Deliberate versus emergent strategies: a case study of information technology in the Post Office

This paper aims to examine the deliberate versus reactive elements of the s trategy process with reference to the strategic information management of t he Post Office. As the literature on strategic management has evolved, ther e has been much emphasis on the planning aspect of the strategy process. Ho wever, in many cases strategy is imposed due to circumstances and the organ isation has to react to circumstances outside its control. At first sight, it would appear that the communications revolution would have a severe impa ct on the Royal Mail and that they would have to find new directions for th eir business. However, what has actually happened is that direct marketing, computer databases and electronic mail have increased the amount of busine ss for the Post Office and it has had to implement a strategy to deal with this extra business. It is clear from this case study that the strategies t owards information management applied by the Post Offices were emergent rat her than deliberate. There are two factors which have meant that the Post O ffice could not have planned; firstly, there was government action in the f orm of a capital spending 'freeze' which meant that, even if they had a pla nned information management strategy, they would not have been able to impl ement it. Secondly, there was the increase in 'junk' mail and mail-shots on the part of businesses using computerised databases. A planned strategy wo uld have had several advantages over the emergent strategies that the Post Office has adopted for IT. A planned strategy for the Post Office Counters in particular would have incorporated meeting the needs of the customer rat her than the Benefits Agency. The decision by the Benefits Agency to gay be nefits directly into bank accounts will now have serious repercussions for the Post Office. The fact that the Post Office was unable to invest in new technology as it became available meant that the task was that much greater once its competitors had overtaken it. (C) 2000 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.