How do CEOs make strategy?
Survey data from 262 CEOs across countries and industries shows wide variation in strategy process formality, with disciplined and well-managed strategy processes constituting a systematically underappreciated source of competitive advantage—and CEOs with formal business training disproportionately implementing structured approaches.
Summary
Foss synthesizes survey research from 262 CEOs to examine how strategy actually gets made and whether process differences matter for firm performance. CEOs vary dramatically in formality: some use structured processes with regular planning cycles, formal documentation, clear priority communication, and systematic execution tracking; others rely on informal, ad hoc approaches where strategy is more centralized and less monitored. Crucially, this variation is not random—CEOs with MBA training or experience in well-managed firms systematically implement more rigorous processes. The piece directly connects strategy process discipline to firm performance outcomes, arguing it is a genuine but underappreciated source of competitive advantage, with implications for both strategy formulation design and CEO succession criteria.
Editor's opinion
Foss provides a well-anchored review of Yang et al.'s paper on CEO strategy processes, effectively connecting it to Upper Echelons Theory, Mintzberg, and his own judgment-based framework — a solid example of bridging academic research and practice. The article stays more descriptive than provocative, but the content and connections are genuinely useful.
Key concepts
Strategy process · CEO decision-making · management practices · firm performance · strategy formulation discipline