Although organizations can, and should, evaluate their environment, no one can foresee the future. Events occur that challenge our assumptions and contradict our forecasts. Also, bright ideas often come spontaneously, outside of the formal strategic planning process's framework, and between planning events. When a deliberate strategy is realized, the result matches the intended course of action. An emergent strategy develops when an organization takes a series of actions that with time turn into a consistent pattern of behavior, regardless of specific intentions.
Deliberate strategies provide the organization with a sense of purposeful direction.
Emergent strategy implies that an organization is learning what works in practice. Mixing the deliberate and the emergent strategies in some way will help the organization to control its course while encouraging the learning process. For example, a university may decide to recruit new students from high schools, which becomes an intended strategy, and develops certain tactics to achieve this goal. However, during the course of the recruitment process, it may realize that community colleges are responding better than high schools to its recruitment efforts. As a result, the university's recruitment practices may change to emphasize attracting students from community colleges.