Proceedings of The 6th International Conference on Research in Business, Management and Finance
Year: 2023
DOI:
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Tactics for Implementing Strategic Change: Development and Validation of a Multidimensional Measure
Antonia Lampaki, Ilias Kapoutsis
ABSTRACT:
Implementing strategic change is a challenging endeavor for organizations. While extensive research has focused on strategic planning, less attention has been paid to the critical phase of implementation. This paper helps address this gap by developing and validating a multidimensional measure of the tactics top managers employ to implement strategic decisions successfully. Drawing on previous research viewing strategy implementation from a processoriented perspective, we focus on four key implementation tactics: intervention, participation, persuasion, and edict. After generating an initial pool of 40 items and refining it through expert review (N = 68) and an item-sort task, confirmatory factor analysis was conducted using a sample of 120 top managers. Results supported a 21-item, four-factor structure with strong psychometric properties. The validated scale provides researchers with a consistent tool to assess the use of different tactics and their link to implementation outcomes. It also enables studying how contextual factors influence the choice and effectiveness of specific approaches. For practice, the measure can help managers select suitable tactics and thoughtfully combine them based on the situation. Overall, by developing and validating this multidimensional scale, this research contributes to closing the prevalent “strategy-implementation gap”. The implementation tactics inventory presents an important step for more nuanced empirical examinations of how strategic decisions are transformed into tangible organizational actions. Advancing knowledge in this critical domain can ultimately increase the success and impact of strategic change initiatives.
keywords: implementation tactics, scale development, strategy execution