Strategic decision-making: Process perspectives

This paper reviews the strategic decision-making process literature with respect to the synoptic formalism/political incrementalism debate. Procedural rationality is chosen as a representative of the synoptic formalism perspective; and both intuitive synthesis and political behaviour are employed as representatives of the political-incrementalism perspective. In this paper, the author discusses the theoretical underpinnings of these three process dimensions, as well as the key research efforts gathered together under each perspective. In conducting this review, a number of areas have been identified which could profitably be examined further, and a number of implications for managers will be highlighted and discussed.