The Financialization of Vision: A Longitudinal Study on Capital Injection, "Vision Drift," and Discourse Shifts in Startup Recruitment

Emerging impact and hybrid startups often commence with prosocial, mission-driven visions intended to addresssocietal challenges. However, as these ventures navigate sequential venture capital (VC) funding rounds, they faceintense institutional pressures to prioritize commercial metrics over social goals. This study proposes a novel,longitudinal mixed-methods computational framework to empirical measure "Vision Drift"—the systematicdisplacement of prosocial organizational identities by capitalized, performance-driven logics. Drawing uponInstitutional Logics Theory and Discourse Analysis, we track a panel of 500 startups over a ten-year longitudinalhorizon (2015–2025). By comparing foundational mission statements with longitudinal job posting texts usingNatural Language Processing (NLP), structural topic modeling, and dictionary-based semantic embedding, weidentify the operational tipping points (e.g., Series B investment rounds) where normative discourse transitions intounit-economics terminology (e.g., CAC, LTV, retention metrics). This research bridges organizational behavior andsociology of finance, providing empirical evidence of how venture capital transforms the normative identity ofmodern entrepreneurial ventures.