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Ambiguity has become a central concept in strategic communication research in recent years. This paper addresses three central deficits in the research to date. First, clarity-focused approaches and ambiguity-focused approaches are in opposition to each other, resulting in an exaggeration of the advantages and opportunities of the respective favored perspective and affording the opposing position little justification at best. Second, research on strategic ambiguity is by and large limited to the organizational perspective and has little interest in societal change. Third, there has been barely any research into concrete practices of strategic ambiguity and these practices have never been systematized.

The research questions will be answered on the basis of the “Theory of Social Systems” (TSS) by Niklas Luhmann, which can be attributed to the “Communication Constitutes Organization” (CCO) perspective. This perspective seems appropriate because the important concepts of communication and decision making play a central role in the TSS.

Strategic communication oscillates between clarity and ambiguity in order to defuse the dilemma and paradox. The re-entry of the distinction is a second-order observation and, thus, reveals the blind spots of clarity- and ambiguity-focused approaches. On this basis, a systematic approach is developed that encompasses various different dimensions of strategic clarity and ambiguity.

The paper focuses on the oscillation between strategic ambiguity and strategic clarity, making clear that the aim is not simply to substitute a new dominance of ambiguity for the clarity that has dominated textbooks thus far. Instead, it is a matter of reflective management of the distinction between strategic ambiguity and strategic clarity. The systematization of the practices of strategic ambiguity and strategic clarity can ultimately be used as a toolbox for the concrete application of strategic ambiguity and strategic clarity.

Overcoming the dualism of clarity-focused and ambiguity-focused approaches makes it possible, first, to explore the situational use of strategic clarity and strategic ambiguity. Second, the societal theoretical perspective shows the way in which organizations respond with strategic ambiguity to the increase in social contradictions without, however, being able to abandon strategic clarity. Third, using the systematic approach to the dimensions presented here, these practices can be described and examined in context.

This paper applies Eisenberg’s theory of strategic ambiguity to stakeholder relationship management during a period of significant change within a public sector organisation. Public sector organisations generally have a wider range of stakeholders than private sector organisations and must discharge their statutory responsibilities within the highly charged environment of the political arena. This paper will contend that communication professionals may deploy strategic ambiguity to manage the competing demands of public sector stakeholders and also to stimulate a diversity of actions and creative responses in the stakeholder community. The paper draws upon an extensive case study of the major science‐funding agency in New Zealand – the Foundation for Research, Science and Technology (FRST) – to illustrate the potential value of and identify some limits to the use of strategic ambiguity.

The purpose of this paper is to assess whether firms' transparency in supply chain (TISC) statements indicate that substantive action is being taken on modern slavery in UK government supply chains.

The authors analyse 66 of the UK government's strategic suppliers' TISC statements and 20 key documents related to the policy intent of the UK Parliament, 2015 TISC requirements. Qualitative document analysis identifies what suppliers say they are doing and what they are not saying to provide novel insights into how firms employ ambiguity to avoid timely action on modern slavery in their supply chains A set of propositions are developed.

The authors elaborate the concepts of time and change in socially sustainable supply chains and illustrate how firms use ambiguity in TISC statements as a highly strategic form of action to defend the status quo, reduce accountability and delay action for modern slavery within supply chains. The authors identify three ambiguous techniques: defensive reassurance, transfer responsibility and scope reduction that deviate from the policy intention of collaborative action.

The results illustrates how ambiguity is preventing firms from taking collaborative action to tackle modern slavery in their supply chains. The lack of action as a result of ambiguity protects firms, rather than potential victims of modern slavery.

Prior research focuses on technical compliance rather than the content of firms' TISC statements. This qualitative study provides novel insights into the policy-resistant effects of ambiguity and highlights the dynamic and instrumental role of modern slavery reporting. Theoretically, we identify accountability as an essential concept to address the causes of modern slavery in supply chains and for developing collaborative supply chain environments to tackle the issues.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the implicit beliefs both high potentials and HR directors hold about the terms of the exchange relationship between high potential employees and their organizations. The paper positions the study within the framework of the psychological contract, exploring specifically whether strategic ambiguity and information asymmetries in high potential programs create a heightened risk of psychological contract breach.

