PARADOXES, CONFLICTS AND TENSIONS IN ESTABLISHING MASTER DATA MANAGEMENT FUNCTION

Managing master data as an organization-wide function enforces changes in responsibilities and established ways of working. These changes cause tensions in the organization and can result in conflicts. Understanding these tensions and mechanisms helps the organization to manage the change more effectively. The tensions and conflicts are studied through the theory of paradox. The object of this paper is to identify paradoxes in a Master Data Management (MDM) development process and the factors that contribute to the emergence of these conflicts. Altogether thirteen MDM specific paradoxes were identified and factors leading to them were presented. Paradoxes were grouped into categories that represent the organization’s core activities to understand how tensions are embedded within the organization, and how they are experienced. Five paradoxes were observed more closely to illustrate the circumstances they appear. Working through the tensions also sheds light on the question of how these paradoxes should be managed. This example illustrates how problems emerge as dilemmas and evolve into paradoxes

Data, Technology, and People: Demystifying Master Data Management

With the amount of data constantly increasing, better practices are needed to manage it. Master data management (MDM) is an organizationally horizontal flow of activities aimed at managing core business data (i.e., master data). MDM differs from traditional data management practices as an organization-wide function. The idea of managing an organization’s most important data is impossible to achieve if MDM is simply treated as a data management practice or a technology-driven phenomenon. Establishing an MDM function involves introducing changes to an organization, which can relate to people and their ways of working, or technology and how it is used. If only a certain aspect is emphasized, the function will not deliver desired results.The object of this thesis is to study MDM not as a straightforward IT project, but as a complicated and multi-dimensional function. The goal is to understand the factors that should be taken into account in the development of an MDM function. The empirical part of this study is an ethnographic case study in a public sector organization, where MDM development was in early phases when the observation began. Altogether, the two data collection periods lasted for 32 months and during this, two MDM development projects were carried out, and MDM development became rooted as part of the organization’s routine operations.MDM development was analyzed as an ensemble that includes social and material components. Its theorization begins with understanding the role of master data in an organization’s information landscape and continues to examine the different views of MDM. Theories of change assist in understanding how change should be observed, understood, and managed.The study indicates that MDM effects multiple levels of an organization. Many organizational factors influence its development, and extensive dependencies exist between these factors. Especially in terms of ownership, other roles and responsibilities assume key positions. By understanding these factors and their roles in MDM development, it is easier to manage them.The study sheds light on the strong alignment between the complex concept of MDM and the organization. MDM literature is scarce and literature of public sector MDM is almost nonexistent. This dissertation contributes to research by widening the understanding of MDM in the public sector context, and by presenting a framework for establishing an MDM function as an organizational function that is closely linked with technology

Plate-Spinning for Success: CIOs, Embrace your Role Paradoxes!

Today’s CIOs face a host of perplexing and conflicting demands. Learning how to embrace these complex paradoxes is akin to learning the art of spinning plates in opposite directions. Early insights from our interview-based study reveal that CIOs are embracing their role-related paradoxes by developing a “plate-spinning mindset,” i.e., a mindset that helps CIOs spin multiple metaphorical plates in opposite directions. In this paper, we inform practitioners what a plate-spinning mindset entails, and how to develop such a mindset

Exploring and managing paradoxical tensions within social non-profit organisations in the health care industry

Purpose – Health care is complex and expensive; the industry is struggling in varying degrees to maintain financial sustainability in an uncertain and changing environment. Mental health disorders have increased significantly, yet even more by the impact of the covid-19 pandemic. Around the globe about one billion individuals are affected by mental disorders, nonetheless mental health is one of the most neglected areas of public health care. Non-profit organisations aim to bridge the gap in public health care service, while facing paradoxical tensions. The purpose of this study is to examine paradoxical tensions and management approaches within non-profit organisations in the field of mental health focusing on eating disorders, in order to deepen the understanding of these organisations and to improve their ability of managing paradoxes in a more efficient way. Methodology – This in-depth, descriptive case study consists of an inductive approach aimed at exploring paradoxical tensions and their relations with another. The author collected data primarily via interviews, in order to perform a qualitative content analysis. Findings – Health care non-profit organisations in the field of mental health are rife with paradoxes, most of them already have been discovered in paradox literature and can be easily allocated to the four types of paradox: learning, organizing, performing, belonging. Whereas others, are absolutely unique and sector specific. The umbrella paradox (financial sustainability – social responsibility) and further sub paradoxes are interlinked with one another and build a complex system. For managing paradoxical tensions, non-profit organisations highlight the importance of communication, transparency and the value in both/and thinking, in order to balance between opposing poles of paradox. Value – This study will contribute to the organizational literature on paradoxes by empirically examining the essential but under-researched theoretical link between paradox and non-profit organisations in the health care sector. Moreover, to provide management-assistance for non-profit organisations by introducing a tool to assess and maintain a complex and dynamic system of interwoven paradoxes

