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Abstract

Contemporary organizations navigate complex environments where plural institutional logics compete to shape organizational fields. These logics often prescribe contradictory actions, exposing organizations to scrutiny from multifaceted stakeholders with competing agendas and disparate expectations. Thus, hybrid organizing is essential for engaging diverse stakeholders – but poses significant challenges for achieving legitimacy. Using data from 209 certified benefit corporations integrating dual social-market orientations, this research examined three dimensions of hybridity—logic centrality, integration, and scope—in their institutional messages via mission statements. Results suggested that organizations with greater legitimacy (1) prioritized communicating their social mission, (2) exhibited higher levels of integration in benefit and employment models, and (3) targeted broader stakeholder groups. However, the legitimacy implications of each hybridity dimension varied based on the evaluating stakeholder group: the accreditation organization or social media users. This research sheds light on when and how organizational hybridity fosters legitimacy, highlighting an institutional and communicative model of stakeholder engagement.

Keywords

organizational hybridity institutional theory of communication hybrid organizing social venture stakeholder communication

Many contemporary organizations, in their need to respond to complex social problems, are characterized by competing stakeholder interests present in today’s pluralistic institutional environments (Battilana et al., 2017; Fu & Cooper, 2025). For example, nonprofit organizations increasingly adopt business-oriented models and emphasize measurable social impact to appeal to diverse stakeholders, including beneficiaries, funders, donors, and board members. Healthcare agencies operate within a multifaceted context shaped by governmental regulations, professional standards, and market pressures. Likewise, news organizations and journalists strive to balance professional ethics (e.g., autonomy, transparency, inclusion) with commercial imperatives (e.g., audience preferences and operational efficacy) in content production (see Fu & Barbour, 2024).

Organizations often embrace hybridity¹ by “mixing elements, value systems, and organizational/institutional logics from various sectors of society” (Ganesh & Stohl, 2021, p. 271). The “institutional logics” referred to by Ganesh and Stohl invoke concepts described in the institutional theory of communication (ITOC) to examine how organizations enact multiple macro-level material practices, cultural symbols, social norms, and established rules. Each institutional logic embodies codified beliefs about how the world ought to work, how organizations should communicate and organize, and how to assess decisions and outcomes as legitimate (Lammers & Barbour, 2006). In one of the most studied contexts of hybrid organizing, social ventures (SVs) contend with competing demands from market and social-welfare logics. The market logic emphasizes profit maximizing and operational efficiency, whereas the social-welfare logic prioritizes pro-social values and collective well-being (Battilana & Lee, 2014).

However, SVs’ integration of social-welfare and market logics deviates from socially legitimate templates for organizing (e.g., pure nonprofit or business), resulting in legitimacy deficit or crisis (Battilana & Lee, 2014). Moreover, multiple logics often prescribe conflicting actions (Thornton et al., 2012), and prior research highlights the legitimacy challenges and threats faced by organizations that combine social mission and entrepreneurial activity (Billis, 2010; Corple, 2024; Kopaneva & Cheney, 2019). Indeed, organizational communication and action perceived as legitimate by some stakeholders (e.g., those aligned with the market logic) may violate the expectations and interests of others (e.g., those espousing the social-welfare logic).

Yet, hybridity can also create opportunities to enhance legitimacy. Organizations that embrace hybrid logics may be seen as innovative, appealing to audiences with complex demands who otherwise had to seek services from separate organizations (see Battilana et al., 2017). Hybridity may also empower organizations by allowing strategic appeals to different sources of legitimacy in various situations (Bertels & Lawrence, 2016). Organizations can selectively couple intact elements from different logics to engage multiple stakeholders and “compensate for their lack of legitimacy” stemming from their non-traditional organizational form (Pache & Santos, 2013, p. 994). For instance, work-integration SVs have access to a broad repertoire of practices for fundraising. They may generate and report on earned income in ways consistent with corporate practices, while also making appeals for corporate donations in diverse and contextually responsive ways of raising money. In corporate social responsibility programming, for instance, a corporation may refer to the presence of nonprofit partners and social impact goals alongside the need for corporate products or interventions (Cooper & Wang, 2024).

Taken together, the conflicting prescriptions from multiple logics can either constrain actors as they attempt to resolve or mitigate tensions, or empower them by allowing strategic appeals to different sources of legitimacy. The simultaneous legitimacy risks and opportunities associated with hybridity present an intriguing puzzle: When and how does hybridity relate to organizational legitimacy? Understanding this dynamic is crucial for any organizations striving to secure critical resources for survival and growth (Battilana & Lee, 2014). Addressing this puzzle requires more systematic research to develop a nuanced understanding of the legitimacy implications of organizational hybridity (Battilana et al., 2017; Fu, 2024).

Based on the ITOC, this research examines how organizations respond to multiple logics through purposeful institutional messages—intentional “representative narrative [s] or label [s]” (Lammers, 2011, p. 166)—to gain support from disparate stakeholders. The priorities and values expressed in institutional messages have constitutive implications for stakeholder evaluation of organizations (Kopaneva & Sias, 2015; Lammers & Barbour, 2006). In this study, we position organizational mission statements as institutional messages, crafted to reach a large number of stakeholders and impart a message or action upon them (Lammers, 2011). External stakeholders may read mission statements directly or indirectly (e.g., through enacted organizational communication in other channels and/or messaging) to derive their judgements of legitimacy (Contractor & Ehrlich, 1993; Gill & Wells, 2014; Litrico & Besharov, 2019).

We examined certified benefit corporations (B-Corps), which exemplify a new hybrid form of SVs legally required to generate shareholder profits while also providing environmental and social benefits to employees, local communities, and society at large (Rawhouser et al., 2015). However, B-Corps’ hybridity has generated significant confusion or skepticism among stakeholders about their priorities or authenticity, making it a contested field. As B-Corps (e.g., Ben and Jerry’s, Warby Parker) work to maximize both profit and social impact, they serve as ideal cases for understanding how organizations communicate multiple logics in their pursuit of legitimacy across diverse stakeholders (Kopaneva & Cheney, 2019).

Findings shed light on the varied manifestations and legitimacy implications of three distinct hybridity facets: logic centrality, integration, and scope (Litrico & Besharov, 2019). Moreover, this study reveals the differential drivers of legitimacy based on the evaluating stakeholder group, highlighting when and how organizational hybridity relates to legitimacy. This research extends the ITOC by suggesting that organizational mission statements function as institutional messages, and these messages carry plural logics which disparate stakeholders use to confer legitimacy differently. Ultimately, these findings offer implications for how organizations confronting hybridity may engage with disparate stakeholders.

