Purpose– The purpose of this paper is to investigate the effects that decision routines have on boards’ strategic decision-making in the forms of decision quality and commitment in associations. In addition, it seeks to examine the moderating impact of (1) division of labor, as a proxy for nonprofit boards leadership style, and of (2) group dynamics (managing conflict and promoting understanding), on the relationship between decision routines and the two proposed outcomes.

Topic’s relation to the state of knowledge in the field – How do association boards make high-quality, consequential decisions? This is an empirical matter that surprisingly has received little attention in the literature. Too little attention has been paid to boards’ strategic decision-making processes and how they are influenced by contextual factors (Cornforth, 2012). More generally, there has been insufficient attention in research design to systematically examining the influence of contextual factors on boards’ strategic decision-making process, or taking account of contextual differences in developing theory about boards (Cornforth, 2012). Recently, Ostrower and Stone’s (2010) findings demonstrated the utility of the framework and approach showing how various external and internal contingencies were associated with different board behaviors. These efforts have potential value in helping organize findings from empirical research on nonprofit governance and to encourage theoretical endeavors to take account of contextual factors.

Design/methodology/approach– Integrating the behavioral theory of decision making (Huse, 2007), group decision process theory (Brown, 2005), and contingency theory (Fiedler, 1967), this study proposes a model that incorporates several moderating influences completing multiple three-way interaction models; and then tests the hypotheses using data exploring CEO responses to strategic decision making and the association’s respective boards.

Findings– Evidence was found to support the expectation that the moderating effects of division of labor and group dynamics on decision routine-decision quality are significant. The moderating impact, however, varied significantly by both the type of leadership arrangement and the level of crisis facing the associations.

Research limitations/implications– This study captured the essence of the decision-making process with respect to the behavioral factors, over the structural factors, involving contingency factors, but future research using longitudinal designs that account for the contingency factors is needed to confirm the validity of the findings.

Practical implications– The practical implications of this study point towards a need for CEOs and boards of directors to pay attention to matching decision-making arrangement with various contingency factors.

Originality/value – This research identified relevant contingency and moderating variables that help to explain the equivocal results of previous studies attempting to link strategic decision-making process to boards’ decision quality and their commitment level.