Strategic Executive Decisions: An Analysis of the Difference Between Theory and Practice (NATO Asi Series C: Mathematical and)

This groundbreaking contribution to business literature examines executive decisionmaking behavior concerning corporate and competitive business strategy. In contrast to previous studies, Strategic Executive Decisions does not offer a prescription for executive decisionmaking. Rather, with the help of extensive data collected over a seven-year period, Stahl describes how some 1500 executives actually do make strategic decisions from the executives' self reports of their own priorities, showing how reality differs substantially from existing theories widely used to explain executive decisionmaking behavior. Required reading for students of management and finance, this book offers an important new methodological alternative to existing theoretical explanations of executive decisionmaking behavior. Based on the observed difference between theory and actual practice, Stahl identifies and explains the limitations of much of the current research in strategic decisionmaking. He goes on to offer a methodologically rigorous alternative that more closely reflects what actually happens when executives grapple with key decisions involving joint ventures, market entry, diversification, acquisitions, project selection, and long-term strategic goals. The bulk of the study is devoted to a detailed analysis of executive decisionmaking in practice. Stahl shows that the only reliable means of determining how strategic decisions are made is unbiased observation of several decisions followed by calculation of what is really important to the decisionmaker. Questionnaires or interviews with the executives, Stahl demonstrates, will often produce misleading information about how a particular decision was made.Michael J. Stahl is the author of 'Strategic Executive Decisions: An Analysis of the Difference Between Theory and Practice (NATO Asi Series C: Mathematical and)', published 1989 under ISBN 9780899303161 and ISBN 0899303161.