Beyond acquiescence and compromise: Organizational strategies in pluralizing institutional environments

Abstract

We set out to investigate how organizations respond to the variety of requirements as experienced in their pluralizing institutional environments. We found that, in addition to acquiescence and compromise, Dutch vocational education and training (VET) organizations predominantly respond with cooperation and coordination strategies. Extensive multistage qualitative data analysis of 26 semi‐structured in‐depth interviews with management team (MT) members showed that cooperation and coordination are viable and effective response strategies to face a divergent and highly differentiated set of sometimes‐conflicting institutional requirements. Our study advances understanding of how organizations deploy strategic choice to arrive at their strategic responses. It offers organizational leaders, legislators, policymakers, and other constituents' insights into complex reality of how contemporary organizations actually relate to and act in their pluralizing institutional environments.