On the risk of studying practices in isolation: Linking what, who, and how in strategy research

Abstract

This is the accepted version of the paper.This version of the publication may differ from the final published version. This paper challenges the recent focus on practices as stand-alone phenomena, as exemplified by the so-called "Practice-Based View of Strategy (PBV)" by Bromiley and Rau (2014). While the goal of "PBV" points to the potential of standard practices to generate performance differentials (in contrast to the Resource Based View), it marginalizes wellknown insights from practice theory more widely. In particular, by limiting its focus to practices, i.e. "what" practices are used, it underplays the implications of "who" is engaged in the practices and "how" the practices are carried out. In examining practices in isolation, the "PBV" carries the serious risk of misattributing performance differentials. In this paper, we offer an integrative practice perspective on strategy and performance that should aid scholars in generating more precise and contextually-sensitive theories about the enactment and impact of practices as well as about critical factors shaping differences in practice outcomes. Permanent repository linkhttp://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/so 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 Bromiley and Rau (2014). While the goal of "PBV" points to the potential of standard practices to generate performance differentials (in contrast to the Resource Based View), it marginalizes well-known insights from practice theory more widely. In particular, by limiting its focus to practices, i.e. "what" practices are used, it underplays the implications of "who" is engaged in the practices and "how" the practices are carried out. In examining practices in isolation, the "PBV" carries the serious risk of misattributing performance differentials. In this paper, we offer an integrative practice perspective on strategy and performance that should aid scholars in generating more precise and contextually-sensitive theories about the enactment and impact of practices as well as about critical factors shaping differences in practice outcomes.

How do things become strategic? ‘Strategifying’ corporate social responsibility

“…The concept of strategifying work hence avoids the risk of considering strategy practices 'in isolation' (Jarzabkowski et al, 2015) by connecting these dimensions and clarifying their potential interactions. The simultaneously communicative and material nature of strategifying -captured by the practices consisting of cognitive coupling and material coupling -suggests that the strategifying concept can also be further developed to uncover some aspects of the performative processes by which strategy is 'brought into being' (Gond et al, 2016;Guérard et al, 2013).…”

Sustainability as Practice: Reflections on the Creation of an Institutional Logic

“…Following this perspective, we address the research gap regarding the comprehension of how sustainability can be a practice. While building theoretical contributions, we add to the sustainability literature by presenting an approach that fosters sustainable actions and stimulates a transition to sustainability [8].…”

“…Then, we must investigate how such actions come to be saturated with meanings elaborated upon by those involved in the day-to-day performance of sustainability. As practice does not occur automatically or in an unproblematic way [8], understandings of sustainability as a practice must be highlighted, including what is required to achieve structural changes towards sustainability, analysing who is responsible for it and how they plan to implement it and determining how such changes manifest in practice.…”

Alliance strategy: context, process, and requirements

“…The single case study with embedded units of analysis involves a technology firm operating within the maritime industryfurther referred to as TechCo -and its service alliance (with one of its public customers). We are interested in narratives of TechCo and its alliance narratives as expression of complex embedded practices (Jarzabkowski et al, 2015). We have focused deliberately only on TechCo and not on their public alliance partner PublicCo 27 to tease out the contradiction-cohesion features of TechCo's internal strategy and the alliance.…”

“…Conceptually, we follow recent work on strategy as practice (Fenton and Langley, 2008;Jarzabkowski et al, 2015). We adopt a strategic narrative lens (Landrum, 2008), being interested in learning more of the relationships between narrative networks and inter-narrative tensions.…”