Navigating Hybridity: Organizational Legitimacy Across Disparate Stakeholders

A central tenet of the ITOC is that organizations seek legitimacy—a favorable social judgment of the appropriateness and acceptance as perceived by key stakeholders in their environment—to ensure survival and growth (Suchman, 1995). However, contemporary organizational environments increasingly demand hybridity, where advocates of different institutional logics compete to shape their organizing and communication (Ganesh & Stohl, 2021). The presence of multiple institutional logics implies the involvement of multifaceted stakeholders (Fisher et al., 2017; Lammers & Barbour, 2006)—those who “have a stake in an organization’s process and/or outputs” (Lewis, 2011, p. 4). This diverse stakeholder landscape suggests that legitimation dynamics have become more complex.

As diverse stakeholders often hold divergent expectations regarding an organization’s core mission and priorities, navigating this complex stakeholder landscape presents significant challenges for organizational messaging and stakeholder engagement. For instance, SVs, which combine elements of charity and business, confront persistent challenges in balancing social and business orientations in their organizing and communication efforts (see Battilana & Lee, 2014). Different institutional funders may impose distinct expectations that shape how SVs develop their identities and innovation (Fu & Cooper, 2024). Investors and members embracing the market logic may view SVs’ communication emphasizing market principles as legitimate. In contrast, beneficiaries and donors aligned with a social-welfare logic may question SVs’ genuine intentions, particularly in relation to profit-driven activities, and remain skeptical about their commitment to social mission (Kopaneva & Cheney, 2019).

For benefit corporations specifically, the need to generate both shareholder profits and some kind of public benefit can result in real or perceived tensions with their intended audiences. Organizational communication perceived as legitimate by some stakeholders—such as promulgating financial accountability and operational efficiency—may be dismissed by others who prioritize social impact as illegitimate or even offensive. A striking example of this dynamic is B-Corp Patagonia’s social media initiative advocating for public land protection. While the campaign aligned with Patagonia’s environmental commitments, it also provoked oppositional stakeholders, including activists and grassroots partners, who “question [ed] the company’s ethics by interrogating its manufacturing practices, bringing the paradox of environmentalism and corporations into the foreground” (Dawson & Brunner, 2020, p. 70).

As the Patagonia example illustrates, perceptions of an organization’s legitimacy may be determined not only through organizational messaging directed at stakeholders, but constructed by stakeholders together in relation to the organizational messaging. More recent communication research on stakeholder relationships has moved beyond the organization-centered approach (e.g., Mitchell et al., 1997) to instead adopt a constitutive perspective, which emphasizes stakeholder engagement, relationships, and interaction (e.g., Koschmann, 2016). This perspective suggests stakeholders can confer legitimacy upon organizations, while organizations actively engage stakeholders in their legitimation efforts (e.g., Albu & Etter, 2016; Lewis et al., 2003). This perspective is particularly relevant for organizations navigating hybridity, where legitimacy is negotiated through complex relationships and interactions among multifaceted stakeholders.

In summary, the coexistence of multiple institutional logics can give rise to conflicting stakeholder expectations regarding appropriate organizational behavior, thereby undermining organizational legitimacy. Such legitimacy deficits may lead to diminished employee morale, the withdrawal of support from key stakeholders, reputational damage, performance failures, and in severe cases, threats to the organization’s survival (see Battilana et al., 2017). Nonetheless, organizations often draw upon different sources of legitimacy to strengthen their standing (Bertels & Lawrence, 2016; Pache & Santos, 2013). The ITOC (Lammers & Barbour, 2006) presents a useful framework for exploring how organizations craft hybrid institutional messages to engage disparate stakeholders in their pursuit of legitimacy (Lammers, 2011; Suddaby, 2011).

ITOC: Institutional Messages Through Mission Statements

The ITOC highlights the communicative nature of institutions, noting that institutions are created, sustained, and reproduced through discourse, rhetoric, communicative practice, and observable routines (Lammers & Barbour, 2006). These texts and messages serve as “carriers” of institutional logics, embedding both formal and informal prescriptions that shape belief systems and guide behavior. Institutional messages allow organizations to draw references to important institutional logics, societal norms, and cognitive schemas in their communication. Through effective use of institutional messages, organizations can gain stakeholder support by aligning their activities with both their internal identity and external perceptions (Lammers, 2011). In sum, the ability of organizations to communicate hybrid logics is closely related to stakeholders’ evaluation of their legitimacy (Dawson & Brunner, 2020; Foreman & Whetten, 2002). Legitimacy is achieved when stakeholders’ “explicit normative evaluation of the organization and its activities” align with the broader societal norms, beliefs, and values (Suchman, 1995, p. 577).

Based on the ITOC, it is reasonable to expect some similarities and patterns across SVs’ institutional messages that communicate both social-welfare and market logics. Di Domenico et al. (2010) argued that SVs must highlight the necessity of commercial activities for social impact through strategic stakeholder communication. Similarly, Kopaneva and Cheney (2019) contended that SVs “authentically driven by social values” need to “explain and defend the legitimacy of these values to the public while distancing themselves from those who taint the idea of socially driven business” (p. 491). In doing so, organizations can engage in legitimacy building through strategic identity construction, rhetorical construction of symbolic capital, and impression management (Fisher et al., 2017; Gill & Wells, 2014).

In this research, we focus on organizational mission statements, which contain essential information about an organization’s purpose, value, strategic direction, and long-term vision (Kopaneva & Sias, 2015). We suggest such organizational discourse enacts institutional communication through four features: establishment, encumbency, reach, and intentionality (Lammers, 2011). Mission statements are established in that they are unequivocal, relatively enduring, readily available, and frequently reported; encumbent as they encourage specific stakeholder action or behaviors; have considerable reach as they are accessible to a broad audience and a wide reach of stakeholders; and intentional in that they are deliberately crafted by an organization. Research indicates that how organizations articulate their identities, values, and priorities in mission statements influences stakeholder evaluations of organizational legitimacy (Gill & Wells, 2014). As institutional messages, mission statements may be strategically designed to reach a wide audience, often employing ambiguity to allow different stakeholders to interpret an organization’s mission in ways that resonate with them (Contractor & Ehrlich, 1993).

In combination, extant studies suggest that key stakeholders’ evaluation of organizational legitimacy depends on how organizational communication reflects multiple logics in institutional messages (see Fu & Barbour, 2024). Given the need to explore stakeholder engagement in contexts reflective of today’s pluralistic organizational landscape (e.g., Koschmann, 2016), SVs provide a vehicle for exploring institutional communication and stakeholder engagement (Fu & Cooper, 2024; Zorn et al., 2011). As SVs primarily espouse social-welfare and market logics (Corple, 2024; Sanders, 2012), we ask the first research question (RQ).