Individual approaches to workplace tensions: implications for creativity and work engagement

Contemporary organizations are rife with contradictions between competing goals, demands, perspectives, and interests. The tensions resulting from such contradictions can trigger stress, anxiety and ambivalence. How can employees constructively deal with the tug of war between contradictory goals, demands, perspectives, and interests that coexist in their work life? This dissertation views tensions not as a problem, but as an opportunity that enables individuals to learn, create and engage. Specifically, this dissertation offers new insights regarding how employees approach tensions that arise from competing work demands and goals, and tensions that arise from conflicts between coworkers. Chapters 2 and 3 focused on intrapersonal tension in the domain of creativity, with Chapter 2 examining how individual factors are associated with the pursuit of one-sided creative solutions, and Chapter 3 investigating when and how leaders and employees can jointly manage tensions arising from workload pressure to achieve better creative performance. Chapter 4 studied relationship conflict as a form of interpersonal tension, suggesting a new way to counteract its negative implications to stay engaged. Taken together, this dissertation advances current understanding of managing tensions at the micro-level and contributes to paradox theory by identifying new boundary conditions that contextualize benefits and costs associated with tensions and paradoxes. I hope this dissertation will serve as a building block for future research on workplace tensions, complementing the traditional view on tensions as negative with one showing how employees and leaders can thrive and progress in tensions

(Re)constructing the wicked problem through the visual and the verbal: the case of a dialogue based architectural competition

Wicked problems are open ended and complex societal problems. There is a lack of empirical research into the dynamics and mechanisms that (re)construct problems to become wicked. This paper builds on an ethnographic study of a dialogue-based architect competition to do just that. The competition studied had the purpose of selecting a design, a project and a design team for a large multifunctional building in Copenhagen. As a part of the competition, four different architect-teams had to come up with solutions on how to transform an old brewery site into a multifunctional building. During the competition, the invited architectural teams presented their designs and team organization in three parallel workshops for a panel of client advisors, user representatives as well as a professional jury. Our data consists of semi structured interviews with key informants before, during and after the competition and participant observations from all the workshops. We focus on the dynamic interplay between design visualizations and verbal dialogues and the ways in which contradictions and tensions emerge and play out. When the architect teams present their solutions at the workshops, the visualization processes creates new knowledge and insights, but at the same time present new problems related to the ongoing verbal feedback. In the design process where the problem is being (re) constructed appears as Heracles fight with Hydra: Every time Heracles cut of a head, two new heads grow out. The paper contributes to the understanding of the relationship between the visual and the verbal (dialogue) in complex design process in the early phases of large construction projects, and how the dynamic interplay between the design visualizations and verbal dialogues develops before the competition produces, or negotiates “a winning design”

Lawyering Paradoxes: Making Meaning of the Contradictions

Effective lawyering requires the ability to manage contradictory yet interdependent practices. In their role as traditionally understood, lawyers must fight, judge, debate, minimize risk, and advance clients’ interests. Yet increasingly, lawyers must also collaborate, build trust, innovate, enable effective risk-taking, and hold clients accountable for adhering to societal values. Law students and lawyers alike struggle, often unproductively, to reconcile these tensions. Law schools often address them as a dilemma requiring a choice or overlook the contradictions that interfere with their integration. This Article argues that these seemingly contradictory practices can be brought together through the theory and action of paradox. After identifying the features of these two lawyering practices—called here legality and proactive lawyering—the Article sets out five lawyering paradoxes that stem from the opposing yet interdependent features of legalistic and proactive lawyering: paradoxes of thought and discourse; relationship; motivation, mindset, and justice. Next, the Article shows the consequences of legal education’s tendency to avoid, sidestep, or downplay these paradoxes. Finally, drawing on existing research and experiences of innovators, the Article identifies three strategies that can enable students and lawyers to construct a dynamic tension between legality and proactive lawyering, and in the process, build the potential for transformative learning and meaningful justice