Collective intelligence for OER sustainability

To thrive, the Open Educational Resource (OER) movement, or a given initiative, must make sense of a complex, changing environment. Since “sustainability” is a desirable systemic capacity that our community should display, we consider a number of principles that sharpen the concept: resilience, sensemaking and complexity. We outline how these motivate the concept of collective intelligence (CI), we give examples of what OER-CI might look like, and we describe the emerging Cohere CI platform we are developing in response to these requirements

Making sense of tragedy: the ‘reputational’ antecedents of a hospital disaster

This article explores the workings of Reputational Dialogues (RD) (as a form of organizational discourse); within the setting of a UK NHS hospital that has encountered disaster. The disaster in question took place at the Bristol Royal Infirmary (BRI), circa 1984-1995; and is thought to have incurred the deaths of 34 ‘special heart babies’. The article explores patterns of RD utilization associated with the tragedy. Transcripts from the hearings of an inquiry into the disaster are used to access these patterns– if within specific limits and constraints that are discussed in the article. The article seeks to comment on the workings of RDs within the BRI disaster setting and considers, tentatively, how these dialogues may have helped to institutionalize dominant and (counter-cultural beliefs) about the BRI and its reputation as a provider of cardiovascular care to young children. Overall, the article contributes to organization theory by beginning the process of observing the institutionalization of RD and its by-products, as organizational phenomena

Sense and symbolic objects: Strategic sensemaking through design

This paper reports on an ongoing investigation into one aspect of the design thinking phenomenon, namely the use of designed artifacts — sketches, renderings, graphics, models and prototypes — as symbolic objects in strategy making and implementation. It examines the conceptual overlap between design and the strategic cognition perspective, which considers cognitive processes and structures involved in strategic decision making, particularly the phenomenon of sensemaking. It is primarily a theoretical exploration, but draws on two short testimonies from designers. The specific conceptual connection between design practice and strategic cognition theory is potentially valuable to business leaders and managers involved with innovation, design management and strategic decisions. Preliminary findings suggest sensemaking activities by designers generate innovative future concepts with far-reaching strategic implications; designed artifacts aid sensemaking and sensegiving by management in exploring new business opportunities and directions. This paper is an early draft of a fuller account to be published in 2013 (AIEDAM Special Issue, Spring 2013, Vol.27, No.2, Studying and Supporting Design Communication, Edited by: Maaike Kleinsmann & Anja Maier)

Making Sense and Talking Sense: A Case Study of the Correlations Between Sensemaking, Identity and Image in the New Zealand Functional Food Industry

Functional foods are purported by scientists to provide consumers with health benefits over and above food’s most basic uses: providing energy and sustaining life. Western nations, including New Zealand, face significant health challenges as their populations suffer from unprecedented rates of chronic illnesses like cancer and obesity, and health-conscious consumers appear willing and able to purchase these products. The functional food industry has been growing rapidly for the last decade and is widely tipped to continue this growth. However, there is concern that the market is largely unregulated and consumers are confused by the sheer volume of news and information about functional food and health issues. The purpose of this study is to examine the way that a functional food producer makes sense of its role in this complex social, political and economic context, particularly regarding its contribution to public health. The study takes a communication perspective and uses primarily a thematic analysis. Theories of organisational sensemaking, identity and image provide a framework for the case study analysis focusing on organisational communication with stakeholders and attempts to manage contextual issues that affect both the case study organisation and the whole industry. Data was gathered by interviewing higher-level managers from a range of divisions in the organisation, and by collecting a selection of corporate communication documents produced by the organisation for consumers. The study found that the case study organisation’s identity was heavily influenced by health values that align with the product’s proven health benefits. However, the organisation promotes the product as a premium food product, which prices a number of consumers out of the market, and illustrates the limitations this particular product has for improving consumer health. At the same time, the organisational identity comes under threat from challenges to the sustainability of the organisation’s production methods. Analysing the way organisational members respond to these threats provides an interesting picture of the way sensemaking processes are affected by external influences as internal stakeholders re-assess the organisation’s identity

Reputation in organizational settings: a research agenda

Within organization theory, reputation is something we have come to associate with embeddedness research. This short paper seeks to develop a research agenda for new reputational research that draws inspiration from, but also seeks to move beyond, the embeddedness thematic

