This paper offers a refined conceptualization of consensus formation and demonstrates in three organizations how this conceptualization enables us to uncover new patterns of consensus building. It describes a longitudinal study which investigated consensus formation in three organizations undergoing major strategic change. The study explored whether consensus building occurred during the strategic change, and if so, how. Initial participants of consensus were also investigated as well as changes in the scope of participants in consensus. Consensus building did occur, but contrary to some views, less through an increase in the strength of consensus and more through an increase in the scope of consensus. Additionally, initial consensus was not located among members of the top management team, but more within an interest group whose members benefited from the given direction of the change.

in St. Louis for their constructive comments on earlier drafts of this manuscript. 1 A THEORY OF STRATEGIC PROBLEM FORMULATION We develop a theory of strategic problem formulation for complex, ill-structured problems. Based on a limited number of assumptions, we theoretically identify a core set of impediments that limit the comprehensiveness of the formulation activity. We then use these impediments to derive design goals, which, if satisfied by an appropriately designed mechanism, can expand problem formulation comprehensiveness. We design a structured process that indeed satisfies the goals and discuss its use in several real-world applications. 2 Designing new business strategies, producing innovations to grow profit, and developing novel supply chain configurations to achieve a cost advantage are some of the complex, illstructured strategic challenges organizations must grapple with in creating sources of competitive advantage (e.g., Camillus, 2008, Nickerson, Silverman, & Zenger, 2007). 1

Strategic decision-making can be viewed as a special kind of decisionmaking under uncertainty. Such decision-making involves the activities of goal formulation, problem identification, alternatives generation, and evaluation/selection. Researchers in cognitive psychology and behavioral decision theory have identified a number of cognitive simplification processes which may effect the way decision-makers to perform these tasks. Within this paper, the research on these processes is summarized and their possible effects on strategic decision-making are discussed. Implications for future research in this area are also drawn.-3-

Two fundamental differences exist between models of the organizational decision process based on participant recollection and those based on archival data or field observation. These differences are discussed and sources of bias in participant recollections are outlined. Finally, suggestions for minimizing these biases in decision process research are It has been argued (Katz, 1953; Mintzberg, Raisinghani, and Theoret, 1976, p. 248) that participant recollection provides the only satisfactory data on the decision-making process. Examination of archival data and field observation by researchers is sometimes seen as inappropriate because

This article argues for a discursive turn in organizational knowledge studies. Existing efforts tend to focus on knowledge outcomes. While valuable in many respects, this approach glosses over communication processes that make knowledge organizational. To fully understand the collective creation and application of knowledge, researchers must attend to four fundamental processes of formulation, reflexivity, adaptation, and simultaneity. Existing methods like cross sectional studies, longitudinal designs, event sequence studies, and conversation analysis can all shed some light on these four processes. However, there is a gulf in existing methods where important discursive phenomena of organizational knowledge go unstudied. High-resolution, broadband discourse analysis (HBDA), which would study organization-wide spoken and written discourse for extended periods of time, is needed to fill the gap. Centering resonance analysis (CRA) is proposed as an automated means of coping with the grea...