STRATEGY AND STRATEGIC MANAGEMENT CONCEPTS: ARE THEY RECOGNISED BY MANAGEMENT STUDENTS?

The purpose of this paper is to assess the acquired knowledge of university management students on strategy and strategic management concepts. Phenomenography was used in the analysis and a collective description was conducted. A sample of students taking management degrees at five universities was adopted. Following data analysis, a model explaining our definition of students is presented. This definition was compared with the existing literature. Our findings do not indicate a single, predominant concept but reflect a diverse set of existing concepts. We conclude that students do present difficulties when it comes to explaining their theoretical definition in real situations applied to organizations. The results contribute towards a better understanding of the universities surveyed, but cannot be generalized. Thus, we recommend future studies replicate this research project at other Higher Education Institutions and confirm the factors making up the construction of the definition of strategy from the perspective of future managers. Given that topics relating to strategy and strategic management are highly relevant to organizations today, it is of similar great importance to identifying just what future managers perceive about these issues. Our model explains the definition of strategy in the vision of young managers about to enter the market. A balance between the current schools of thought on strategy and an approach to the reality of enterprises are presented as challenges for both teachers and researchers in this field.