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Two Strategic Schools Comparisons

Two Strategic School Theories

Two Strategic School Theories

"The primary business of every business is to stay in business." (Levitt, 1962, p.1).
Yet, business sustainability seems harder than ever to achieve. A key to providing an organization with a beneficial, reliable foundation possibly could lie within the boundaries of planning in conjunction with its strategies. Mintzberg classifies strategy into 10 schools of thought, either prescriptive and practitioner-focused or descriptive and research-focused. Prescriptive schools seek to control strategy through process analysis process and strategy formulation. While, descriptive schools seem to be about strategy development and emergence (Minzberg, Lampel, Quinn, and Ghoshal, 2004; Minzberg, Ahlstrand, and Lampel, 2005).
For this paper, Mintzberg’s learning and cognitive schools of thought will be explored. These two schools theoretically address change based on assumed interrelationships. Both schools do have risk and uncertainty attached to complex change variables apparent in both the internal and external environments. However, imperative as strategy formulation takes place will be manageable and resourceful approaches integrated within frameworks that can facilitate change.
Compare and contrast two schools of thought
Learning school of thought strategic processes evolves through experimentation where management incorporates historical data of lessons learned through trial and error into overall plans of action. Learning school’s root is psychology. Moreover, change happens on an as need basis. In addition, learning school involves every organizational member and information flows in bottom-up process. As a result, management strategies remain ambiguous because ideas are generated randomly from different subsystems within an organization. Learning school seems to address organizational capabilities of how, when and what tools to use. Therefore, learning school does not seem to be results...