Strategizing by routines
Year: 2008
Type: article
Abstract: Starting from the theoretical discussion on routines and building on informal and interpretative perspectives on strategizing and organizing the paper analyses how interplay through communication between routines and strategizing, explicitly and tacitly, takes place. This is done through a study of how management in 15 small and medium sized Danish firms strategizes on a daily basis and by an in-depth longitudinal study in one of those firms. This study reveals how routines influence strategizing and how some routines create a specific framework for these processes. It also looks upon how routines occur, are reformed, and created through strategizing in a natural becoming process, and how strategic routines in some situations do not have the same influence on strategizing as non-strategic routines. Key concepts: Strategizing, routines, sensemaking, becoming. Defining routines and strategy Foci for this paper are two forms of routines – strategic and non strategic. A routine is defined following the classic definition of Winter (Winter, 1964: 263): “pattern of behavior that is followed repeatedly, but subject to change if conditions change”, (se also Becker 2004:664). At the same time we will discuss if an alternative definition of Hodgson and Knudsen might be more relevant: “Routines are dispositions rather than sets of behaviors” (Hodgson and Knudsen 2004:289) to enlarge the range of routines. By characterizing routines as dispositions we argue for a process approach and understanding of routines where also potentials are included. At the same time we argue that routines represent more than repeated behavior, routines are part of and elements to maintain or develop how we conceive the world and make sense of our behavior. These actions are constantly changing since every encounter we take part in is different and therefore naturally modifies the routines we use. In addition to both these definitions routines are seen in the following way: “Historically the term ‘routines’ clearly referred to recurrent interaction patterns, that is, collective recurrent activity patterns.” This might be supplemented in the following way by the same authors: “By “organizational routines”, we mean patterned sequences of learned behavior involving multiple actors who are linked by relations of communication and/or authority” (Cohen & Bacdayan 1994:555). Both these quotations underline the interpersonal content of the kind of routines discussed here. This is also the case in the following: “Routines depend on a group of individuals...” (Hodgson & Knudsen 2004:290). On the function of routines a number of quotations point at: “routines offer a powerful concept that accounts for much of what happens – both good and bad – in organizations...” (Cohen & Bacdayan 1994:556), “routines are a major source of organizational competence.” (op. cit:555), and “without routines, organizations would loose efficiency as structures of collective actions.” (op. cit. 554) Other writers have been on the same track: “These explanations suggest that routines arise because they are functional; they minimize costs and increase managerial control, while maximizing the legitimacy of the organization.” (Feldman & Pentland 2003:97).
Institution: Aalborg University
Language: English
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W2101394055