Style and strategy: New metaphors, new insights

Steve Barnett

European Management Journal, 1996, vol. 14, issue 4, 347-355

Abstract: Traditional strategic planning starts from problematic assumptions about how we know - attempting to predict certainty, or at least high probability, for business relevant futures. This article suggests starting from uncertainty, based on the metaphor of emergent paradigms (self-organizing systems whose evolution cannot be predicted). Planning using emergent paradigms benefits from dialogue with people whose perspectives differ drastically from most senior executives. The goal is to have higher level ongoing strategic conversations, not fixed plans, as the basis of future business success and innovation. Examples of such conversations are provided from the automobile, systems consulting, and food industries. Practical steps are suggested for replacing, or at least supplementing, a traditional strategic style with this 'dialogic' approach to business futures.

Date: 1996
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