Skip to main content
Close

INSEAD professor's new book provides a guide to decision-making in the domain of corporate strategy

INSEAD professor's new book provides a guide to decision-making in the domain of corporate strategy

INSEAD professor's new book provides a guide to decision-making in the domain of corporate strategy

CEOs and their staff must ask themselves if there are good reasons for taking certain paths and avoiding others

INSEAD, the leading international business school, today announced the publication of a new book: “Corporate Strategy: Tools for Analysis and Decision-Making”. The book, co-authored by INSEAD Professor of Strategy Phanish Puranam and Professor Bart Vanneste from UCL School of Management, provides corporate strategists with the tools needed to understand the alternatives that lie behind major strategic choices.

Based on over two decades of research and teaching in the world’s leading business schools, “Corporate Strategy: Tools for Analysis and Decision-Making” modernises the typical textbook format by focusing on decisions, rather than theories.

The authors tackle the big decisions that determine whether multi-business companies thrive or falter. These include the choice between retaining or divesting businesses, inorganic or organic growth, mergers/acquisitions or alliances, and directive or evaluative control by headquarters.

“Too often, corporate strategists are led by their professional advisers into the consideration of a particular industry, acquisition target, or alliance partner, as vital to their growth plans. It’s a bit like facing the magician who forces you to pick the card he wants you to pick. Strategists – by which we mean CEO’s and their staff – must know how to take a sophisticated look at the roads not taken. By asking the right questions, they must figure out if there were indeed good reasons for avoiding them.” says Phanish Puranam, the Roland Berger Chaired Professor of Strategy and Organisation Design and Academic Director of the PhD Programme at INSEAD.

“Decisions about corporate strategy are some of the most – if not the most – consequential decisions that CEOs of multi-business firms can take,” says Bart Vanneste, Associate Professor in Strategy at UCL School of Management. “Since the competition for the CEO is a mutual fund manager who can assemble similar portfolio of businesses, the only way to survive in today’s markets is for a CEO to get the corporate strategy right. Making sure that individual businesses do well, is quite often not enough.”

The book combines the latest thinking on designing organisations with corporate finance – both key ingredients for a corporate strategist, but which rarely appear together in contemporary books on the topic.

By showing corporate strategists how to break down and analyse complex decisions, the authors aim to help improve the quality of corporate strategy choices, show observers how to analyse them and guide students towards understanding them.

The book is now available to buy on Amazon here.

About INSEAD, The Business School for the World

As one of the world’s leading and largest graduate business schools, INSEAD brings together people, cultures and ideas to develop responsible leaders who transform business and society. Our research, teaching and partnerships reflect this global perspective and cultural diversity.

With locations in Europe (France), Asia (Singapore), the Middle East (Abu Dhabi), and now North America (San Francisco), INSEAD's business education and research spans four regions. Our 162 renowned Faculty members from 40 countries inspire more than 1,300 degree participants annually in our Master in Management,  MBAGlobal Executive MBA, Specialised Master’s degrees (Executive Master in Finance and Executive Master in Change) and PhD programmes. In addition, more than 10,000 executives participate in INSEAD Executive Education programmes each year.

INSEAD continues to conduct cutting-edge research and innovate across all our programmes. We provide business leaders with the knowledge and awareness to operate anywhere. Our core values drive academic excellence and serve the global community as The Business School for the World.

Contacts for press: 

Aileen Huang
Tel +65 9008 3812
Email: [email protected]
Cheryl Ng
Tel +65 8750 0788
Email: [email protected]
Gwenaelle Hennequin
Tel +33 6 15 12 10 86
Email: [email protected]