Micro Foundations of Mission Drift: Affective and Cognitive Perspectives

Abstract

When there is a gradual shift from the intended founding purpose of an organisation, scholars term this mission drift, and it has become a central concern in hybrid organisational research, where commercial and social gains are combined. While prior research has attributed mission drift to macro-level institutional and governance factors, etc., this study highlights the emotional and cognitive processes that contribute to the gradual deviation from founding missions. This paper develops two distinct theoretical perspectives on the micro foundations of mission drift, drawing on Affective Events Theory (AET) and Construal Level Theory (CLT). Using a thematic study, we show how recurring emotional reactions to mission-relevant events (AET) and systematic shifts in psychological distance and cognitive abstraction (CLT) independently and jointly explain how individual-level experiences culminate into organisational-level mission drift. We compare both perspectives, highlight their complementarities and divergences, and propose a research agenda with testable propositions. In practice, we argue that sustaining mission alignment requires organisational interventions that target both emotional climates and cognitive framing. The paper advances microfoundations research in hybrid organising and offers a pluralistic theoretical foundation for future empirical work.