Meaning Management: A Framework for Leadership Ontology

Leadership is a multifaceted and complex subject of research and demands a sound ontological stance that guides studies for the development of more integrative leadership theories. In this paper, I propose the leadership ontology PVA (perception formation – value creation – achievement realization) and associate it with the two existing leadership ontologies: TRIPOD (leader – member – shared goals) and DAC (direction – alignment – commitment). The leadership ontology PVA, based on a new theory called “meaning management,” consists of three circularly supporting functions: cognitive function to form perception, creative function to generate value, and communicative function to realize higher levels of achievement. The PVA is an epistemology-laden ontology since the meaning management theory allows one to make propositions that explicitly link its three functions with the leadership outcomes: perception, value, and achievement. Moreover, the PVA leadership ontology transcends and includes both the conventional TRIPOD ontology and the DAC ontology

The management of expatriates : contemporary developments and future challenges

The rapid growth of international business at a time when many multinational companies (MNCs) are under increasing cost pressures has led these organisations to take a much closer look at their expatriation policies and practices. Faced with unprecedented levels of foreign competition at home and abroad, firms are beginning to recognise not only that international business is high on top management's list of priorities but that finding and nurturing the human resources required to implement an international strategy is of critical importance (Dowling et al., 1994). Much of the research on the management of expatriates currently available is drawn from research focused on North American multinationals. Adler (1997) commented that most research on international human resource management was concerned with American expatriates and continues to be written from an American rather than an international perspective. This introduction seeks to highlight the growth of research into expatriation to set the context for the five papers in this special edition that both add to some traditional areas of expatriate research and open up new fields relevant to this area of enquiry in international management and international business

Making sense of tragedy: the ‘reputational’ antecedents of a hospital disaster

This article explores the workings of Reputational Dialogues (RD) (as a form of organizational discourse); within the setting of a UK NHS hospital that has encountered disaster. The disaster in question took place at the Bristol Royal Infirmary (BRI), circa 1984-1995; and is thought to have incurred the deaths of 34 ‘special heart babies’. The article explores patterns of RD utilization associated with the tragedy. Transcripts from the hearings of an inquiry into the disaster are used to access these patterns– if within specific limits and constraints that are discussed in the article. The article seeks to comment on the workings of RDs within the BRI disaster setting and considers, tentatively, how these dialogues may have helped to institutionalize dominant and (counter-cultural beliefs) about the BRI and its reputation as a provider of cardiovascular care to young children. Overall, the article contributes to organization theory by beginning the process of observing the institutionalization of RD and its by-products, as organizational phenomena.Reputation effects; the medical profession; organizational crisis; institutionalization; discourse analysis

What is Strategic Competence and Does it Matter? Exposition of the Concept and a Research Agenda

Drawing on a range of theoretical and empirical insights from strategic management and the cognitive and organizational sciences, we argue that strategic competence constitutes the ability of organizations and the individuals who operate within them to work within their cognitive limitations in such a way that they are able to maintain an appropriate level of responsiveness to the contingencies confronting them. Using the language of the resource based view of the firm, we argue that this meta-level competence represents a confluence of individual and organizational characteristics, suitably configured to enable the detection of those weak signals indicative of the need for change and to act accordingly, thereby minimising the dangers of cognitive bias and cognitive inertia. In an era of unprecedented informational burdens and instability, we argue that this competence is central to the longer-term survival and well being of the organization. We conclude with a consideration of the major scientific challenges that lie ahead, if the ideas contained within this paper are to be validated

Coping with Problems of Understanding in Interorganizational Relationships: Using Formalization as a Means to make Sense

Research into the management of interorganizational relationships has hitherto primarily focused on problems of coordination, control and to a lesser extent, legitimacy. In this article, we assert that partners cooperating in such relationships are also confronted with ‘problems of understanding’. Such problems arise from differences between partners in terms of culture, experience, structure and industry, and from the uncertainty and ambiguity that participants in interorganizational relationships experience in early stages of collaboration. Building on Karl Weick’s theory of sensemaking, we advance that participants in interorganizational relationships use formalization as a means to make sense of their partners, the interorganizational relationships in which they are engaged and the contexts in which these are embedded so as to diminish problems of understanding. We offer a systematic overview of the mechanisms through which formalization facilitates sensemaking, including: (1) focusing participants’ attention; (2) provoking articulation, deliberation and reflection; (3) instigating and maintaining interaction; and (4) reducing judgment errors and individual biases, and diminishing incompleteness and inconsistency of cognitive representations. In this way, the article contributes to a better understanding of the relationships between formalization and sensemaking in collaborative relationships, and it carries Karl Weick’s thinking on the relationship between sensemaking and organizing forward in the context of interorganizational management.Formalization;Sensemaking;Interorganizational Cooperation;Understanding