RQ1

How does SVs’ pursuit of legitimacy through institutional messages (i.e., mission statements) with external stakeholders reflect (a) social-welfare and (b) market logics?

Organizational Hybridity: Logic Centrality, Integration, and Scope

Although SVs shaped by dual social-market logics may exhibit similar patterns of institutional communication, the ITOC also predicts heterogeneity in their messaging. Organizations do not passively adopt institutional logics; rather, they actively engage stakeholders through institutional messages that shape and refine these logics, highlighting their uniqueness and distinctiveness. We suggest that organizational hybridity comprises three key components (Litrico & Besharov, 2019), which vary across organizations and have important implications for legitimacy building. Each hybridity dimension is unpacked below.

Centrality

Centrality² refers to the extent to which organizations communicate a single or multiple logics as core to their functioning (Besharov & Smith, 2014). In high-centrality organizations, no single dominant logic prevails; instead, these organizations must balance and integrate multiple logics in fundamental aspects such as goals and strategy. In contrast, low-centrality organizations are driven primarily by a single logic. Thus, opposing demands or logics in hybridity are not necessarily equal (Fu & Cooper, 2025). Empirical research has documented variations in logic centrality in organizational activities and communication. Through a content analysis of organizational mission statements, Litrico and Besharov (2019) found that while some SVs heavily emphasized either social benefits or profit-making (indicating low centrality in opposing ways), most SVs integrated both logics “to varying degrees” by emphasizing revenue-generation activities and community-building or social change agenda in grant applications (p. 350). Similarly, Kopaneva and Cheney’s (2019) case study of three B-Corps revealed the differences in how SVs balanced their conventional business identities with their transforming, mission-driven identities, ultimately varying in the centrality of social and market logics.

SVs must balance the social-welfare and market logics to achieve legitimacy, which involves strategically adapting their messaging and practices to appeal to multiple stakeholder groups (Pache & Santos, 2013). Pache and Santos argue that hybrids have access to a broad repertoire of institutional templates, which they can configure in diverse ways. As the authors note, hybridity “can place them at advantage if they are able to craft a configuration of elements that fits well with the demands of their environment and helps them leverage a wider range of support” (p. 994). In their study of work integration SVs, Pache and Santos demonstrate that SVs may selectively enact either the social-welfare or market logic across various dimensions, including ownership, governance, legal status, profit distribution, professional affiliations, and volunteer mobilization. For instance, some SVs may adopt the social-welfare logic in domains such as ownership, governance, and legal status, while applying market logic in areas like profit distribution, professional affiliations, and resource mobilization. Others may reverse this configuration, reflecting a flexible blending of logics tailored to their specific environments.

Selective coupling not only “allows hybrids to satisfy symbolic concerns” for impression management, but also serves as “a safer and more viable strategy” than decoupling when public scrutiny is unavoidable (p. 994). Unlike decoupling, which risks being exposed as non-compliant in cases of enduring conflict, selective coupling enables organizations to maintain legitimacy without facing such risks. Additionally, it is “a less costly” approach than compromise, which requires organizations to develop entirely new practices (p. 994). In sum, selective coupling is a more accessible, less costly, safer, and viable strategy that balances both symbolic and substantive concerns. Furthermore, organizations may need to adapt their messaging to acknowledge that stakeholders no longer have fixed identities, but instead may possess multiple or fluid identities in relation to the organization (Koschmann & Kopczynski, 2017). Indeed, longitudinal data supports this notion, showing that SVs increasingly emphasized both social-welfare and market logics in their grant applications to appeal to funders and gain legitimacy (Litrico & Besharov, 2019). Based on this line of research, we hypothesize.

SVs that prioritize both social-welfare and market logics (i.e., high centrality) have higher levels of legitimacy than those that prioritize only one logic (i.e., low centrality).

Locus of Integration

Locus of integration is another key dimension in which hybridity may vary across organizations. It reflects “how the multiple logics that constitute the hybrid are combined within the organizational core” (Litrico & Besharov, 2019, p. 354). While centrality addresses the relative importance of plural logics, locus of integration focuses on how these logics are integrated, or the ways in which SVs incorporate social benefits within their business model.

Although the market-mission tension is well-documented (e.g., Sanders, 2012), SVs have typically adopted specific models of integration to hybridize dual logics. According to Litrico and Besharov (2019), these models generally fall into three categories: whom the business serves (benefit model), what it sells (sales model), and whom it employs (employment model).

(1) Benefit Model: High-integration SVs align social-welfare and market logics by structuring their business to serve a disadvantaged target population. For instance, microfinance organizations provide small loans to low-income individuals, particularly women, who may otherwise not have access to traditional banking services.

(2) Sales Model: High-integration SVs sell products or services that generate social benefits. For instance, fair trade SVs produce and/or sell coffee beans cultivated under rigorous sustainability standards to improve both environmental outcomes and farmer welfare.

(3) Employment Model: High-integration SVs create job opportunities for disadvantaged populations. Work-integration SVs, for example, hire individuals facing employment barriers due to disability, migration, incarceration, or mental health challenges.

The three models are not mutually exclusive. An organization may integrate dual logics through multiple loci in one or all models—serving a disadvantaged population as its target market, selling socially beneficial products and services, and/or employing disadvantaged populations.

We expect the locus of integration to be positively related to organizational legitimacy. Research suggests organizations that integrate multiple logics well in substantive ways—rather than merely exhibiting them as symbolic structures decoupled from organizational operations—tend to achieve higher legitimacy among stakeholders (Pache & Santos, 2013). This is because a high level of integration demonstrates a genuine commitment to integrating multiple logics in pursuit of plural goals and public agendas. Similarly, Litrico and Besharov (2019) found SVs providing employment opportunities for disadvantaged beneficiary groups had greater funding success. These key integration models—determining “who is served,” “who is employed,” and “what is sold”—are central to organizational outcomes (Litrico & Besharov, 2019, p. 350). Drawing on the ITOC, SVs that effectively integrate multiple logics craft institutional messages that resonate with diverse stakeholder groups, positioning themselves as both acceptable and appropriate within the evolving landscape of hybrid organizing. Therefore, we hypothesize.

SVs with higher levels of integration in social-welfare and market logics in the (a) benefit, (b) sales, and (c) employment models have higher levels of legitimacy.

Scope

Scope refers to “the breadth of enactment of multiple logics” within the key stakeholder group each logic addresses (Litrico & Besharov, 2019, p. 354). In the context of SVs, scope describes whether the primary stakeholder group associated with a particular logic—whether social-welfare (beneficiaries) or market (customers)—is broad or narrow. While centrality concerns the interrelationship among multiple logics and their relative importance to each other, scope focuses on the independent role and reach of a particular logic. Although related, the two concepts are distinct; an SV may have highly central social-welfare and market orientations while still exhibiting an uneven scope. Online Appendix A summarizes these key concepts.

