ConJunction

At the 42nd Strategic Management Conference in London, the paper “Taking individual choices seriously: Self-selection and the coordination of strategy work” co-authored by Martin Friesl, Christoph Brielmaier (both University of Bamberg) and myself, was awarded the Best Paper Award of the Strategy Practice Interest Group of the Strategic Management Society (SMS). Christoph was so kind to collect our award certificate in London.

The Abstract of the paper reads as follows:

An increasing body of work investigates the participation of a diverse set of actors in strategy making. There is also a converging view in strategy practice and process research that diverse participation in the strategy process has positive implications for corporate renewal and success. In this paper, we argue that extant research tends to gloss over a fundamental condition underpinning participation in such types of strategizing: participation does largely do not involve a hierarchical mandate but is the result of processes of self-selection on the individual level. While this may seem self-evident, it is of crucial importance. These forms of strategizing are, therefore, not the outcome of deliberate top-down choice, nor do they form a ‘random’ pattern. Rather, they are based on an ‘endogenous’ logic, which explains whether an individual self-selects into the process or not. Thus, it is this logic of self-selection that ultimately gives rise to strategic outcomes. This paper aims to make three contributions to strategy practice and process research. It differentiates two forms of self-selection (managed and unmanaged) and describes their implications on the level of the organization and the level of the individual. Moreover, this paper also theorizes the underlying mechanisms governing selection choices.

We are currently revising the article for publication in a journal. In case you are interested in the conference paper, I am happy to provide it via e-mail.