Scientific Progress in Strategic Management Bleg

19 August 2006 at 1:36 pm Nicolai Foss 4 comments

| Nicolai Foss |

I have little doubt that strategic management as a field of inquiry has made significant strides forward in the last 3-4 decades. Let’s just ambitiously assert that it has made “scientific progress.” One has little doubt that an overwhelming majority of the Academy of Management’s perhaps dominant division, the Business Policy and Strategy Division, would agree with this assessment. This is not just bias; the BPS may be important because strategic management is a scientific success story. But on what grounds can we assert this? Here are some possibilities:

The field produces an increasing number of corroborated predictions (Popper, Friedman).
Slight variant of 1): The field produces novel theoretical facts that are confirmed in empirical research practices (Lakatos).
The field is increasingly capable aligning hitherto contradictory perspectives and subordinate them under overarching perspectives.
The field to an increasing extent digs into the real causal structure that produces the phenomena that strategic management is taken up with. (Scientific realism, reductionism).
The field increasingly takes a methodological individualist approach to explanation (Foss, International Journal of Strategic Change Management, forthcoming).
The field is becoming increasingly formalized (Rich Makadok?).

Of course, there are other possibilities. Let us abstract from the pomo ones (e.g., strategic management is becoming increasingly adept at playing word games), and only consider serious ones. So what do the readers think? JC? Teppo? Joe? Rudy? And can anyone point me to relevant literature, in SM as well as in philosophy?

Entry filed under: - Foss -, Methods/Methodology/Theory of Science, Strategic Management.

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4 Comments Add your own

1. Bob V | 19 August 2006 at 5:34 pm

Just curious: do you regard research into complex systems and evolutionary economics as pomo?
2. Cristian | 19 August 2006 at 11:57 pm

Nicolai,

I am not sure about the scientific progress made by the field of strategic management over the past few decades. Here’s what I wrote in “Looking Down on Corporate Strategy” at RedefiningStrategy.com:

“Over time, as more offerings became commodities and more companies were faced with increased competition, the term “corporate strategy” seemed to make perfect sense. Few, if any, would question its usage. Ironically though, while the term’s validation got stronger with the passage of time, the concept itself became increasingly unfit for the realities of the evolving business world. The best evidence supporting this claim is offered by the emergence of the concept of the business model in the nineteen nineties. Although focused more on the operational side of business, like strategy, the concept of the business model is also intended to describe/prescribe the essence of enduring corporate success. However, its increasing popularity points to a mounting dissatisfaction with the effectiveness of corporate strategy.”

As for your request “point me to relevant (SM) literature,” I would like to invite you to visit my initiative at http://www.BizBigPic.com.

Cristian | BizBigPic
3. Nicolai Foss | 20 August 2006 at 1:50 am

Bob V, Why should anyone characterize this research as pomo? I certainly don’t. I have contributed to evolutionary economics myself.
4. Bob V | 20 August 2006 at 3:17 pm

It was a naive suspicion on my part as I haven’t delved into the topic yet.

With the disclaimer of my ignorance provided, let me explain why I asked. Pomo to me are those arguments which attempt to criticize the rationalist approaches that we typically embrace in science. Pomo arguments like to make metaphors based on Go:del’s theorem, quantum mechanics, relativism, and the second law of thermodynamics. These are invoked in the attempt to show the boundaries of linear, rational thought.

Evolutionary economics, in my understanding (based on rumor), says that we cannot easily predict the behavior of a large, complicated economic system based solely on an examination of the individual components. It argues for holistic analysis–not that this is a bad thing, but I did associate it with pomo.

By the way, where would you direct an operations management doctoral student to learn a small bit about evolutionary economics?