Strategizing Activities and Practices (SAP)
The Strategizing Activities and Practices Interest Group aims to create a developmental community for academics and practitioners who wish to advance knowledge and understanding of strategy as something people do rather than something organizations have. We aim to offer opportunities for lively and stimulating engagement to scholars sharing this interest.
595 Members
Division
Domain Statement
Strategizing Activities and Practices advances the knowledge and understanding of strategy as something people do and not just something organizations have, and therefore the work involved in doing strategy. Empirically the focus is on the day-to-day-work, activities and practices of strategists, with an interest in how this work socially accomplishes a wide range of individual and organizational outcomes, and also relates to broader societal and institutional trends.
The focus on strategists extends beyond concerns with upper echelons and even middle managers to include other influential players such as consultants, non executives and business school gurus, and beyond considerations such as demographics to a consideration of how aspects such as training, knowledge, identity and emotions can affect an individual’s strategy making activity.
The focus on the work of strategists includes both understanding at a micro level traditional areas of strategy process and content research and the generic practices (e.g. planning routines, discourse, tool-use) by which they are accomplished. Methodologically this research focus generates particular challenges in terms of closeness to strategic practitioners. Thus the interest group encourages methodological innovation through, for example, collaborative and mixed method approaches, action research interventions, executive development and coaching based relationships, video and narrative approaches. Theoretical pluralism is also encouraged with recognition of the potential contributions from a wide range of sociological and organization theories such as practice based, institutional, discourse, sensemaking, routines and cognition.