SVs differ in the breadth of social-welfare and market logics enacted for two stakeholder groups: (a) beneficiaries and (b) customers. Based on these distinctions, SVs can be categorized into four types. Generalist SVs serve a broad beneficiary group (e.g., the public at large) and a broad customer group (e.g., women, farmers, youth); leveraged SVs serve a broad beneficiary group but a narrow customer group; channeled SVs serve a narrow beneficiary group but a broad customer group; and focused SVs serve both a narrow beneficiary group and a narrow customer group. In summary, generalist SVs have the broadest scope, focused SVs have the narrowest, and leveraged and channeled SVs fall somewhere in between.

This classification, based on the range of target stakeholders, highlights variations in niche strategies that define the scope of social-welfare and market logics in organizations. Research suggests that stakeholder appeal is influenced by organizational niche broadness—the range of environmental conditions that support its survival (Nelson, 2018)—which, in turn, influences audience perceptions of organizational legitimacy. Experimental evidence further indicates that stakeholders tend to perceive generalist organizations as more legitimate than specialist ones. Massey (2001) speculated that generalists may “have more complex organizational structures designed to facilitate interaction with a more diverse environment” to adapt their messaging and practices to the needs of disparate stakeholders than specialists (p. 160). Taken together, these studies suggest that generalist organizations – those that offer a range of services or those that are trying to reach a broad range of stakeholders – achieve higher legitimacy. Thus, we further hypothesize.

SVs with a broad scope have higher levels of legitimacy than those with a narrow scope.

Method

Sample and Procedure

Benefit corporation represents a new hybrid form of SVs that was first codified in U.S. law in 2010. Regulations impose high standards of accountability and transparency to ensure they balance profit with social mission against third-party standards, positioning them within the plural institutional logics of social-welfare and market (Rawhouser et al., 2015). However, since B-Corps may not fit neatly into traditional business or nonprofit categories, establishing legitimacy has become a significant challenge. Thus, studying the legitimation dynamics of B-Corps not only enables B-Corps to gain critical resources and improve performance, but also shape broader institutional fields by legitimizing alternative forms of value creation, thereby setting higher standards for businesses (Kim & Schifeling, 2022).

We obtained a sample of U.S. B-Corps (N = 220)³ that operate under the benefit corporation legal structure from the B-Lab (https://www.bcorporation.net/), a global leader in initiating B-Corp certification and the primary accreditation agency driving the B-Corp movement in about 90 countries (see Kim & Schifeling, 2022). Since 2006, B-Lab has developed rigorous guidelines, standards, and certification processes to help companies “maintain a balance of mission-aligned philanthropic and earned revenue” (B-Lab, n.d.).⁴ To achieve certification, a company must (1) demonstrate high social and environmental performance by scoring at least 80 points on the B Impact Assessment (out of about 250 possible points across five categories: governance, workers, community, environment, and customers) and passing a risk review; (2) make a legal commitment by adopting the benefit corporation legal structure and adjusting corporate governance to be accountable to all stakeholders; and (3) ensure transparency by making information about their performance, as measured against B-Lab’s standards, publicly available on their B-Corp profile. Every B-Corp must undergo a verification process every three years to maintain certification.

We collected mission statements from B-Corps’ websites (n = 209)⁵ during the summer of 2020 (see Online Appendix B for some examples). The procedure was as follows: First, two research assistants attended a training session led by the first two authors to ensure consistency in identifying mission statements. This step was necessary to account for instances where organizational websites lacked a designated “Mission Statement” section and to consider cases where multiple sections (e.g., “About Us,” “Our Company,” “Core Values,” or “What We Do”) jointly constituted an organization’s mission statement (Kopaneva & Sias, 2015). Following the training session and research protocol, the two research assistants independently extracted mission statements from one or multiple relevant sections for each of the 209 B-Corps. They then met to discuss discrepancies, engage in robust discussions, and finalize a consensus version for each mission statement. The average word count of the collected mission statements was 273.67 (SD = 14.98).

Organizational Legitimacy

Much research has established that “measuring legitimacy is a persistent challenge” (Schoon, 2022, p. 478) and requires specifying the relationship between the object of legitimacy and the audience that confers legitimacy. We assessed legitimacy using (1) ratings from B-Lab, and (2) social media sentiment in public mentions. We focus on the B-Lab and social media users as stakeholders for several reasons. First, they extend beyond the traditional stakeholder categories identified in classic literature (e.g., Mitchell et al., 1997) and better reflect the diversity of stakeholders in contemporary organizations (Koschmann, 2016). Second, they represent distinct yet influential stakeholder interests that organizations must navigate to achieve legitimacy. B-Lab, as a certifying authority, formally confers legitimacy through certification, establishing and enforcing the rules and norms that define how B-Corps should operate. In the digital age, the “pluralization of discourses” and “potential democratization of online arenas” highlight the necessity of social media as a key channel for understanding organizational legitimacy (Etter et al., 2018, p. 68). Social media users wield considerable influence over organizations, shaping public perception and legitimacy (Albu & Etter, 2016).

B-Lab

The B-Lab rating measured an organization’s average B Impact Score from 2007 to 2019. As the founding and sole accreditation agency of the global B-Corp movement, B-Lab uses the B Impact Score to assess the extent to which an organization generates positive social impact. A higher score reflects a stronger capacity to create value for customers, employees, local communities, and the environment, supported by a well-developed governance structure.

Social Media Users

Following prior research (e.g., Illia et al., 2023; Mahrenbach & Pfeffer, 2023), we measured organizational legitimacy on social media based on sentiment in X/Twitter mentions. Etter et al. (2018) argue that social media data and sentiment analysis capture “affect-based responses to organizational actions by citizens” and offer insight into “the broader fit between an organization’s perceived behavior and heterogeneous social norms,” thereby constituting a measurable indicator of legitimacy (p. 60). Importantly, leveraging such data allows researchers to move beyond the traditional gatekeeping role of institutional evaluators, thereby pluralizing assessments of organizational legitimacy from diverse stakeholders.

