Strategy Safari

The word strategy has been around for a long time. It is considered to be the high point of managerial activity, and managers use the word both freely and fondly. But what does the word really mean? Strategy Safari sets out to provide an answer.

In this colourful primer, Henry Mintzberg, Bruce Ahlstrand and Joseph Lampel draw together diverse strands of strategic thought into ten distinct schools. In a final chapter they seek to blend the schools together; pointing out however that a truly unified theory may not be possible or desirable. The result is a thoughful and readale guide to the wilds of strategic management.

Stratefy Safari can be read by anyone with an interest in business strategy but it is especially useful to those managers, scholars and students who must reconcile academic theory with the everyday reality of modern corporate practice.

• Embarkation
  

1. "And Over Here, Ladies and Gentlemen:
   The Strategic Management Beast"
• Why ten?
• A field review
• Five Ps for strategy
• Strategies for better and for worse
• Strategic management as an academic discipline
2. The Design School
   Strategy Formation as a Process of cConception
• Origins of the Design School
• The Basic Design school Model
• Premises of the Design School
• Critique of the Design School
• The Design School: Contexts and Contributions
3. The Planning School
   Strategy Formation as a Formal Process
• The Basic Strategic Planning Model
• Sorting out the Hierarchies
• Premises of the Planning School
• Some More Recent Developments
• Planning’s Unplanned Troubles
• The Fallacies of Strategic Planning
• The Context and Contribution of the Planning School
4. The Positioning School
   Strategy Formation as an Analytical Process
• Enter Porter
• Premises of the Positioning School
• The First Wave: Origins in the Military Maxims
• The Second Wave: The Search for Consulting Imperatives
• The Third Wave: The Development of Empirical Propositions
• Critique of the Positioning School
• Contribution and Context of the Positioning School
5. The Entrepreneurial School
   Strategy formation as a Visionary Process
1. Origins in Economics
2. The Litterature of the Entrepreneurial School
3. Visionary Leadership
4. Premises of the Entrepreneurial School
5. Contribution, Critique, and Context of the Entrepreneurial School
6. The Cognitive School
   Strategy Formation as a Mental Process
• Cognition as Confusion
• Cognition as Information Processing
• Cognition as Mapping
• Cognition as Concept Attainment
• Cognition as Construction
• Premises of the Cognitive School
• Critique, Contribution, and the Context of the Cognitive School
7. The Learning School
   Strategy Formation as an Emergent Process
• Formation vs Formulation
• Emergence of a Learning Model
• New Directions for the Learning School
• From Organizational Learning to the Learning Organization
• Critique of the Learning School
• Contribution and Context of the Learning School
8. The Power School
   Strategy Formation as a Process of Negotiation
• Micro Power
• Upper Echelons Theory: Strategic Management At the Top
• Macro Power
• Conclusion
9. The Cultural School
   Strategy Formation as a Collective Process
• The Nature of Culture
• Premises of the Cultural School
• Culture and Strategy
• The Swedish Wing of the Cultural School
• Resources as the Basis of Competitive Advantage
• Critique, Contribution and Context of the Cultural School
10. The Environmental School
    Strategy Formation as a Reactive Process
• Premises of the Environmental School
• The Contingency View
• The Population Ecology View
• Institutional Pressures to Conform
• Critique, Contribution, and Context of the Environmental School
11. The Configuration School
    Strategy Formation as a Process of Transformation
• Configuration and Transformation
• Splitters and Lumpers
• Premises of the Configuration School
• Researching Configuration
• Transforming Organizations
• Critique, Context, and Contribution of the Configuration School
12. "Hang On, Ladies and Gentlemen,
    You Have Yet to Meet the Whole Beast
• Of Tails and Tusks, Plans and Patterns
• Taming the Wilds of Strategic Management
• Toward Seeing the Whole Beast
• The Hunt for Strategic Management

One of few strategy books worth reading.

If you will have to read ONE strategy book in your life, this is it. Excellent overview and introduction to different schools with pros and cons. Sometimes a bit sarcastic, but that only makes it readable. If you're an aspiring MBA student; read this and you'll even find the strategy courses funny and easy. If you're an practitioner; read this and learn how to see through all your quick-fix consultants that shows up with a new strategy model every now and then.

In Short: an extremely useful and interesting book.