Background
We develop and test theory on executive impression management in interactive disclosure settings. Prior research has focused on executives’ prepared, one-way communication, overlooking whether executives sustain their narratives under real-time analyst questioning. Drawing on impression management theory, we examine how failures to sustain a consistent narrative across scripted and unscripted communication shape investor reactions. Specifically, we introduce executive tone decoupling—the extent to which the tone of executives’ prepared presentations is more positive than their spontaneous responses to analyst questions—and argue that such inconsistencies constitute ineffective impression management that triggers negative market reactions. We further theorize disclosure timing as a boundary condition and argue that delays between earnings releases and earnings calls give investors more time to process information, reducing the perceived severity of tone inconsistencies. Employing a novel machine learning–based measure of executive impression management that filters out expected tone variation in interactive settings on a sample of S&P500 earnings calls from 2010 to 2025, we find that a one-standard-deviation increase in tone decoupling is associated with a decline of 21 basis points in 3-day cumulative abnormal returns. We contribute to impression management theory by demonstrating that impression management breaks down when executives cannot sustain narratives under analyst pressure.
Approach
Machine learning–based measure of executive impression management that filters out expected tone variation in interactive settings on a sample of 20,000 S&P 500 earnings calls from 2010 to 2025.
Project publications and presentations
Jin, X., Ademi, E. & Tumasjan, A. (2026). Scripted Optimism and Unscripted Truth: How Executive Tone Decoupling Shapes Market Reactions. Accepted for presentation at the 86th Academy of Management Annual Meeting, Philadelphia, PA, USA
Jin, X., Ademi, E. & Tumasjan, A. (2026). Scripted Optimism and Unscripted Truth: How Executive Tone Decoupling Shapes Market Reactions. Presented at the 16th EIASM Workshop on Top Management Teams and Business Strategy, Valencia, Spain
Project members