From September to December 2020, we used the platform’s free search API through Netlytic⁶ (Gruzd, 2016) to collect data on 169 B-Corps with verified X/Twitter accounts.⁷ Sentiment in X/Twitter mentions was operationalized as the average Syuzhet score of all tweets mentioning an organization’s account. Using Netlytic, we gathered 186,008 mention tweets and applied the Syuzhet package in R (Jockers, 2015) to compute sentiment scores based on sentiment dictionaries. For each organization, sentiment scores were computed per mention tweet, and the average sentiment score of all associated posts was calculated. A Syuzhet score above zero indicates positive sentiment, while a score below zero indicates negative sentiment. The absolute value represents the intensity of sentiment. We assigned “0” to organizations without an official X/Twitter account for these two variables.⁸

Organizational Hybridity

We conducted content analyses to assess the hybridity of social-welfare and market logics in the mission statements. Two research assistants participated in two training sessions with the first two authors, after which they independently coded a subset of mission statements until achieving acceptable intercoder reliability⁹ based on Krippendorff’s alpha values (specific values for each variable are provided in the following sub-sections, with .70 typically considered an acceptable threshold and .80 a satisfactory threshold for reliability). Any discrepancies were resolved through robust discussions with the first two authors. Following this, they independently coded the remaining sample. The coding procedures are outlined below.

Centrality

Centrality was operationalized as the degree to which an organization emphasized both social mission and business goals. While SVs may incorporate other logics (e.g., state, religion), most research has focused on the social-market hybridity (see Battilana & Lee, 2014, for a review). Following Litrico and Besharov (2019), this variable was created through a two-step process using both manual and computer-aided content analysis. First, the intensity of an institutional logic was measured as the percentage of words associated with (a) social-welfare logic, (b) market logic, and (c) both logics in an organization’s mission statement. After word tokenization and lemmatization¹⁰ in R, we counted the number of words in each mission statement and compiled a list of the top 300 words (see Online Appendix C). Two research assistants then coded these words to determine whether they reflected social-welfare logic (e.g., social, community, support, local, care, serve, environment), market logic (e.g., business, product, investment, performance, strategy, profit, management), dual social-market logics (e.g., work, impact, build, client, employee, grow, solution), or neither logic, based on Litrico and Besharov’s (2019) coding of similar words (α = .81). Robust discussions helped resolve disagreements. Although this dictionary-based approach does not fully capture the contextual nuances of word usage in mission statements, we chose this method because it aligns with the identification of logics through the keyword matching strategy (see Litrico & Besharov, 2019). After assigning words to different logic categories, we calculated the frequency of words reflective of the first three logic categories (i.e., social-welfare, market, dual logics) in each mission statement by counting the number of words reflecting each respective logic.

Second, we calculated the ratio of social-welfare-related to market-related words in each mission statement as an indicator of centrality. To account for the word count of each statement, as well as the potential for low centrality at both extreme ends (i.e., when one logic dominates, either social-welfare or market, both considered low centrality), we used the following formula:

c e n t r a l i t y = 1 - \frac{| {i n t e n s i t y}_{s o c i a l w e l f a r e} - {i n t e n s i t y}_{m a r k e t} |}{({i n t e n s i t y}_{s o c i a l w e l f a r e} + {i n t e n s i t y}_{m a r k e t})}

This formula calculates the absolute difference between the percentage of social-welfare-related and market-related words, while also accounting for their total percentage when other types of words were present. Thus, a ratio closer to 1 indicates higher centrality, reflecting a balanced integration of both logics. Conversely, a ratio closer to 0 indicates low centrality, where one logic (either social-welfare or market) dominates in word usage in mission statements.

Locus of Integration

Locus of integration was the degree to which an organization combined social-welfare and market logics by “developing a business that serves a disadvantaged target population” (i.e., benefit model), “selling a socially beneficial product or service” (i.e., sales model), and “providing employment opportunities to a target population” (i.e., employment model; Litrico & Besharov, 2019, p. 352). After reading each organization’s mission statement, two research assistants manually coded the degree of integration in each model (0 = not clear or absent, 1 = low, 2 = high). The intercoder reliability for the benefit, sales, and employment models was .73, 1.00, and .92, respectively.

Scope of Logics

Scope of logics represented whether an organization engaged with a broad or narrow set of stakeholders. We first created two binary variables to measure each organization’s target beneficiaries (α = .88) and customers (α = .91), based on the research assistants’ reading of these mission statements. The scope in beneficiary/customer group was coded as “1” if the organization did not specify a particular target group; otherwise, it was coded as “0.” Following Litrico and Besharov (2019), we then summed the two binary values to create an ordinal variable to classify organizations as generalist (scope = 2, broad), leveraged or channeled (scope = 1, intermediate), or focused (scope = 0, narrow). In our sample, 158 organizations (75%) were generalist, 14 organizations (7%) were focused, and 37 organizations (18%) fell in between.

Control Variables

As variables were constructed in 2021, organizational age was calculated as 2021 minus the organization’s founding year. Certification duration represented the number of years since a B-Corp was certified by B-Lab. X/Twitter age was calculated as 2021 minus the registration year of the organization’s official account on the platform, while organizations without an account were coded as “0.” We also controlled for each B-Corp’s X/Twitter followers, which was log-transformed due to its skewed distribution. The sample included B-Corps from 23 U.S. states, with the largest representation from California (n = 99), followed by Oregon (n = 22), Massachusetts (n = 13), New York (n = 13), and Pennsylvania (n = 13). As California was the dominant category, geographic location was coded as “1” for B-Corps headquartered in California, and “0” otherwise. Table 1 presents the descriptive statistics and pairwise correlations.

Table 1.

Pairwise Correlations Among Study Variables

Variable	M	SD	Min	Max	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12	13	14
1. B-lab rating	102.12	15.97	60.16	171.33	--
2. Sentiment in X/Twitter mentions	.68	.82	−.16	4.35	−.03	--
3. Centrality	.65	.25	0	1	−.02	−.06	--
4. Intensity: Social-welfare logic	.12	.04	.02	.26	.17*	.11	−.51**	--
5. Intensity: Market logic	.07	.04	0	.18	.02	−.10	.71**	−.21**	--
6. Intensity: Both logics	.18	.06	.04	.56	.11	−.08	.23**	−.09	.21**
7. Integration: Benefit model	1.24	.47	0	2	.02	.06	−.01	.03	.02	−.05	--
8. Integration: Sales model	1.97	.22	0	2	.03	.14*	−.11	.09	−.08	.03	−.10	--
9. Integration: Employment model	1.10	.32	0	2	−.02	.22**	−.06	.08	−.07	−.09	.22**	.06	--
10. Scope	1.69	.59	0	2	.04	−.12	.11	−.08	.12	.07	−.49**	−.10	−.17*	--
11. Organizational age	21.20	2.83	4	231	.14*	.08	.11	−.06	−.03	.02	−.15*	−.02	−.03	.12	--
12. Certification duration	8.52	2.47	4	14	.28**	.04	.14*	.11	.09	.16*	−.15*	−.04	−.06	.08	.23**	--
13. X/Twitter age	7.69	4.85	0	14	.08	.43**	−.01	.22**	−.02	−.08	.01	.05	.07	.03	.12	.10	--
14. Number of followers (logged)	2.32	1.56	0	6	.09	.49**	−.09	.22**	−.06	−.14*	.07	.06	.10	−.03	.10	.03	.82**	--
15. Geographic location	.45	.50	0	1	−.05	.14*	−.05	−.02	−.08	−.19**	−.07	.12	.11	.01	−.03	.12	.07	.09

Note. *p < .05; **p < .01.