A total of 20 high potentials and 11 HR directors from nine different organizations were interviewed. Open and axial coding of the qualitative data was performed by three raters.

Information asymmetry in high potential programs, indeed, poses a potential risk for psychological contract breach. Although strategic ambiguity can be an effective communication strategy in that it creates a power imbalance in favor of the organization, at all times a delicate balance must be maintained between leaving room for flexibility and intuitive decision making, and creating perceived promises in high potential employees that are subsequently broken. In fact, through information asymmetry organizations run the risk of achieving the exact opposite of the goals they had for their high potential programs in the first place.

Hardly any research has been done on the psychological effects of identifying a very small proportion of an organization's workforce as high potentials. In addition, research contrasting employee and employer beliefs about psychological contract terms is scarce.

Research examining organizational diversity has largely ignored the role corporate web sites play in establishing the tone for diversity in organizations. Serving as “electronic storefronts,” corporate web sites are typically the first point of contact individuals have with an organization. The purpose of this paper is to centralize communication as a critical tool in understanding the strategies corporations use to communicate their diversity philosophy, practices and policies. This virtual ethnographic study examines corporate web sites (n=100) across industries and sectors to capture the strategies organizations use to strategically communicate diversity to a variety of stakeholders.

Taking a virtual ethnographic, this study examines 100 corporate web sites across industries to capture the methods organizations employ to strategically communicate diversity in their respective organization.

Results from this ethnographic study reveal that organizations typically use three strategies in their diversity messages: impression management, persuasion and strategic ambiguity. Strategic ambiguity and the persuasive use of selling, telling and framing their diversity message are ubiquitous in corporate diversity communication. The use of these strategies may have a profound impact on how diversity is perceived within organizations. Implications for practice and research are discussed.

This is one of the first social science/humanistic studies to examine diversity messages on corporate web sites and advances a conceptual framework for electronic diversity communication. Additionally, this project employs a virtual ethnographic approach, a novel, yet contemporary, method.

The research aim of this article is to generate novel insights into how public sector organizations (PSOs) strategically communicate with the public about critical issues on social media. To this end, the study explores the public's experiences of the Swedish Police's sense of safety communication on Instagram in the third largest city in Sweden, where the lack of a sense of public safety is a main societal challenge.

The research was designed as a case study employing photo-elicitation interviews as a method to collect the empirical material. A phenomenography approach was used to analyze public experiences of the Swedish Police's Instagram communication in Malmö, Sweden.

Findings show that the police's strategic communication of safety on Instagram is experienced along the dimensions of a sense of protection, a sense of proximity and a sense of ambiguity. Taken together, these dimensions broaden and develop the knowledge of what communicating a sense of safety in the public sphere entails.

This study adds to previous research on strategic communication in public sector organizations by demonstrating what strategic communication accomplishes at the receiving end outside of the organization.

This study aims to examine the relationship between self-perceived talent status (SPTS) and positive employee outcomes (work engagement and organisational commitment), mediated by organisational justice (distributive and procedural justice). The authors define SPTS as employees’ self-conceptualisation of talent, formed by inferring the organisation’s initiatives regarding training and development opportunities and through informal recognition by others.

The authors measured SPTS using eight items on a five-point scale. Through an internet survey company, the authors initially surveyed 1,207 full-time employees from 300 Japanese companies with ≥ 300 employees. In the second round of the survey, conducted after approximately two weeks, 876 (82.9%) responses were collected from the initial 1,207 respondents, which were used for the final analysis.

SPTS was directly and positively related to work engagement, organisational commitment, distributive justice and procedural justice. In learning organisations, SPTS was positively but indirectly related to work engagement and organisational commitment, mediated by distributive justice. In non-learning organisations, SPTS was positively but indirectly related to work engagement and organisational commitment, mediated by procedural justice.

