and Organizational Forms,” published in Organization Science; “Multiple Category Memberships in Markets: A Formal Theory and Two Empirical Tests,” published in American Sociological Review and “Jacks of All Trades and Masters of None: Audiences’ Reactions to Spanning Genres in Feature Film Production,” published in Administrative Science Quarterly.
Hsu received her Ph.D. in organizational behavior from the Graduate School of Business at Stanford University. She also holds master’s degrees in sociology and statistics from Stanford.
Room 3304
224 Managing Human Resources
Explore the different choices firm make in governing and managing their workers–decisions as to wages, benefits, working conditions, ways of organizing work, and other management policies and practices. Analyze employment systems fit with firms environments and strategies, and the consequences of choices managers make regarding policies and practices.
How Wine Critics’ Quality Ratings Impact the Market
It is well known that in markets such as restaurants, films and books, critics directly shape outcomes by guiding consumers’ attention and purchase decisions through their assessments of product quality. Less understood is how critics influence the decision making and behavior of producers.
How Wine Critics’ Quality Ratings Impact the Market
Oganization Science: Evaluative Schemas and the Mediating Role of Critics
It is well known that in markets such as restaurants, films and books, critics directly shape market outcomes by guiding consumers’ attention and purchase decisions through their assessments of product quality. Less understood is how critics influence the decision-making and behavior of producers.
Greta Hsu Awards
Typecasting, Legitimation, and Form Emergence: A Formal Theory
Sociological Theory, 2011
In this paper, Associate Professor Greta Hsu and co-authors Michael T. Hannan from the Stanford University Graduate School of Business and László Pólos from Durham University propose a formal theory of multiple category memberships which has the potential to unify two seemingly unconnected theories: typecasting and identity-based form emergence.
224 Managing People in Modern Organizations
Modern systems for managing people. Examination of the changing workforce and workplace, emphasizing high-technology and knowledge-intensive organizations. The impact of firms’ environment (competition, product market, regulations) on choices for managing people. The consequences of these choices for firms and managers.
Greta Hsu and Victor Stango Awarded Tenure as Associate Professors
Assistant Professors Greta Hsu and Victor Stango have both received tenure and will be promoted to associate professor effective this summer.
Hollywood and eBay: Cases for Market Specialization
American Sociological Review, 2009
Why are products or producers that span multiple categories penalized in competitive markets? A recent study by Assistant Professor Greta Hsu and colleagues Professor Michael T. Hannan of the Stanford Graduate School of Business, and Assistant Professor of Management Özgecan Koçak of Sabanci University in Istanbul, Turkey, examines the effects of market specialization in the U.S. feature-film industry and eBay.
Jacks of All Trades and Masters of None: Audiences’ Reactions to Spanning Genres in Feature Film Production
Administrative Science Quarterly, 2006
Through analyses of audience reception of U.S.-produced feature film projects from the period 2000–2003, Associate Professor Greta Hsu develops insight into the trade-off assumed in organizational ecology theory between an organization’s niche width and its fitness.
Identities, Genres, and Organizational Forms
Organization Science, 2005
In recent years, there has been an increasing emphasis within organizational ecology on identity as a fundamental basis for the conceptualization and identification of organizational forms. This paper, by Associate Professor Greta Hsu and co-author Michael T. Hannan from the Stanford University Graduate School of Business, highlights the benefits of an identity-based conceptualization of organizational forms and outlines an identity-based agenda for organizational ecology.