Lilla Hortoványi

Strategy Without Templates

Adaptation in Digital Environments

9.2 Selective Visibility: What Cannot Be Seen

The second mechanism concerns visibility. Algorithmic systems do not display all relevant information. They sort, rank, prioritize, and suppress. In doing so, they shape the field within which organizations observe outcomes and learn from them. This selectivity is not accidental. It follows platform objectives, optimization logics, and governance choices that may only partly overlap with the goals of firms operating on the platform.

This happens in at least three ways.

First, ranking systems determine what users are likely to see. These systems typically combine many signals, such as relevance, popularity, recency, engagement, profitability, and platform-specific priorities. Firms can usually observe some outputs of this process, such as ranking position or changes in impressions, but not the weighting logic that produced them. Managers can see movement in visibility, but not the decision rule behind it.

Second, recommendation systems shape attention rather than simply reflecting existing preferences. They do not just help users find what they already want. They also influence what users are likely to consider at all. Yuan et al. (2025) show that recommendation systems affect customer search behavior. Choudhary et al. (2023) similarly show that recommendations interact with consumer search in ways that shape later demand patterns. Recommendations, therefore, do not merely reveal demand. They help organize it.

Third, platforms decide what information they disclose to firms. Sellers may see aggregate conversion rates but not detailed user pathways. They may receive performance summaries but not the logic by which exposure was allocated. They may observe reviews but may not know which customers were shown the product and why. The problem is, therefore, not a lack of data in general, but a selective disclosure regime that creates structured blind spots.

This matters because it changes the learning problem. Firms must no longer learn only about their products, customers, or rivals. They must also learn about the platform’s visibility regime. This is a second-order learning task. The organization is trying to understand not just market outcomes, but the system that determines which outcomes become visible in the first place.

Research on digital platforms supports this claim. Malgonde et al. (2022) show that multi-sided recommender systems are governance tools, not neutral devices. Alaimo and Kallinikos (2021) and Cennamo et al. (2022) likewise argue that platforms organize access, interaction, and value capture through infrastructural design choices rather than market neutrality. Visibility is, therefore, not just a technical output. It is a strategic mechanism.

The key claim of this section is that feedback is constrained before the firm even begins to interpret it. Organizations do not start from a full view of the environment and then fail to understand it. They start from a filtered view whose structure is externally organized.

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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