INFORMATION-SYSTEMS FOR STRATEGIC THINKING SUPPORT

The management of change, growing environmental turbulence and contradictions between management theory and practice are topics that have been considered to be serious problems facing modern managerial work. The most complex and unstructured tasks of managers are dealing with strategy. Managers have to make rather difficult decisions about the identification, planning and revision of strategies, most of them on an intuitive basis. The focus of systems thinking has shifted from optimization towards learning [4]. Information systems such as Executive or Expert Support Systems (ESS) offer potential solutions to strategic planning and learning problems. Managers can use an ESS as a learning environment assisting strategic thinking and integrative learning. A number of approaches have been presented for the strategy process. This paper attempts to evaluate the opportunities and limitations of different support systems and to synthesize the strategy process in order to create a theoretical basis for developing a computer-based ESS. Some technological opportunities are discussed at the end of the paper.