Analysis

To address RQ1, we conducted automated textual analyses to identify the most frequently used words in the mission statements. To test the three hypotheses, we examined the relationships between logic centrality, integration, scope, and organizational legitimacy using ordinary least squares regression models (see Tables 2 and 3). Variance inflation factor values for all variables ranged from 1.03 to 1.51, indicating that multicollinearity was not a concern.¹¹

Table 2.

Regression Results Predicting Organizational Legitimacy From B-Lab Ratings

	Model 1	Model 2	Model 3	Model 4
H1: Logic centrality		−3.86 (4.36)
Intensity: Social-welfare-logic words			53.64* (27.01)	54.33* (27.03)
Intensity: Market-logic words			−1.81 (29.00)	−2.32 (29.02)
Intensity: Words in both logics			15.83 (17.23)	16.01 (17.24)
H2a: Integration: Benefit model		10.80** (2.67)	10.53** (2.67)	10.18** (2.70)
H2b: Integration: Sales model		2.55 (4.98)	1.65 (4.98)	1.81 (4.99)
H2c: Integration: Employment model		−1.89 (3.40)	−2.25 (3.40)	−3.35 (3.60)
H3: Scope		3.98* (1.98)	3.89* (1.98)
Intermediate scope				8.03 (4.91)
Broad scope				9.63* (4.46)
Organizational age	.05 (.05)	.08 (.05)	.09† (.05)	.09† (.05)
Certification duration	1.77** (.44)	1.93** (.44)	1.69** (.45)	1.69** (.45)
X/Twitter age	−.14 (.38)	−.32 (.38)	−.41 (.38)	−.44 (.38)
Number of followers (logged)	1.22 (1.18)	1.07 (1.19)	1.13 (1.19)	1.25 (1.19)
Geographic location (1 = California)	−2.76 (2.11)	−2.04 (2.17)	−1.21 (2.22)	−1.32 (2.23)
Intercept	85.44*** (4.02)	64.71** (12.30)	57.84** (12.19)	56.98** (12.23)
R ²	.10	.18	.19	.20
Adjusted R²	.08	.13	.14	.14
$Δ$ R ²	--	.08	.09	.10
F	4.58**	4.22**	3.88**	3.64**

Note. †p < .10; *p < .05; **p < .01. Unstandardized coefficients B (standard error SE). Incremental R² is calculated based on Model 1.

Table 3.

Regression Results Predicting Sentiment in X/Twitter Mentions

	Model 1	Model 2	Model 3	Model 4
H1: Logic centrality		.00 (.20)
Intensity: Social-welfare-logic words			−.56 (1.27)	−.55 (1.27)
Intensity: Market-logic words			−1.19 (1.36)	−1.20 (1.36)
Intensity: Words in both logics			.18 (.81)	.18 (.81)
H2a: Integration: Benefit model		−.13 (.12)	−.12 (.13)	−.13 (.13)
H2b: Integration: Sales model		.30 (.23)	.29 (.23)	.30 (.23)
H2c: Integration: Employment model		.40* (.16)	.41* (.16)	.39* (.17)
H3: Scope		−.14 (.09)	−.13 (.09)
Intermediate scope				−.06 (.23)
Broad scope				−.24 (.21)
Organizational age	.00 (.00)	.00 (.00)	.00 (.00)	.00 (.00)
Certification duration	.00 (.02)	.00 (.02)	.01 (.02)	.01 (.02)
X/Twitter age	.01 (.02)	.01 (.02)	.01 (.02)	.01 (.02)
Number of followers (logged)	.22** (.06)	.22** (.06)	.22** (.06)	.23** (.06)
Geographic location (1 = California)	.16 (.10)	.10 (.10)	.09 (.10)	.09 (.10)
Intercept	−.03 (.19)	−.63 (.57)	−.56 (.57)	−.57 (.58)
R ²	.25	.29	.30	.30
Adjusted R²	.24	.26	.25	.25
$Δ$ R ²	--	.04	.05	.05
F	14.48**	8.23**	6.89**	6.34**

Note. †p < .10; *p < .05; **p < .01. Unstandardized coefficients B (standard error SE). Incremental R² is calculated based on Model 1.

Results

For RQ1, Figure 1 and Online Appendix C provide the most frequent words (n = 104) that appeared at least 100 times across all mission statements. Each word was coded as representing a specific logic (i.e., social-welfare, market, or dual social-market), and we further calculated the frequency of each logic among these most frequent words. Among these top words, 24 (23%) were social-welfare-related, 11 words (11%) were market-related, 34 words (33%) were coded as a combination of social-welfare and market logics. The remaining did not fit into any of these categories. After accounting for the word count of each mission statement, the average mission statement contained about 12% social-welfare-related words (SD = .04, Min = .02, Max = .26), 7% market-related words (SD = .04, Min = 0, Max = .18), and 18% words belonging to both categories (SD = .06, Min = .04, Max = .66). These findings suggest B-Corps blend both logics in their institutional messages, while slightly emphasizing their social mission.

Figure 1.

Most frequent words in the mission statements

H1 posited that organizations that communicated both social-welfare and market logics as central to their organization (i.e., high centrality) would have higher levels of legitimacy. However, the results revealed that centrality was not significantly related to legitimacy as judged by either the accreditation agency or social media users. We further examined the relationship between the intensity of words associated with a specific logic and organizational legitimacy. The results showed B-Corps that communicated a higher percentage of social-welfare-related words in their mission statements were more likely to receive higher B-Lab ratings (B = 53.64, SE = 27.01, β = .14, p = .04; see Table 2). In other words, B-Corps that focused on communicating their social mission were more likely to be considered legitimate by the accreditation agency.

According to H2, organizations with higher integration in the (a) benefit, (b) sales, and (c) employment models would have higher levels of legitimacy. H2 was partially supported. The results showed that B-Corps with higher integration in the benefit model gained higher legitimacy based on B-Lab ratings (see Table 2; B = 10.54, SE = 2.67, β = .29, p < .001), supporting H2a. In other words, B-Corps that serve disadvantaged populations tend to be evaluated as more legitimate by the accreditation agency. Moreover, B-Corps with higher integration in the employment model had higher legitimacy based on social media sentiment (see Table 3; B = .40, SE = .16, β = .16, p = .01). This suggests B-Corps providing employment opportunities to disadvantaged populations are perceived as more legitimate by social media users. H2c was supported. Overall, H2 was partially supported.

