Ineffectual Orders: Habituated Effectuation in a Scaling Social Enterprise

The institutional complexity and economics of worth literature are largely silent on the potential for conflict between particular orders of worth—meta-cognitive conventions for making and justifying decisions—to become intractable. The entrepreneurship literature is largely silent on the potential for effectuation—a meta-cognitive process informing decision-making under uncertainty—to become habituated. Our ethnographic study of a globally scaling, inclusivity social enterprise brings together these disparate literatures to show that effectuation and its alternative, causation, can act as catalysts for conflict among orders of worth, and when habituated among focal actors, hold the potential to turn a globally scaling social enterprise into a failed organization. Insights for theory and practice in hybrid organizations and entrepreneurship are provided.