Imagery and Strategy

Abstract

This article addresses a relatively unexplored area: the language that top managers share in the process of strategic decision-making. An empirical investigation of two groups of top managers responding to the same external stimuli revealed, first, that much of the language with which strategy was articulated was filled with imagery and, second, that managers made strategic decisions in partial response to their figures of speech. It is suggested that the process by which imagery emerges and influences decision-making may comprise three stages: (a) collective discussion of individual perceptions of the stimuli; (b) evolution of a common vocabulary and syntax, including images, by which managers describe and communicate aspects of the stimuli; (c) emergence of a reigning image that permeates the language describing the stimuli to which top managers respond strategically.