Body of Knowledge Guide

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The purpose of this guide is to help users of the Body of Knowledge understand the strategic management concepts and themes by organizing the terms by theme.

The research that created this Body of Knowledge was instrumental in creating regenerative managing. Follow the link here to find out more about it:

An Introduction to Regenerative Managing

The terms in the Body of Knowledge are related to one anther. They are part of broader conceptual themes. A given term may belong to more than one theme. For example, the term 'business model' belongs to multiple themes -- the inquiry theme, the business organization theme, and the strategic framework themes.

Following are some themes and a hierarchy of terms related to each theme.

  • See quality.
  • Iterative inquiry is a form of synthesis. This inquiry process synthesizes an understanding of the...
  • The ability to judge, make a decision, or form an opinion objectively, authoritatively, and wisely...
  • At its core, knowledge is truth, meaning that it conforms with reality. Though this may appear...
  • Knowledge is the basis for development of technology. Technology development is the basis for...
  • ""Effective knowledge use implicitly means changing the way people think about knowledge, which...
  • Knowledge worker is a term coined by Peter F. Drucker in 1954 (Drucker, 1954). A knowledge worker...
  • See Occam*s razor.
  • Leadership is the ultimate advantage. Without leadership, all other factors of competitive...
  • See quality.
  • Learning is a process. Single loop learning is a circular four step process - 1) learning is...
  • When an organization's focus is on learning prior to execution, and then leaps ahead to learn again...
  • Levels, or types, of learning inform us as to the process of learning that may, or needs to, be...
  • A learning organization is one that prompts its own evolution in order to adapt to its ecosystem....
  • See learning and learning levels of.
  • Level 5 leadership is Jim Collins' term for the leadership demonstrated by leaders of what he...
  • The levels of understanding framework is linked in with the systems thinking mindset that focuses...
  • See bounded rationality.
  • The living present describes a much more dynamic present than the conventional view of the present...
  • If one assumes that organizations' decision making actors have limited rationality (see bounded...
  • Logic, from Classical Greek λόγος logos (the word), is the study of...
  • See modularity.
  • See learning levels of.
  • ...where preparation and opportunity meet...
  • The multidivisional form of organization that evolved out of the early 1900s, classic examples...
  • In organizational theory, the term 'macro' refers to global or population-wide levels of existence...
  • See economics.
  • The directing the affairs of a business organization -- guiding, leading, envisioning, regulating...
  • What makes a management technique a fad is not the technique itself. The techniques typically are...
  • Management is a social technology. Its innovation has brought about some of the most profound and...
  • Peter F. Drucker, paraphrased the key points that he felt Alfred P. Sloan was making in My Years...
  • ""The management scientist's mandate is to use rational, systematic, science-based techniques to...
  • According to Bartlett and Ghoshal (1993), a ""managerial theory of the firm"" would be more attuned...
  • A market is the group of existing or potential buyers of an offering. Source: Roth, Alvin E., (...
  • Competitive advantage lessons from the market economy (from Kay, 2004) -- The market economy...
  • A phrase popularized by Theodore Levitt in a 1960 Harvard Business Review article, in which...
  • Source: Wikipedia contributors, ""Material Cause,"" Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia, http://en....
  • The philosophical theory that physical matter and its motions is the only reality and that...
  • Meaning is viewed in the context of the communication process. Models of communication view...
  • To measure refers to ascertaining the characteristics of something. There are at least two...
  • Technologies of foolishness (March, 2007) -- Technologies of foolishness are an answer to the need...
  • Mechanistic refers to a type of thinking based on the Newtonian view of nature and nature's...
  • In addition to their being mechanisms for accomplishing a great variety of objectives and, perhaps...
  • Mental models are images, representations, or schemes of how we perceive and understand the world...
  • See ethics.
  • The branch of philosophy concerned with explaining the nature of the world. It is the study of...
  • A methodology is a set of methods, principles, and rules for engaging in an inquiry -- such as the...
  • In organizational theory, the term 'micro' refers to local levels of existence or study, in...
  • Micro-diversity of interaction results in variation having the potential to result in...
  • See economics.
  • Mind is related to consciousness, an awareness of one's own existence. In a conscious being, it is...
  • See purpose and mission statement. Mission is part of policy in the policy-strategy-resource...
  • Mission statement characteristics ( Ackoff, 1999a, pp 125-127) -- It should contain a formulation...
  • A model is an abstraction of reality. No matter how well constructed, models are always wrong....
  • From Hamel, 2002, pp 153-154 -- All business organizations have four models. Theoretically, if the...
  • Modularity is a key aspect of business architecture. The more a product or system is broken down...
  • Philosophy -- An indivisible, impenetrable unit of substance viewed as the basic constituent...
  • Philosophy, in metaphysics, any of various theories holding that there is only one basic substance...
  • See wisdom.
  • ""The state of the spirits of a person or group as exhibited by confidence, cheerfulness,...
  • The study of the whole form or structure of anything.
  • Firms, like other economic organizations, serve to coordinate the actions of groups of people and...
  • Multidimensionality is a complex system characteristic. See complex adaptive system.
  • See M-form.
  • What is organizing itself in the ongoing gesture-response of complex responsive processes is the...
  • Natural philosophy was the term whose usage preceded our current term science in the sense that...
  • The view of the world that takes account only of natural elements and forces, excluding the...
  • ""If x is a necessary cause of y; then the presence of y necessarily implies that x preceded it....
  • See classical economics for an explanation of neoclassical economics. Classical or neoclassical...
  • Signals that do not contain meaningful data or other information.
  • A highly complex system that lacks linearity between two qualities, especially input and output. A...
  • Normative and prescriptive in relation to strategy refers to the ""rules"" of strategy formation,...
  • Normative ethics is comprised of ethical theory and applied ethics. See ethics.
  • Norms and values make up ideology which governs and guides behavior. ""Only in the rarest of...
  • See noumenon.
  • Reality, as opposed to the phenomenal, the appearance of reality to people in the form of...
  • noumenon (singular), noumena (plural) Related to Kantianism, things as they really exist, as...
  • Novelty refers to the creatively new, that which has never existed before. Organizations evolve...
  • The thing in question, the situation, the phenomenon being examined. See objective, subject, and...
  • To present a phenomenon as an object, making it objective, externalizing it. To present or regard...
  • Objective and subjective are ontological classifications. It is not by any means a given that...
  • 'Objective position' refers to the notion that a manager in an organization, or strategist, can be...
  • Occam's razor (sometimes spelled Ockham's razor) is a principle attributed to the 14th-century...
  • Offerings provide value to the environment of a business organization. The organization fulfills...
  • See offering.
  • The study of the existence of being. The subject of ontology is the study of the categories of...
  • A distributed model of innovation where the enterprise reaches out beyond its own boundaries to...
  • See model hierarchy.
  • Operational pertains to the ongoing activities of the business to produce and deliver its offerings...
  • The definition of operational thinking as defined here comes from the systems school of thinking....
  • Organizations and organisms -- organizations are often compared to organisms. Though this analogy...
  • 'Organization' refers to something made up of elements, or members, with varied functions and...
  • See organizational architecture.
  • John Roberts (2004, pp 16-18) defines the organization variables that make up an organization...
  • Organizations must evolve in order to survive. Those that evolve the most successfully will have a...
  • The activities of strategic management require capable individuals. The activities serve both to...
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