Evaluating the performance effects of Miles' and Snow's strategic archetypes in banking, 1983 to 1987: Big or small?

Abstract

Miles and Snow postulated that although an organization's adaptability is limited, different firms, using different decision making processes can be viable in the long run, even in the same industry. Here, we describe an investigation of Miles' and Snow's viability hypothesis in the banking industry. The research includes three contributions. First, it demonstrates the initial theory is inadequate for a turbulent environment; second, it suggests a methodological reason this theory has proven so difficult to evaluate—the strategy decision process effect is small, while many researchers were looking for large effects; and, finally, this study highlights that it is not the main effects of decision process, strategy, or environment that explain performance (in the banking industry), but interactions between them.