Structural holes and managerial performance: Identifying the underlying mechanisms

nnovativeness nowledge heterogeneity etwork structure Structural holes theory suggests a variety of possible explanations for the empirically observed relationship between structural holes and individual managerial performance. However, little has been done to disentangle onemechanism fromanother. This paper empirically tests amediatedmoderationmodel that distinguishes between the five different theoretical mechanisms: autonomy, competition, information brokering, opportunity recognition and innovativeness. The findings suggest that of these five theoretical causal motors, innovativeness plays a key role in linking network structure and network content to performance.