Executives ‘ Perceptual Filters: What They Notice and How They Make Sense

Abstract

Management magazines, academic journals, and textbooks almost always presume that analyses of past events reveal how those events actually unfolded. Such writings also frequently portray strategy formulation and implementation as a causal sequence, in which executives perceive some reality, analyze the options offered by this reality, decide to pursue one or more of these options, and obtain results when their organizations ‘ environments react. Thus, according to this causal sequence, organizations ‘ environments act as impartial evaluators of executives ‘ perceptions, analyses, and actions. When the results are good, executives receive credit for accurately perceiving opportunities or threats, for analyzing these correctly and for taking appropriate actions. When the results are bad, executives get blamed for perceiving erroneously, for making analytic mistakes, for taking inappropriate actions.