Table 1.

Data structure

First-order codes	Theoretical categories	Aggregate dimensions
Rejection of announcement/closure and employees disengage with MNE	Break in cooperative behavior	Impact on knowledge transfer
Statements that conveyed conviction that something needed to happen quickly to re-engage staff
Descriptions that conveyed how staff were willing to engage with knowledge transfer activities	Reinstated cooperative behavior
Statements that indicated objective of protecting and preserving company and staff interests
Anger, frustration, discontent, shock	Emotional barriers	Emotions
Mistrust, betrayal
Sad, upset
Pride	Emotional enablers
Trust, sense of purpose
Counselling	Engaging with emotions	Subsidiary leadership practices
Reassuring
Training and professional development	Reconfiguring incentives
Additional financial incentives
Reflection, inflection, and establishing a new narrative	Sensegiving for subsidiary identity
Local leaders emphasizing tradition of site delivery
Informal one-to-ones and group sessions to reinforce sense of “we’re all in it together”
Established subsidiary identity based on historical performance	Disruption to subsidiary identity	Subsidiary identity dynamics
Discontinuity in subsidiary identity (due to closure announcement)
Some continuity in subsidiary identity	Legacy subsidiary identity
Task-focused, narrower subsidiary identity