Name and describe Rajagopalan and Spreitzer’s (1997) three theoretical perspectives (or “lenses”) that close the gap between content and process.

Question

What will be an ideal response?

Answer 1

The three theoretical perspectives are rational, learning, and cognitive studies. The rational school of thought focuses more on content than on process and assumes that the external environment can be viewed objectively. The learning perspective assumes that the external environment is dynamic, changing, and uncertain, and that objectivity is very difficult. Change is evolutionary but the process is not linear. Rather, managers learn from the consequences of the change steps they take and then take the next step according to what they learned from the previous one. Cognitive, like the learning perspective, focuses more on process than content—on managerial cognitions, such as core beliefs, causal maps, and knowledge structures. As managerial actions to effect strategic changes are studied, retroactive attributions are used to deduce what managers were thinking to have caused such actions.