| The subject of this thesis is to isolate and better understand strategic decision making frameworks as they are used in practice, and the role that feedback and learning processes play in reaching a decision within an entrepreneurial or strategic investment decision context and in technologically intensive, complex, dynamic, and uncertain environments. This research is motivated by a continuing schism between two diverging perspectives or schools of decision making. The first is the view that 'the manager is a technician' (Schon, 1983: 236); the second that 'the manager is a craftsman' (ibid.).; Following the Hegelian approach of 'thesis, antithesis, synthesis' (Dewey, 1915: 51), we will attempt to outline a third alternative to the two prevalent and conflicting schools of decision making, namely, Analytic or Synoptic versus Experiential or Incremental School. This third alternative consists of the Meta-Cognitive Paradigm and the Strategic or Active Incrementalism Framework of Decision Making (Carayannis, 1993, 1994a, 1994b, 1994c).; We formulate our third proposed alternative following a hybrid of the hypothetico-de-ductive and the inductive approaches to developing new insights and knowledge in the area of strategic decision making. We rely on both a review of the current divergent theories of decision making as they apply to an entrepreneurial/strategic investment decision context and the findings from our field research with several technologically driven enterprises. Thus, we attempt to identify empirically the presence of Strategic Incrementalism within the context of the Strategic Management of Technology, through in-depth-interview-driven, ethnographic case studies of twenty companies headquartered in the USA, Canada, Germany, and France, that operate in high risk, uncertainly and complexity, dynamic, and technologically intensive business environments.; The study covers at least two companies from each of five major arenas of industrial activity, covering at least two business cycles, with products of short, medium, and long term development as well as life cycles, with domestic and international operations, and finally from four very competitive (industrial chemicals, health care products, transportation means, and multimedia), and one regulated market (power generation) used as the control group. The literature review and the empirical findings are synthesized to develop an architecture of multiple-level technological learning (strategic or learning to learn-how-lo-learn from experience, tactical or learning how-to-learn from experience, and operational or learning from experience) as the engine for building core competencies and sustaining competitive advantage.; The following companies were studied: Multimedia--Sun Microsystems, Enable Software (USA), Agfa-Compugraphic (Germany). Health Care--Bristol Myers Squibb (USA), Bayer (Germany). Transportation Means--BMW, Daimler-Benz (Germany), Airbus Industries, Matra Automobile (France). Industrial Chemicals--BASF (Germany), Saint Gobain (France). Power Generation--Consolidated Edison, Niagara Mohawk, NYPA, RGE, TVA, Duke Power (USA), Ontario Hydro (Canada), EdF (France). |
