AbstractTop decision making processes are generally depicted as chaotic, unstructured, incremental or spasmodic, and protracted. In this article it is shown, based on data from 25 strategic decision processes from 12 organizations in three industry sectors, that, within certain limits, there certainly are control options in strategic decision-making processes. In addition, their use tums out to be profitable. The analyses of patterns in the use of control dimensions in the 25 cases leads to a typology of four types of decision models or strategies: the neo-rational model (n = 3), the bureaucratic model (n = 4), the arena model (n = 8) and the open-end model (n = 10). This empirical typology confirms earlier typologies based on literature.The use of control strategies is shown to vary across industry sectors and topics of decisions and have adifferential effect. It is concluded that context and content variables have either a selection effect (some strategies do not occur in some sectors) or a optimization effect (some strategies are more effective than others in a given context).