BEST ARTICLE AWARD 2018

Strategy as Diligence:
Putting Behavioral Strategy Into Practice

We are pleased to announce that "Strategy as Diligence: Putting Behavioral Strategy into Practice" by Thomas C. Powell, is the winner of the 2018 Best Article Award.

Each year, California Management Review recognizes the article published during the preceding volume that has made the most important contribution to management education. This article was selected as a finalist based on its performance and distribution, and the final selection was made by members of the California Management Review Editorial Board and International Advisory Board in April 2018. The award includes a cash prize of $1000, which Thomas Powell has generously gifted to the University of California.

This article draws on behavioral research and strategy practice to present a guiding approach for managers called "diligence-based strategy." In markets comprised of people rather than rational economic agents, the analysis of competitive advantages matters less than the diligent execution of fundamental activities. Diligence-based strategy offers an applied method for formulating and executing strategy in organizations, showing how managers can leverage technology and management discipline to drive business success in the twenty-first century.

By offering a behavioral perspective on strategy that is consistent with the growing use of behavioral models in economics, Powell's model emphasizes strategy implementation over strategy formulation. And by integrating various paradigms of thinking, the article also clearly demonstrates how scholarly research can inform the decisions of practicing managers.

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Core Concepts

Decision-Making in Organizations
New research has shown that the world’s best managers can overcome biases and reliably make effective decisions by following an approach called diligence-based strategy, a systematic focus on the firm's most essential operational abilities.