The strategy process as a result of learning, questioning, and performing in a city organization

Abstract

This article analyzes a strategy-drafting process, using it to illustrate what can happen in a strategy process that affects a city organization but is invisible in the final strategy document. In the ethnographically inspired method, a city organization and its strategy-formulating work were followed for two years. Observations and interviews were the main data-collection methods. The article builds on a framework from the strategy and public management literature. The article concludes that strategy formulation in public organizations is a means of learning new practices, questioning ongoing development, and enhancing performance.