Management and Business Environment
Richard Whittington in his book entitled “What is strategy – and does it matter?” presents four generic approaches to strategy formulation, development and implementation in organisation. These perspectives on strategy are [2]:
The Classical approach – the oldest and still most influential view on strategy relying on rational and careful planning to maximise organisation profit. Classicists theorist assumes that business environment and organisation behaviour are predictable, planning are essential to predict future market changes and to prepare strategic plan to adopt to the changes. Rational analysis and objective decisions allows achieving long-run successes and avoid failures.
The Evolutionary approach – more fatalistic approach, seeing the business environment as a jungle in which the main aim of an organisation is to survive by being efficient. Business processes and competition between organisations are compared to the biological evolution processes. Rational long-term planning is irrelevant due to unpredictable business environment. Only these organisations which are capable of fitting efficiently to the environment changes may have a chance to maximise theirs profit.
The Processual approach – seeing the rational long-term planning as a futile processes, due to unforeseeable behaviour of people and unpredictable business environment. Strategy emerges as a result of pragmatic processes of forecasting and learning. The optimal strategy is not known.
The Systemic approach – believing that rational planning is useful, however it is embedded in social system. This strategy perceptive believes that people and theirs behaviour are foreseeable and can prepare the rational plan of action. However, the strategy objectives and practices are depended on the social system in which the strategy is carried out.
The above generic perspectives of strategy differ fundamentally according to: the outcomes of strategy, the processes by which the strategy is made. To
The Classical approach – the oldest and still most influential view on strategy relying on rational and careful planning to maximise organisation profit. Classicists theorist assumes that business environment and organisation behaviour are predictable, planning are essential to predict future market changes and to prepare strategic plan to adopt to the changes. Rational analysis and objective decisions allows achieving long-run successes and avoid failures.
The Evolutionary approach – more fatalistic approach, seeing the business environment as a jungle in which the main aim of an organisation is to survive by being efficient. Business processes and competition between organisations are compared to the biological evolution processes. Rational long-term planning is irrelevant due to unpredictable business environment. Only these organisations which are capable of fitting efficiently to the environment changes may have a chance to maximise theirs profit.
The Processual approach – seeing the rational long-term planning as a futile processes, due to unforeseeable behaviour of people and unpredictable business environment. Strategy emerges as a result of pragmatic processes of forecasting and learning. The optimal strategy is not known.
The Systemic approach – believing that rational planning is useful, however it is embedded in social system. This strategy perceptive believes that people and theirs behaviour are foreseeable and can prepare the rational plan of action. However, the strategy objectives and practices are depended on the social system in which the strategy is carried out.
The above generic perspectives of strategy differ fundamentally according to: the outcomes of strategy, the processes by which the strategy is made. To