Untangling self-reinforcing processes in managerial decision making: co-evolving heuristics?

Over the last 30 years, specific investigations into self-reinforcing processes in managerial decision making have been gaining momentum within the mainstream literature of management. However, to date, it is claimed that understanding these processes properly still requires additional research efforts. Thus, this conceptual article aims to follow this claim. The article tries to inform the conversation about self-reinforcing processes in managerial decision making through adopting lenses drawing from the biological philosophy of organizational change. In particular, the co-evolutionary approach to organizational change, with a focus on CEOs, and/or Top Management Teams, is adopted. As its core contribution, the article proposes that self-reinforcing processes in the CEOs/TMTs’ decision making can occur because of the emergence (and subsequent consolidation) of co-evolving heuristics. On this basis, the article also prospect potential avenues for future integrations in this field. As the article concludes, advancing the general understanding of self-reinforcing processes in managerial decision making can represent an important opportunity for the research and practice of management in general, but also for some management sub-domains, such as that of behavioural strategy, in particular.