Beyond the social: Embracing sociomateriality into strategy for understanding external environmental changes

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Abstract

Current organizational studies addressing external environmental changes predominantly adopt a human-centric perspective, focusing on the unforeseen implications and social responses to such changes. This paper argues for a shift from viewing external environmental changes purely as social phenomena to recognizing the intertwined roles of both social and material elements. The methodology involved a literature review of organizational studies, specifically focusing on studies during and after the pandemic (2020–2024), using search terms like “COVID-19”, “pandemic”, “organizations”, “implication”, and “work”. The analysis employed a thematic approach to identify patterns within the literature. This paper concludes that a sociomaterial perspective can provide a robust framework for enhancing our understanding of environmental dynamics, advocating for its broader application in organizational research. This paper contributes to organizational studies in two ways. First, it brings the material into the foreground to amend deficiencies in our understanding of the organizational external environment within which organizational practices are formed and framed. Second, the paper synthesizes the literature on sociomateriality to eliminate the ambiguity often associated with this framework, facilitating its adoption in empirical research.

Keywords: External Environment, Organizational Practices, Strategic Management, Theoretical Framework, Sociomateriality

Authors’ individual contribution: The Author is responsible for all the contributions to the paper according to CRediT (Contributor Roles Taxonomy) standards.

Declaration of conflicting interests: The Author declares that there is no conflict of interest.

JEL Classification: C8, D70, L1, L16, M10

Received: 09.03.2024
Accepted: 19.11.2024
Published online: 21.11.2024

How to cite this paper: Aljabr, N. (2024). Beyond the social: Embracing sociomateriality into strategy for understanding external environmental changes. Corporate & Business Strategy Review, 5(4), 171–179. https://doi.org/10.22495/cbsrv5i4art16