Do African managers think differently about strategy? Some preliminary insights into the strategic behaviour of firms in Mauritius

Abstract

Africa is fertile for business yet it hardly attracts the attention of strategy academics. International cross-cultural management and strategy literatures have long acknowledged the significant influence of cultural, political and institutional contexts on the strategy processes and behaviours of firms and markets, but there is limited empirical evidence to understand how these contextual differences impact on the way strategy is formulated and implemented, and test the relevance and applicability of received Anglo-Saxon or Western wisdom on strategy in those contexts. This paper addresses this issue partly. This research focuses on businesses Sub-Saharan Africa, and more particularly looks at the strategic behaviour of firms and managers in Mauritius. This paper aims to explore the perceptions and meanings of strategy amongst senior managers in Mauritius. Theoretically, the paper draws insights from the resource based theory and the behavioural theory of management to examine the varying perceptions and meanings of the strategy process – the process of analysing, choosing and implementing strategy - in firms in Mauritius. Using a case based methodology; in-depth interviews were carried out with ten senior managers of different size organisations. The findings reveal varied evidences of mixed approaches to formulating and implementing strategy within those organisations