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The Role of Micro‐Strategies in the Engineering of Firm Evolution

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  • Carlo Salvato

Abstract

abstract This paper proposes a model of strategic evolution as a sequence of intentional recombinations of a company's Core Micro‐strategy with new resources and organizational routines. A Core Micro‐strategy is defined here as the established system of interconnected routines, micro‐activities and resources that can be traced through most of a company's strategic initiatives. The paper is based on two comparative case studies and on theories of evolution in social and cultural systems, intraorganizational ecology and the resource‐based view of the firm. The resulting model advances the existing literature on strategy evolution by (1) incorporating a more direct and salient role of managerial leadership within processes of strategic evolution, (2) incorporating a central role for micro‐level processes through which management can directly and intentionally shape strategic evolution, and (3) proposing recent developments in the resource‐based view of the firm as a suitable theoretical framework with which to explain the processes in which strategic evolution is rooted. The model also contributes to the dynamic capabilities perspective by offering a microprocessual interpretation of their workings. The resulting view of dynamic capabilities suggests that they operate more through repeated recombination patterns of stable organizational factors, than through disruption of existing practices. The paper describes the empirical evidence which emerges from analysis of the two case studies; the two descriptive models of strategy evolution inductively built on the cases; the theoretical model resulting from cross‐case analysis and iteration between the two grounded models and theoretical frameworks.

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  • Carlo Salvato, 2003. "The Role of Micro‐Strategies in the Engineering of Firm Evolution," Journal of Management Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 40(1), pages 83-108, January.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:jomstd:v:40:y:2003:i:1:p:83-108
    DOI: 10.1111/1467-6486.t01-2-00005
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    10. Stańczyk-Hugiet Ewa, 2014. "Routines in the process of organizational evolution," Management, Sciendo, vol. 18(2), pages 73-87, December.
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    13. Christopher Coghlan & JoAnne Labrecque & Yu Ma & Laurette Dubé, 2020. "A Biological Adaptability Approach to Innovation for Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs): Strategic Insights from and for Health-Promoting Agri-Food Innovation," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(10), pages 1-21, May.
    14. Tamim Elbasha & Alex Wright, 2017. "Reconciling structure and agency in strategy -as-practice research: Towards a strong- structuration theory approach," Post-Print hal-01557268, HAL.
    15. Ericson, Mona, 2014. "On the dynamics of fluidity and open-endedness of strategy process toward a strategy-as-practicing conceptualization," Scandinavian Journal of Management, Elsevier, vol. 30(1), pages 1-15.
    16. Eriksson, Taina, 2014. "Processes, antecedents and outcomes of dynamic capabilities," Scandinavian Journal of Management, Elsevier, vol. 30(1), pages 65-82.
    17. Vrontis, Demetris & Basile, Gianpaolo & Simona Andreano, M. & Mazzitelli, Andrea & Papasolomou, Ioanna, 2020. "The profile of innovation driven Italian SMEs and the relationship between the firms’ networking abilities and dynamic capabilities," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 114(C), pages 313-324.
    18. Kim, Sung Min & Mahoney, Joseph T., 2006. "Collaborative Planning, Forecasting, and Replenishment (CPFR) as a Relational Contract: An Incomplete Contracting Perspective," Working Papers 06-0102, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, College of Business.
    19. Matthijs Janssen & Carolina Castaldi & Alexander Alexiev, 2014. "Dynamic capabilities for service innovation: conceptualization and measurement," Working Papers 14-07, Eindhoven Center for Innovation Studies, revised Mar 2014.
    20. Aimilia Protogerou & Yannis D. Caloghirou & Glykeria Karagouni, 2014. "The relevance of the 'dynamic capabilities' perspective in low-tech sectors," Chapters, in: Hartmut Hirsch-Kreinsen & Isabel Schwinge (ed.), Knowledge-Intensive Entrepreneurship in Low-Tech Industries, chapter 7, pages 138-165, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    21. Nicolaï Foss & Nils Stieglitz, 2012. "Modern Resource-based Theory(ies)," Chapters, in: Michael Dietrich & Jackie Krafft (ed.), Handbook on the Economics and Theory of the Firm, chapter 20, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    22. Steensen, Elmer Fly, 2014. "Five types of organizational strategy," Scandinavian Journal of Management, Elsevier, vol. 30(3), pages 266-281.

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