STRATEGIC MANAGEMENT IN AN ENACTED WORLD

(LINDA SMIRCICH AND CHARLES STUBBART, 1985)

Henrik Alen

Jessi Mänttäri

16.9.2014

OBJECTIVE/PERCEIVED VS. ENACTED ENVIRONMENT

  Objective & Perceived

 

Enacted (Interpretative worldview)

 

Environment Independently given

Accurately /inaccurately

perceived

Enacted through social construction and interaction

processes of organized actors

Interpretative: Specific set of events and relationships

noticed and made meaningful by a specific set of

strategists

Organization Open system

Should adapt to its

environment

Socially constructed system of shared meaning

Interpretative: The degree to which a set of people share

many beliefs, values and assumptions that encourage

them to make mutually-reinforcing interpretations of

their own acts and acts of others

Task of strategic

manager

Maintain congruence

between constraints and

organizational needs

Strategy: a fit between an

organization and its

environment

Organization making, to create and maintain systems of

shared meaning that facilitate organization action

Strategists’ social knowledge constitutes their

environment

IMPLICATIONS OF THE CONCEPT OF ENACTED ENVIRONMENT FOR STRATEGIC

MANAGEMENT

1) Abandoning the prescription that organizations should adapt to their environments

2) Rethinking constraints, threats and opportunities

3) Considering the primary role of the strategic managers to be the management of meaning

MANAGING IN AN ENACTED WORLD

• Process of enacting a reality1) Prior enactment

2) Thinking and acting

3) Competing enactments

• Self-reflection and challenging assumptions -> forget what you know

CRITIQUE

• Not that useful in day-to-day managing -> valuable tool in determinig and updating strategy -> eventual results of one’s impact impossible to foresee

• Role of strategic manager -> constant questoning

• Any environment can be enacted -> laws, regulations, prior enactments etc.

• Usefulness and generilizability of interpretative studies?

THANK YOU!

QUESTIONS, COMMENTS?