Boards of directors and firm innovation: a contingency perspective on board effectiveness

This article examines how the relation between boards of directors and innovagion is moderated by firm-level variables. Some governance scholars have recently underlined the need to adopt perspectives other than the dominant agency paradigm, to enhance our understanding of actual sources of board effectiveness. Moving beyond agency theory, this article applies insighrs from the literature on decision making groups to boards of directors. Furthermore, it applies the structural contingency theory to explore how main relations between boards of directors and firm innovation are contingent upon varied firm-level moderators,