Table Of ContentStrategic Decisions and Weak Signals
FOCUS SERIES
Series Editor Jean-Charles Pomerol
Strategic Decisions and
Weak Signals
Anticipation for Decision-Making
Humbert Lesca
Nicolas Lesca
Firstpublished2014inGreatBritainandtheUnitedStatesbyISTELtdandJohnWiley&Sons,Inc.
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Contents
INTRODUCTION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ix
CHAPTER1.THESUBJECTWITHINTHEFIELD OFMANAGEMENT
SCIENCE:CONCEPTSANDISSUES. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
1.1.Strategicmanagementandstrategicdecision-making . . . . 3
1.2.Strategicdecision-makingandanticipation . . . . . . . . . . . 6
1.2.1.Knowingandanticipating . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
1.2.2.Anticipatinganddeciding. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
1.2.3.Anticipatingforeffectivedecision-making. . . . . . . . . . 12
1.2.4.Characteristicsofastrategicdecision. . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
1.3.Anticipation,anticipativeinformationand
weaksignals. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
1.3.1.Weaksignals . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
1.3.2.Characteristicsofaweaksignal . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20
1.3.3.Weaksignalsforanticipation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
1.3.4.Wheremightwefindaweaksignal? . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
1.3.5.Usefulnessofweaksignalsinstrategicdecision-
making . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
1.4.Weaksignalsandanticipativestrategicscanning . . . . . . . 25
1.4.1.Anticipativestrategicscanningandweak-signal
detection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
1.4.2.Theuseofweaksignalsdependson
managers’wishes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
1.5.Organizationalissuesinanticipativestrategicscanning,
whichcouldweakenstrategicdecision-making . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
1.5.1.Definitionof“targeting”ofanticipativestrategic
scanning . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32
vi StrategicDecisionsandWeakSignals
1.5.2.Insufficientinformation:toorestrictiveatarget,and
theconsequencesforstrategicdecision-making . . . . . . . . . . 34
1.5.3.Toomuchinformation:consequencesofinformation
overloadforstrategicdecision-making . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36
1.5.4.Detectingaweaksignalinaninformation-overload
situation(inafulltext) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43
1.6.Conclusion:conceptsdiscussed,issuesnotedand
resultingrequirements. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45
CHAPTER2.STATEOFTHEART:SYSTEMSSUGGESTEDBY
PREVIOUSAUTHORS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
2.1.Entrypoint:collectiveinterpretationofaset
ofhomogeneousweaksignalstomakesense. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48
2.1.1.Interpretingweaksignals:sense-making . . . . . . . . . . 49
2.1.2.Howaboutsense-makingusingimages,remotely? . . . . 51
2.1.3.Puzzlemethod:example. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52
2.2.Directlydetectingaweaksignalinafulltext. . . . . . . . . . 58
2.3.Automaticallyselectinga“useful”information
fragment(a“brief”,forourpurposes) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59
2.3.1.Dataoverloadversus“useful”information
fragments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59
2.3.2.Managerswantautomationofinformation
detection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61
2.3.3.Isitpossibletoautomatethedetectionof
potentiallyusefulinformation? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 63
2.3.4.Prototypeofadevicetofilterdataobtainedfrom
Web2.0:ABIMA. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65
2.4.Improvingweak-signaldetectionbyimproving
thetarget. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 68
2.4.1.Whatshouldwescanforintheenvironment? . . . . . . . 68
2.4.2.Learningabouttheboundaryoftheenvironment
beingscanned. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 68
2.4.3.Anautomatedtechniquetohelpchangean
organization’speripheralvision. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69
2.5.Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71
CHAPTER3.PROPOSEDSYSTEMS:RESULTSOFINFORMATION
SYSTEMPROTOTYPINGRESEARCHCONDUCTEDATTHE
CNRS-CERAGLAB(FRANCE) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73
3.1.TARGETBUILDER,anaidtotargeting
scanningpriorities. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 74
3.1.1.Usefulness. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 74
Contents vii
3.1.2.PrinciplebehindTARGETBUILDERsystem. . . . . . . . 75
3.1.3.RecaponTARGETBUILDER . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81
3.2.APROXIMA,automatedextractionoffragments(briefs),
whichmayholdweaksignals. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82
3.2.1.Usefulness. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82
3.2.2.PrinciplebehindAPROXIMAsystem . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82
3.2.3.Casestudy:applicationtothetopicof
“solar/photovoltaic”power. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86
3.2.4.RecaponAPROXIMA . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91
3.3.ALHENA,anaidtofindingconnectionsbetween
weaksignals. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 92
3.3.1.Usefulness. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 92
3.3.2.PrinciplebehindALHENAsystem. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 93
3.3.3.Casestudy:applicationtothetopicof
“CO valorization”. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 94
2
3.4.Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105
CONCLUSION. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 107
GLOSSARY . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 111
BIBLIOGRAPHY . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 121
INDEX . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 129
Description:An increasing number of business executives, managers and political leaders are using the concept of “weak signals” nowadays. There are also an increasing number of people trying to find out exactly what this concept means, as well as when and how to use it. Such questions arise particularly whe