H3 posited that organizations with broader scopes would have greater legitimacy. H3 was partially supported: B-Corps targeting a broader range of stakeholders received higher ratings from the B-Lab (B = 3.98, SE = 1.98, β = .15, p = .04). Figure 2 visualizes these findings.

Figure 2.

Final results

Discussion

Pursuing legitimacy from disparate stakeholders is an ongoing challenge for organizations that often espouse hybrid institutional logics. These legitimation challenges have become even more pronounced in the digital age, where stakeholders have greater voice and power to shape organizational actions (Albu & Etter, 2016; Ganesh & Stohl, 2021). As Dawson and Brunner (2020) note, “This messy, moving, and rowdy media environment necessitates a different ontological perspective” (p. 65). Integrating the ITOC (Lammers & Barbour, 2006) and hybridity framework (Litrico & Besharov, 2019), this research aims to enrich our understanding of the legitimacy implications of organizational hybridity across diverse stakeholders.

The findings revealed that B-Corps were perceived as more legitimate by the accreditation organization when they (1) prioritized communicating their social mission, (2) demonstrated higher levels of integration in benefit models (i.e., developing a business that serves a disadvantaged target group), and (3) targeted broader stakeholders. By contrast, B-Corps with higher integration in their employment models (i.e., providing employment opportunities for a target population) were considered more legitimate by social media users. These findings contribute to a multi-dimensional model of organizational hybridity proposed by Litrico and Besharov (2019), focusing on multiple facets of institutional communication through mission statements. In doing so, we introduce a communication-centered perspective on institutional messages, highlighting the relationships and interactions inherent in stakeholder engagement and hybrid organizing.

Variation Across Stakeholder Groups in Organizational Legitimation

First, the significant relationships between each of the three hybridity dimensions and legitimacy from B-Lab highlight the importance of the accreditation agency in the emerging B-Corp field. B-Lab, in particular, has a strong focus on social mission and a wide reach of customer and beneficiary groups for engagement. Thus, social mission and the substantive coupling of market and social-welfare logics in institutional messages are critical for B-Lab’s assessment, which focuses on B-Corp’s performance across governance, worker welfare, community, environment, and customer service. Moreover, the broad stakeholder scope favored by B-Lab suggests high standards for hybrid SVs and the mission-market tensions they confront (e.g., Sanders, 2012).

Although accreditation agencies serve as gatekeepers for emerging fields, social media plays a significant role in spreading awareness and knowledge among external stakeholders. This study showed that social media users tend to judge B-Corps as more legitimate when they better integrate social-welfare and market logics in their employment models. The significance of the employment model further reinforces the importance of “mission,” suggesting that social media audiences may perceive the employment of disadvantaged populations as a mission-focused initiative. Similarly, prior research indicates that institutional funders may evaluate SVs as more legitimate when SVs integrate employment models (Litrico & Besharov, 2019). From the perspective of the ITOC, the difference in legitimation mechanisms across stakeholder groups (i.e., accreditation agency vs. social media users) highlights that each stakeholder group evaluates organizational legitimacy based on distinct guiding principles, ideals, and belief systems. This leads to diverse expectations and demands regarding the institutional communication of organizational identities, priorities, and activities (Fisher et al., 2017).

Budding research has portrayed social media as a “highly complex” and “really dangerous” domain (Albu & Etter, 2016, p. 25) with “wide-ranging and contradictory public input” and “an exploded stakeholder pool” (Dawson & Brunner, 2020, pp. 58-59). Social media users may emerge as critical stakeholders who can direct public attention, spark backlash, or even cancel organizations during key events, crises, or social movements. They have become pivotal actors in conferring legitimacy onto organizations (Etter et al., 2018). Taken together, social media users challenge traditional understandings of stakeholders, serving as imagined audiences for which that organizations must plan and engage.

In combination, these results expand scholarly understanding of stakeholders. Unlike traditional organization-centered models of stakeholder thinking in which organizations determine whether stakeholders are legitimate or not (e.g., Mitchell et al., 1997), this study suggests stakeholders themselves have the power to confer legitimacy on organizations. Moreover, this study suggests the evaluation of legitimacy is constituted through communication and interaction between the organization and its stakeholders (Suddaby, 2011). This study echoes recent research that moves beyond organization-centered approaches (Koschmann & Kopczynski, 2017), but the focus on SVs allows for consideration of both financial stakes alongside mission concerns. Thus, the relationship between organizations confronting hybridity and their stakeholders may be more complicated (or perhaps interdependent) than prior research has typically assumed. In this light, much of the research aimed at identifying and managing stakeholders no longer fits the reality of today’s hybrid organizing landscape. The critical question is: Which stakeholders serve as gatekeepers for organizational legitimacy, and what are the “gates” or pathways through which they bestow legitimacy?

Hybrid Organizing as Organizational Reality and Future

A dominant institutional logic once characterized most organizational fields and domains, but plural institutional logics are now common, making organizational hybridity a prevalent feature of contemporary organizations (Battilana et al., 2017; Fu & Cooper, 2025; Ganesh & Stohl, 2021). We contend that multiple organizational identities, hybrid forms and logics, and complex stakeholder relationships are not only current organizational realities but also the future landscape of organizing. This research demonstrates the value of the hybridity lens in understanding organizations that embrace multiple institutional logics in pursuit of plural organizational identities, agendas, and goals.

Regardless of how “accepted” hybrid forms of organizing have become, mission-driven organizations may face a higher threshold in meeting stakeholder demands. A mission-market perspective (Sanders, 2012) suggests the social mission component is arguably more challenging to satisfy. This is partially because social missions are harder to measure than business goals, and benefit or employment models may be more difficult to implement or evaluate than sales models, with potentially higher standards for achieving social impact. Organizations focused on social impact work may struggle to gain legitimacy, as key stakeholders might be suspicious of, or even hostile toward, mission-driven organizations that adopt business models. Kopaneva and Cheney (2019) similarly noted that the root of social-market tensions lies in the debate over whether SVs driven by social value creation can be “counted as successful and trustworthy” (p. 499) when they operate using market mechanisms. Consequently, the findings highlight a preference for social mission communication in mission statements.