Given SPTS’s positive impact on employee outcomes, to eliminate the information asymmetry between organisations and talent due to strategic ambiguity, organisations should increase SPTS by helping talents perceive the plethora of development opportunities in the talent pool.

The results demonstrate the utility of SPTS for improving employee outcomes based on strategic talent management (TM) mechanisms including talent rewards, talent development opportunities and promotions. Furthermore, the results demonstrate that distributive justice plays an important role in the build-based TM context of learning organisations.

This study reviews the literature on business-school (b-school) competition and competitiveness to extend our understanding of b-schools’ competitive strategies.

Both content and network analysis were used in the examination of the scholarly discourse.

The analyses distinguish three literature streams. The first concentrates on resources, capabilities and competencies; the second focuses on measures of competitiveness; and the third includes competitive dynamics and strategy discourse. The analysis shows that the conceptions of competitiveness are quite coherent concerning resources, capabilities and competencies. However, in the “measures of competitiveness” and “industry dynamics and strategy,” discourses were more diverse, indicating greater ambiguity in how the core competencies, capabilities and resources are portrayed as competitiveness outside the institutions. The literature suggests that the measures and indicators of competitiveness are ambiguous to external stakeholders and, furthermore, reflect institutional goal ambiguity.

The question of how, and to what extent, increasing competition in management education and research catalyzes unwelcome changes in the industry has been of great concern to management educators and scholars. This has given rise to a considerable body of literature referring to b-school competition. Despite its topicality, this discourse has remained theoretically fragmented and separate from the mainstream strategy literature. Therefore, this study provides a review and critical discussion of the current state of research on b-school competition, as well as proposes avenues for future research and tools for strategic management of b-schools.

Managing the corporate reputation of hybrid firms (organizations that act commercially to pursue social agendas) involves particular challenges because of competing stakeholder interests. With reference to the Trappist beer market, the paper seeks to identify the value of message ambiguity in reducing stakeholder tension, while simultaneously achieving a clear market positioning.

In total, 25 in‐depth interviews were conducted with brand marketers, owners, channel buyers, industry representatives and consumers.

The findings demonstrate how ambiguous communications minimize tension between stakeholders. One form of ambiguous message strategy is identified – i.e. the deliberate use of “authenticity” as a positioning device. This positioning allows stakeholders to ascribe conflicting meanings to the Trappist brand, resulting in increased reputation and decreased stakeholder tension.

The use of authenticity and message ambiguity represents one means of balancing stakeholder interests, while achieving a clear market position. The paper believes the findings are particularly relevant for social marketers and managers of highly symbolic brands.

Marketers can reduce stakeholder conflict through the use of brand images that emphasize normative as opposed to performance‐based commitments. Such commitments need to be broad enough to allow different stakeholders to ascribe their own meaning to the brand without diminishing the strength of the firm's market position.

The goal of the research was to check whether the sender communicating in an ambiguous manner can gain the benefits in three aspects: perception of his or her image, evoking agreement with issue stand and intention to support him or her in the election. Impact of ambiguous messages was compared with the impact of messages consistent or inconsistent with participants' opinions.

Two experiments were conducted. Participants were randomly divided into three groups and each of them was presented with (1) a message supporting or (2) opposing given proposition or (3) an ambiguous message not revealing the ultimate opinion of the sender. Participants' initial views on the issues were measured. In experiment 1 an expert message concerned the building of the nuclear power plant was presented. In experiment 2 it was a politician's message about introducing the guaranteed number of parliamentary seats for women.

The results suggest that a strategy of argumentative ambiguity applied by senders may be beneficial if the point is to avoid recipients' objections. However, the consequences of ambiguity for the evaluation of sender's credibility and voters' intentions can be seen to be negative.

This research was looking for the reconcile of the contradictory results of previous research, which may have their source in the various operationalization of ambiguity. It was focused at an argumentative ambiguity (i.e. presenting different points of view without declaring support for any of the options).