Strategy Retold: Toward a Narrative View of Strategic Discourse

Subhendu Pattnaik

by David Barry, Michael Elmes

Summary

• Strategy’s Changing Theory• Why Take a Narrative Turn?

• Key Narrative Voices

• Strategy as a Type of Narrative• Difference between Fiction & Narrative

• Shkolovsky Narrative Framework

• Strategic Credibility• Materiality

• Voice & Perspective

• Ordering & Plots

• Readership

• Strategic Defamiliarization• Epic Narrative

• Technofuturist Narrative

• Purist Narrative

• Betting on Future• Changing Patterns of Authorship

• Changing Archetypes

• Polyphonic Strategy

• Conclusion

Background

Objective: Understanding Strategic Management as a form of Fiction

20 Years Ago, we started with – Planning could not do any wrong.(Mintzberg, 1994:4)

Today - Competition, Forecasting, Fit affect this planning.

Need to reconceptualise strategic enterprise is strongly felt.(cf. Mintzberg, 1994: 91-214; Prahalad & Hamel, 1994)

Why Narrative as a technique?

• Objective: The goal is not to replace strategic thinking but to provide theorists and practitioners with an additional interpretive lens.

• Why?• Narrativity emphasizes the simultaneous presence of multiple, interlinked realities, thus is well positioned for

capturing the diversity and complexity present in strategic discourse.

• Narrative approach highlights the discursive, social nature of strategy, linking it more to cultural and historicalcontext (cf. Smircich & Stubbart, 1985)

• Narrative approach can make the political economies of strategy more visible (cf. Boje, 1996)

• From a practitioner’s viewpoint, narrativist stance can encourage people to explore strategic issues in moremeaningful ways (Wilson, 1979).

• Key Narrative Voices• Among Literary theorists, narratives have gradually become a key platform for discussing stories.

• Various forms – Past or Future oriented, Written or Spoken, Fact or Fantasy, Short story or Novel

• Field draws from – Literary criticism, Rhetorical theory, Aesthetics, Semiotics, Poetics, Artistry

• Subjective heterogeneous interpretations of texts are the norm; A View that opens up new trains of thoughtamong different readers.

• Narrativity encompasses both the telling and the told, Can be applied to strategizing and strategies.

Strategy as a type of Narrative

• Traditional strategy conceptualizations – Fit, Prediction & Competition

• Contrasting View by Narrative Approach – How language is used to construct meaning, explores ways in which organisational stakeholders create a discourse of direction to understand influence of one another’s actions.

• In narrative form, strategy stands between theatrical drama, historical novel, futurist fantasy and autobiography.

• Regardless of whether Narrative takes Traditional approach( Forward looking strategies) to Emergent approach ( Retrospectively focused strategies), it can be considered as a form of fiction.

• Fiction does not necessarily mean something which is false, it is just something which is created and made up.

• Any story the strategist tells, is but one of Many competing alternatives woven from a vast array of possible characterisation, plot lines, and themes.

• Thus strategic effectiveness from a narrative perspective is intimately tied to acceptance, approval and adoption.

• Diverse Narrative frameworks exist to explain how authors create effective stories – We follow the Shkolovskyframework –

• Strategic Credibility (Narrative has to be credible)

• Strategic Defamiliarization (Narrative has to be Novel, new, unique)

Strategic Credibility

• You should not say directly – Trust Me! My strategy will work – it will happen. Instead draw upon myriad oftactics which invokes a sense of realism and facticity.

• Materiality• Refers to Physicality of strategy; Printed vs Verbal oration of strategy. Once printed, strategy assumes an

undeniable corporeal existence.• Modern day – projection onto screen, diverse tactics to give importance to the presentation. But too much

of show can bring to light its fictitiousness and thus, convincing strategy presentation stop well short ofcinematic emulation.

• Repetitions are allowed in Verbal orations to group action patterns, facilitate recall & create emphasis• Choice of Characters are meticulously done to resemble familiarity, mannerism etc thereby keep

credibility. Ex: Aliens

• Voice & Perspective• Who Sees (Internal & External Perspectives both covered?) and Who Says (Narrator a character in the

story or not?)• Traditional writing excluded author from the statement itself in an effort to stay unbiased and present

singular perspective. Ex: (Statement as this bullet point) Why Singular – Reader is unaware that thestrategic info is pulled from multiple sources and the view adopted is one of the many possibilities.

