Brown Bag: Professor Thomas Zellweger
“Strategy as Active Inference”, Date: Wednesday, 2nd October 2024: 12:00-14:00, WEV F 109-111
The Chair of Strategic Management and Innovation at ETH invites you to the brown bag seminar with:
Thomas Zellweger
University of St.Gallen
external page Speaker website
Date: Wednesday, October 2, 12:00-14:00
Location: WEV F 109-111
Presentation title: Strategy as Active Inference
Abstract
In this paper, we depict strategy as active inference. Rooted in cognitive neuroscience and artificial intelligence, active inference motivates managers to articulate strategies as causal theories (theorizing), to assess prediction errors when enacting these theories (controlling), and to modify theories with the goal of minimizing future prediction errors (modifying). Variation in managers’ cognitive capabilities to theorize, control, and modify strategies leads to variation in strategies’ fitness. A strategy is thus a type of artificial intelligence that the manager calibrates to the environment using a top-down theory, which is in turn calibrated by bottom-up feedback of prediction errors. With our paper we expand the understanding of cognitive managerial capabilities and provide an integrative perspective about how attention, exploration, and organizational hierarchies promote learning and strategies’ fitness.
About the speaker
Thomas Zellweger holds the Chair in Family Business at the University of St.Gallen, Switzerland, where he is also the Director of the Swiss Research Institute of Small Business and Entrepreneurship (KMU-HSG). After two years as a marketing director in a fintech startup in Brussels, Thomas completed his PhD at the University of St.Gallen with highest distinction. His research has been published in the leading academic journals, such as in the Academy of Management Review, Academy of Management Journal, Strategic Management Journal and Organization Science, amongst other outlets. Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung counts him with his research amongst the most influential economists in the German speaking world. His research also received several international awards and has been discussed in the international media such in The Economist, Bloomberg, Forbes, and the New York Times. Research stays and visiting professorships have taken him to Stanford University, the Wharton School, and the University of British Columbia, among other locations. Thomas is a member of supervisory boards of family firms and advises business owners and entrepreneurs on governance and strategic questions.
We look forward to welcoming you!
The Chair of Strategic Management and Innovation