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Biography
You can contact Li Dai at Li.Dai@lmu.edu.
Li Dai teaches undergraduate and MBA courses in international business, strategic management and global strategy at LMU. In addition, Dai has taught extensively in the business programs at Texas A&M University and Ivey Business School, with the latter's MBA program ranked #1 in the world by Bloomberg Businessweek. Her studies utilizing geo-referencing methodology on firm strategy in hostile contexts are considered seminal by peers in the field of management. This research, along with her work on institutions in emerging markets, has been recognized with prestigious awards and invited for publication by Oxford University Press and featured in the highest-ranked journals in fields spanning international business, strategic management and entrepreneurship. She is a faculty fellow at the Center for Emerging Markets at Northeastern University and sits on the Editorial Review Board of the Journal of International Business Studies and Journal of International Business Policy, both top-ranked journals in the field of international business and the two flagship journals of the Academy of International Business.
Education (2)
Texas A&M University: Ph.D., Strategic Management and International Business 2011
University of Toronto: B.Com., Finance and Economics 2006
Areas of Expertise (6)
Political Violence
Emerging Markets
Multinational Corporations
Institutional Theory
Firm Strategy in Hostile Contexts
Geographical Information Systems (GIS)
Industry Expertise (3)
Education/Learning
Political Organization
Management Consulting
Accomplishments (16)
LMU EMBA Business Applications of Blockchain Certificate (professional)
2019
eFaculty Certificate for Online and Hybrid Teaching and Learning (professional)
2019
Strategic Management Society Best Paper Prize Finalist (professional)
2017
Association Francophone de Management International Best Paper Award (professional)
2016
New Jersey Business and Industry Association Bright Idea Award (professional)
2015
The Moon Fellowship (professional)
2015
Multinational Business Review Most Cited Paper (professional)
2012
Skolkovo Best Paper Award Finalist (professional)
Academy of Management, 2012
Best Paper on Emerging Markets Finalist (professional)
Academy of Management, 2012
Farmer Best Dissertation Award Runner-Up (professional)
Academy of International Business, 2012
Best Overall Doctoral Paper (professional)
Southern Management Association, 2010
Best Paper in Strategy Track (professional)
Southern Management Association, 2010
Haynes Prize for Most Promising Scholar Finalist (professional)
Academy of International Business, 2009
Best Conceptual Paper Award (professional)
Emerald Publishing, 2008
Regents Scholarship (personal)
Texas A&M University, 2007
Dean's List (personal)
Faculty of Commerce, University of Toronto, 2003-2006
Affiliations (3)
- Academy of Management
- Strategic Management Society
- Academy of International Business
Articles (13)
International diversification of family-dominant firms: Integrating socioemotional wealth and behavioral theory of the firm
Journal of World Business2020-04-01
Drawing on the behavioral theory of the firm, we shed light on an extant debate about whether family firms are more or less likely to diversify internationally. In an analysis of firm-level data from 93 countries over 2011–2018, we find that family-dominant firms—with their established preference for low breadth-high depth international diversification—will seek to increase their breadth when performance falls below aspiration level, but that doing so can hurt their performance stability. Our study advances the literature by identifying important boundary conditions to their prioritization of socioemotional wealth and micro-foundational mechanisms that underlie strategic change in family-dominant firms.
A delicate balance for innovation: Competition and collaboration in R&D consortia
Management and Organization Review2019-03-04
This study examines how competitive and cooperative relationships within R&D consortia influence member firms’ innovation output. We propose a U-shaped relationship between the presence of market competitors for a member firm and the firm's joint R&D output with other consortium members, and examine how the relationship is mediated by interactions with other members at the firm level and moderated by collaborative efforts at the consortium level. Using a unique sample of 320 firms from 52 R&D consortia in China, we find support for our predictions. This multi-level study extends our understanding of competition and cooperation in multi-party networks and provides insights for creating a balance between the two forces that is conducive to innovation.
Caught in the crossfire: Dimensions of vulnerability and foreign multinationals’ exit from war-afflicted countries
Strategic Management Journal2016-11-30
When war occurs in a country, some foreign multinational enterprises (MNEs) stay on, while others flee. We argue that MNE responses to external threats depend on the firm's vulnerability, which we decompose into exposure (proximity to threat), at-risk resources (potential for loss), and resilience (capacity for coping).
Multinational enterprises and emerging markets
Oxford Bibliographies in Management2015-08-31
This article presents research on how multinational enterprises (MNEs) seeking high-growth opportunities tackle these challenges in entering emerging market countries before introducing a group of studies on emerging market multinationals.
Entrepreneurial orientation and international scope: The differential roles of innovativeness, proactiveness, and risk-taking
Journal of Business Venturing2014-07-01
This research integrates the international business and entrepreneurship literatures by examining the independent influences of innovativeness, proactiveness, and risk-taking on the ability of a firm to broaden its scope across international markets.
Global strategy: MNEs in deadly environments: Strategic responses to disasters, conflict and crime
Academy of Management, Best Paper Proceedings2014-05-01
An emerging body of research in international business examines firm response to challenging environments involving disasters, conflict and crime.
Place, space, and geographical exposure: Foreign subsidiary survival in conflict zones
Journal of International Business Studies2013-04-18
This study focuses on the role of geography in foreign subsidiary survival in host countries afflicted by political conflict. We argue that survival is a function of exposure to conflicts, and depends on the characteristics of place (the conflict zone) and space (geographic concentration and dispersion of other home-country firms).
Understanding technology and industry emergence: A qualitative study of the fuel cell industry
Academy of Management, Best Paper Proceedings2013-04-01
This research empirically examines the Aldrich and Fiol (1994) model of industry creation to assess the cognitive and sociopolitical factors at the organizational, intra-industry and inter-industry levels that influence emerging technologies and industries.
External threats and MNE strategy: The role of exposure, resources and coping mechanisms
Academy of Management Proceedings2012-01-01
Multinational enterprises (MNEs), when threatened by political violence in a host country, make different choices; some stay, others exit. What determines who stays and who leaves?
International business, international management, and international strategic management: What is in a name?
International Studies of Management and Organization2010-12-10
In this article, we build on Boddewyn's earlier research to explore the three fields of inquiry, develop new domain statements, and link them to one another.
Rethinking the O in Dunning’s OLI paradigm
Multinational Business Review2010-05-01
In this paper, we focus specifically on the O in the OLI paradigm, tracing the history of Dunning’s ownership advantages. We argue that the modifications of O advantages over the past 37 years, as Dunning attempted to bring all IB phenomena and IB‐related theories under the OLI “big tent,” has had mixed results.
Caught in the middle: Multinational enterprise strategy in interstate warfare
Competitiveness Review2009-09-25
The purpose of this paper is to investigate interstate warfare and its association with foreign direct investment (FDI) and multinational enterprise (MNE) strategy by integrating insights from international business (IB) and international political economy (IPE) literature.
Maximizing cooperation in a competitive environment
Competitive Forum2008-06-05
The purpose of this paper is to delineate the conditions and governance structures that facilitate cooperation among firms, which are by default competitors. The theoretical lenses of resource dependence theory, institutional theory, and transaction cost theory are employed to show how organizations can coordinate to achieve the optimum level of cooperation along two dimensions, uncertainty and technology.
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