Theoretical Contributions and Practical Implications

There are several contributions to both research and practice. First, by drawing on the ITOC (Lammers & Barbour, 2006) and hybridity (Litrico & Besharov, 2019) frameworks and applying them to the B-Corp context, this study sheds light on how organizations communicate with disparate stakeholders through the centrality, integration, and scope of multiple logics in their institutional messages. We extend the ITOC research by examining the nuance in institutional messages through the lens of hybridity, explicating multiple dimensions of hybridity. Moreover, this research provides insights into how the different hybridity dimensions are variably related to organizational legitimacy. As B-Corps are a relatively new but increasingly prevalent organizational form, and given that institutional messages, like other institutionalized practices, may be widespread across organizational fields (Lammers, 2011; Suddaby, 2011), this research offers valuable implications for how mission statements might be utilized by organizations and interpreted by external stakeholders.

In addition, this research identifies the differential predictors of organizational legitimacy based on evaluating stakeholder groups, including accreditation organizations and social media users. The findings on the legitimacy implications of hybridity illuminate when and how organizational hybridity can foster legitimacy, addressing the conflicting results of previous qualitative studies (e.g., Kopaneva & Cheney, 2019; Pache & Santos, 2013). Since most organizations encounter hybridity to varying degrees (Battilana et al., 2017; Fu, 2024), these insights provide guidance for organizations navigating hybridity challenges, helping them reconcile multifaceted logics and unlock the potential of SVs for social change. By elucidating multifaceted institutional messages in hybrid organizing and exploring their divergent implications for organizational legitimacy, this research responds to scholarly calls for deeper theorization and examination of hybrid organizing and communication in the contemporary organizational landscape (e.g., Fu & Barbour, 2024; Ganesh & Stohl, 2021; Waisbord, 2023).

Finally, this research extends the literature on stakeholder communication, suggesting that the stakeholder-organization relationship is mutually reinforcing where organizational legitimacy is concerned. Early research views stakeholders as passive receivers of institutional messaging (Lammers, 2011) and as entities that may be recognized as legitimate by organizations (see Mitchell et al., 1997). This study supports the view of Etter et al. (2018) that stakeholder reactions play a key role in determining whether organizations are legitimate, thereby shifting the focus of organizational messaging from stakeholder management to stakeholder engagement (Lewis et al., 2003). Similarly, recent research advocates for a relational, mutually constitutive view of organizational legitimacy, in contrast to an organization-centric view (e.g., Castelló et al., 2016). By acknowledging the critical role of stakeholders in the legitimation process, this research expands stakeholder communication beyond mere strategic or normative obligations, embracing a constitutive approach (see Koschmann, 2016). In doing so, this study extends the ITOC (Lammers, 2011; Lammers & Barbour, 2006) by adding that organizational mission statements act as institutional messages that carry plural institutional logics. Stakeholders, in turn, serve as gatekeepers, using these logics to infer legitimacy.

The role of stakeholders as gatekeepers of organizational legitimacy also prompts practical considerations about the channels and messaging strategies organizations should use. The findings suggest that SVs should prioritize communicating their social mission, integrating both social-welfare and market logics into their benefit and employment models, and targeting a broad spectrum of customers and beneficiaries. Specifically, SVs can engage in active and effective organizational listening, using feedback from disadvantaged beneficiaries to drive positive changes in program offerings and hiring practices. Additionally, organizations may include diverse beneficiary and customer stakeholder groups in their mission statements to promote diversity and inclusion.

Limitations and Future Research

This study has several limitations that provide opportunities for future exploration. First, it focused only on mission statements and overlooked other channels for institutional messages (e.g., grant application documents, press releases, organizational social media posts). Future work should examine how stakeholders evaluate legitimacy across these different channels.

The second limitation concerns measurement. Future research should combine archival data (Etter et al., 2018) with survey data (e.g., public opinion surveys; Schoon, 2022) to better measure organizational legitimacy and the locus of integration, whereas this study relied only on archival data. Regarding variable coding, the intercoder reliability for the integration in benefit models was slightly above the acceptable threshold (α = .73) after three rounds of training and independent coding. Another issue was the high level of integration in the sales model for most B-Corps. The lack of variance in this variable may explain the null effects observed.

This study employed a dictionary-based textual analysis to characterize institutional logics (e.g., Litrico & Besharov, 2019; Ressler et al., 2024). While this approach offers a scalable means of identifying patterns in mission statements, we acknowledge that this method is often insensitive to semantic nuance, contextual variation, and the symbolic or content-dependent nature of language (Loewenstein et al., 2012). Specifically, the logic associated with a given word can vary significantly depending on its linguistic, social, and historical context.

Finally, future research could study organizations that confront hybridity in other fields and sectors to improve the generalizability of the findings. Given the limitations of cross-sectional data analysis, future studies could use a longitudinal design to explore how hybridity evolves over time and its implications for organizational legitimacy.

Conclusion

In today’s hybrid organizing landscape, the diverse stakeholder demands and public agendas have complicated the process of organizational legitimation (Ganesh & Stohl, 2021). As such, understanding the divergent legitimacy implications of organizational communication across disparate stakeholders is imperative. This study explored how multiple insti/copyright/ci/pitutional logics were reflected in the mission statements of B-Corps and examined how institutional messages about hybridity were related to different stakeholder judgements of organizational legitimacy. The results revealed disparate stakeholders responded differently to B-Corps’ communication of multiple logics in their hybrid institutional messages. Given the widespread presence of hybridity in organizational reality and its significance for the future of organizing landscape, more research should employ the hybridity lens to study communication and organizing.

Supplemental Material

Supplemental Material - Hybrid Institutional Messages and Organizational Legitimacy Across Disparate Stakeholders

Supplemental Material for Hybrid Institutional Messages and Organizational Legitimacy Across Disparate Stakeholders by Jiawei Sophia Fu, Yu Xu, Katherine R. Cooper in Management Communication Quarterly.

Footnotes

Acknowledgement

The authors would like to thank Charis Shin and Ashley Chang for their help with data collection and content analysis.

ORCID iDs

Jiawei Sophia Fu

Katherine R. Cooper

Funding

The authors disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: This research was supported by the Rutgers University School of Communication and Information GIFR Research Grant to the first author.

Declaration of conflicting interests

The authors declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Supplemental Material

Supplemental material for this article is available online.

Notes

Author Biographies

Jiawei Sophia Fu (PhD, Northwestern University) is an associate professor of Communication at the School of Communication and Information of Rutgers University. Her research interests center around hybrid organizing, social networks, digital technologies, institutions, and innovation for social impact.

Yu Xu (PhD, University of Southern California) is an associate professor of integrated marketing communications in the Medill School at Northwestern University. His research interests include media industries and analytics, social and communication networks, organizational change, ecology and evolution, and computational social science.

Katherine R. Cooper (PhD, University of Illinois, Urbana Champaign) is an associate professor at the College of Communication of DePaul University. Her main research interests include nonprofit organizations, interorganizational collaboration, and organization-community coordination in response to social challenges.

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