Chair of Strategic Management
At the Chair of Strategic Management, our research focuses on how organizations and businesses deal with multiple competing, and often paradoxical demands, and how they develop strategies aimed at achieving long-term goals. We also question what constitutes a strategic activity and consider how such activities are linked with individual organizations’ strategizing processes. We study the social impact of organizations’ strategies, as well as considering interorganizational and industrial strategizing.
Our research
The Chair of Strategic Management, held by Professor Jane Lê, focuses on practice-based studies of complex strategic contexts.
Our research specializes in energy, telecommunications, and water infrastructure, since businesses operating in these industries can have significant economic and societal impact. Professor Lê is particularly interested in paradox and materiality. She also has extensive training in psychology and sociology, and has a wealth of experience working in human resource management, strategy, and organizational studies. She has an impressive knowledge of research methods, using a range of research designs, including cross-sectional and longitudinal case studies, and drawing on multiple qualitative data sources including interviews, observations, and archival sources to study private and public sector organizations.
Professor Lê’s work has appeared in a number of prestigious journals including Academy of Management Journal, Organization Science, and Organization Studies. She is actively involved European Group for Organizational Studies, having led the Research Community Platform, and the Academy of Management, serving five years in the leadership rotation of the Strategizing Activities and Practice interest group. Additionally, she has secured highly competitive grants, including an Australian Research Council Discovery Grant entitled ‘The Human Side of Energy Security’.
We aim to produce high-quality research with real world relevance, putting emphasis on how organisations can overcome the challenges of working in complex environments. We seek to understand organizations’ strategizing processes and their strategies’ consequences on both companies’ long-term outcomes, and society as a whole.
Our team
Theses information for doctoral position applicants
Do you want to support teaching at a leading international business school and work on exciting research projects in the fields of strategic management? Join a strong team with an active and inspiring culture: a passion for teaching and research.
Future Leaders Fundraising Challenge
The “Future Leaders Fundraising Challenge” is a one-week leadership course at the outset of WHU’s MBA program that is designed to teach leadership through experience, to preview topics covered throughout the MBA program, and instill in students a lasting sense for leaders’ social responsibility beyond their organizations.
