Lilla Hortoványi

Strategy Without Templates

Adaptation in Digital Environments

2.6 The Environment as Structured Ecology

Together, these four mechanisms support a different conception of the environment. The relevant unit of analysis is no longer the isolated firm situated within an external context. It is the firm embedded within a structured ecology of interdependent actors, interfaces, governance mechanisms, and technological infrastructures.

This shift from industry to ecology is not merely rhetorical. It marks a change in ontological emphasis. Industry-based views foreground rivalry, substitution, and bounded competition. An ecological view foregrounds interdependence, role differentiation, connectivity, and the co-evolution of value creation. Competition does not disappear, but it unfolds within a relational system whose architecture shapes participation, power, and coordination.

Adner’s (2017) ecosystem-as-structure view is especially helpful here because it brings analytical clarity to the concept of ecology. It treats the ecosystem not as a vague metaphor for connectedness, but as a configuration of activities and relationships required for a value proposition to materialize. This is precisely why the term structured ecology is analytically useful. It captures both interdependence and organized constraint. The environment is not a free-floating network. It is a patterned arrangement of interfaces, roles, standards, bottlenecks, and governance mechanisms.

However, the concept of structured ecology requires further theoretical specification to avoid either vague ecosystem metaphors or technological determinism. Three clarifications are critical.

First, structure in digital ecologies is architectural rather than purely emergent. Unlike biological ecosystems, where structure arises from distributed interaction, digital ecologies are deliberately shaped through platform design, APIs, and governance mechanisms (Gawer, 2021). Therefore, architecture is not neutral infrastructure but a constitutive force that shapes what actions are possible, visible, and rewarded.

Second, ecological interdependence is mediated rather than direct. Firms interact through technological interfaces that filter, rank, and reshape interactions (Kellogg et al., 2020). This introduces asymmetry: platform owners control the interfaces, creating hierarchical ecologies rather than flat networks. Ecosystem dynamics, therefore, require attention to power embedded in architectural control (Cennamo & Santaló, 2019).

Third, ecological evolution is non-Darwinian. Variation is not random but often directed through platform experimentation, while selection mechanisms can change abruptly through governance changes (Pentland et al., 2022). This produces punctuated, regime-shift dynamics rather than gradual adaptation. Established configurations can be rapidly invalidated.

Together, these features position structured ecology as a middle-range theoretical construct. It is neither purely technological nor purely agential. Platforms play a central role because they concentrate architectural control, selective visibility, and governance by design (McIntyre & Srinivasan, 2017; Rietveld et al., 2019). They do not merely mediate exchange. They actively structure the environment.

This also clarifies why platforms matter so much in contemporary strategy. Platforms define participation rules, shape attention, regulate access to data and users, and create asymmetries through control over boundary resources (Cennamo & Santaló, 2019; McIntyre & Srinivasan, 2017; Rietveld et al., 2019). In doing so, they structure not only interactions, but the conditions under which interaction becomes possible.

The concept of structured ecology, therefore, allows the chapter to move beyond both simplistic environmental determinism and loose ecosystem metaphor. The environment is neither a passive backdrop nor an amorphous web of relations. It is a structured and evolving system whose architecture shapes what firms can see, do, and become.

This reconceptualization also aligns with empirical observations from transition and disruption contexts. Research on Hungarian Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs), for example, shows that firms often respond to changing conditions not only by internal adjustment, but by repositioning within evolving systems of platforms, channels, and interfaces (Pogácsás & Szepesi, 2023). Such cases illustrate an important point: firms do not merely react to a fixed environment. They reposition themselves within changing systems of coordination.

Tartalomjegyzék

Kiadó: Akadémiai Kiadó

Online megjelenés éve: 2026

ISBN: 978 963 664 204 4

Gazdaság

What happens when understanding comes only after action has already begun?

Traditional strategy rests on the assumption that organizations can understand their environment before deciding how to act. Yet the conditions that once allowed organizations to rely on benchmarking, best practices, and proven strategic templates can no longer be taken for granted. Today, organizations increasingly face situations for which no clear roadmap exists. Established assumptions become less reliable, familiar reference points lose their clarity, and strategic decisions must be made before their consequences can be fully understood.

Strategy Without Templates explores how organizations learn, adapt, and navigate environments in which uncertainty is pervasive and established templates are absent or no longer sufficient. Instead of treating strategy as a process of prediction and planning, the book explores how strategic paths take shape through action, experimentation, adjustment, and learning.

A central insight in the book is that temporary solutions are often necessary. What begins as a practical response to an immediate challenge may gradually shape future possibilities in unexpected ways. Some solutions create new opportunities and sources of advantage. Others become constraints that are difficult to overcome.

Hivatkozás: https://mersz.hu/hortovanyi-strategy-without-templates//

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