Faculty
Philip Nell, Søren Henning Jensen, Sven Junghagen

Course Coordinator
Søren Henning Jensen

This course will provide students with a thorough understanding of central elements in the strategic management process and develops competences that allow the students to address strategic issues from different theoretical perspectives. As such, the course reveals the complexity of the strategic decision making process and equips the students to perform critical and creative analyses of strategic situations.

Strategic management is an eclectic discipline, applying ideas from many different research traditions and disciplines. This interdisciplinary approach reflects the complexities that underpin strategic thinking in theory and in practice alike. The course aims to develop an understanding of that complexity and how it can be handled in different strategic decision situations. Handling the strategy development process is not accomplished through a mechanical application of management tools but constitutes an intellectual analysis combining different – and often paradoxical – perceptions. Therefore, this course does not build on a single paradigm or research tradition, but explores different strategy making modes in the analysis of contemporary strategy issues.

The exam consists in writing a scientific paper. The topic for the scientific paper will reflect a combination of topics addressed in the course. The topics are assigned at random. The papers can be done individually or in groups of two. However, if written in groups it is a requirement that the different parts of the paper are individualized, so it clearly shows who has written which part in order to facilitate the possibility of individual grading. The examination is internal.

During this course various perspectives within the strategic management field will be adopted in group presentations and discussions of relevant case examples in order to illustrate the underlying theoretical perspectives in practice.