Abstract: This paper explores how strategic management thinking manifests
itself in strategic management practice in the public sector. Mintzberg’s framework
of ten strategic management schools of thought is chosen for mapping strategic
management thinking. The paper analyses a convenience sample of 35 strategic
management processes, observation of an agency’s strategy reformulation process
and interviews of managers in the public sector in Norway for informing the
discussion. Strategic planning is heavily criticised in some of the business strategy
literature. The analysis indicates that strategic management in the public sector
extensively uses strategic planning, bundled with certain other schools of thought,
despite tendencies to downplay formal, mechanistic planning in contemporary
strategic management theory.