• Heteroglossia – Diverse languages and customs- Currently in use in organisations where heterologicdifferences between divisions exist.

Strategic Credibility contd.

• You should not say directly – Trust Me! My strategy will work – it will happen. Instead draw upon myriad of tactics which invokes a sense of realism and facticity.

• Ordering & Plots

• Epic Hero – Hero/Company facing huge obstacle – Hero pulls together employees and wins the battle.

• Romanticist - Company portrayed as recovering from a fall of grace; We have gotten awfully fat. We’ll battle our bulge, find our core self and emerge a slimmer, wiser, more attractive company.

• Readership

• Akin to Beauty Lies in the Eyes of Beholder – Meaning of a Text resides not just ‘in the text itself’ but also in the ‘background and experiences” the readers bring into the text while consuming it.

• The interplay of text, author and reader indicates that the relationship is dynamic – reflecting the intent of the author and construction of meaning by reader.

Today’s professionalization of managers works reverse- they want to standardize reader’s responses.

Strategic Defamiliarization

• Any defamiliarizing perspective or device, no matter how initially exciting and captivating, becomes familiar, mundane and tiresome with time.

• Applied to Strategy, this means that strategic narratives have shelf lives – use-by-dates that require a steady influx of new perspectives. And New perspectives are attained by getting away from day-to-day distractions (Ex: Off-Site meetings)

• This need for defamiliarization thus explains need for rapid adoptions of presentation formats which are novel and credible.

• Epic Narrative – is concerned with Interpretation. In light of SWOT, how do we navigate towards opportunities and away from threats. (This genre (construct), uses few basic ideas to design strategy)

• Technofuturist Narrative – This genre is known for complexity and extraordinary attention to detail. Focuses more on temporal (time) sequencing, this results in comprehensive, futuristic texts filled with detached, quasi-scientific forecasts. However, ironically, widespread use of this technique proved its undoing.

• Purist Narrative – This genre offered a defamiliarizing, relatively atemporal character-based narrative. Offered guarantee that companies able to choose an ideal strategic type, conform to it, avoid joining Porter’s stuck in the middle and directionless reactors would earn above-average returns in its industry despite competitive forces. Too many theories confused readers and undermined the appeal of this.

• Other contender frameworks came in all employing some forms of defamiliarization – Technofuturistic genre with very short time horizon & later evolved with renewed interest in distant events but in an ‘imagining’ way.

Betting on the Future

• What forms will strategic narratives take next? Will depend on the organizations of the future

• Future organisations will be even more fluid and permeable than today’s.

• Surrounded by growing pool of unpredictable opportunities, future orgs will need to rely more on quick-thinking, knowledgeable employees whi can attend to environmental shifts and work innovatively with paradox.

• Thus, credibly defamiliarizing strategic narratives will embody and reflect these emerging trends.• Changing Patterns of Authorship

• Reducing Stakeholder attention spans, Abundance of written materials (print/email) will force strategic authors of tomorrow to create engaging, lively and artful stories that can be told quickly.

• More of Participative planning will come in.• Authors to realize stakeholder success at influencing directionality of the firm will depend less on the employee

designation and more on their conceptual and political capabilities.• Changing Archetypes

• Bowles (1993:403) used mythical archetypes to situate organisational themes – Sky-god Zeus.

• Future strategists will need to find archetypal bases that reflect greater feeling, sustenance and play.

• Polyphonic Strategy • Author will take less authoritative role and get into dialogical authorship. • Creating such polyphonic narratives would mean strategic authors assume a more processual role, which

emphasizes listening for diverse points of view and representing them in ways that generate dialogic understanding.

An Illustrative Tale

• Large European Aluminum Producer

• Company portrayed having recently overcome a long period of decline.

• There developed an expressed restlessness within the organization. Company executives asked Marjorie Parker (1990) to life the company to a new plateau.

• Challenge was to find a new way to represent the organization. Metaphor search was on.

• Company finally emerged as a world leader in aluminum production.

Conclusion

• Strategy as a tale has a great perspective to offer.• Helpful when theorists study power and politics of strategy.

• The narrative view also invites number of hitherto unasked, but potentially important questions.

The points mentioned in the slidedeck has been taken almost verbatim from the original work of Barry & Elmes and should by no means be considered to be the work of the presenter – Subhendu Pattnaik.