How can organizations tackle the challenge of pursuing a social mission? The role of dynamic managerial capabilities

Nearly 200 Business Roundtable CEOs have recently pledged to run their companies for the long-term benefit of all of their stakeholders, including the communities where they operate. This article explores the central role of dynamic managerial capabilities in allowing organizations to fulfill their social mission, which involves fostering socioeconomic inclusion of disenfranchised members of society.

We draw on research in management, international business, and entrepreneurship to articulate why organizations need dynamic managerial capabilities to reconfigure organizational resources and practices for the pursuit of a social mission.

This article brings out how each dimension of dynamic managerial capabilities – human capital, social capital, and cognition may influence this pursuit. It also provides suggestions on how to develop these capabilities.

We contend that organizations need dynamic managerial capabilities to address the complex and dynamic interactions between the organizations and structural forces in the society perpetuating exclusion. Such capabilities are not built in but can be developed.