69,864 research outputs found

    Contingent support: exploring ontological politics/extending management

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    This paper is located within the critical management tradition of management education/development. The paper seeks to introduce the neglected area of Actor Network Theory and Mol’s anti-foundationalist ontological politics and demonstrates their potential to developing alternative critical pedagogy and management practice. Following a discussion of problem-based learning, the paper goes on to introduce the emergent pedagogic practice termed contingent support. Through a series of vignettes drawn from fieldwork collected from a second year undergraduate decision making module, the paper discusses carefully how the practice termed contingent support is informed by Actor Network Theory and ontological politics in particular. The paper goes onto reveal the significance of contingent support sensibilities of materiality, situatedness and performance and shows how they can give a new vigour to educators interested in developing more responsible management. Finally, the paper considers contingent support’s transformational potential and sets an agenda for future researc

    THE APPROPRIATION OF NEW ARRANGEMENTS OF PUBLIC ORGANIZATIONS: LOCALLY NEGOTIATE TO STRATEGICALLY ACT

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    The link between strategy and public organization is of growing interest since years and we especially question what organizations strategically do when they implement new organizational arrangements imposed by public policies. And we especially contribute to what public organizations strategically do when they face changes (Bryson and al., 2010). We especially focus on actors who face such changes which are both strategic and institutional (when changes modify the existing institutions). And we question what actors strategically do when they have to appropriate new organizational arrangements. Taking into account the complex and fragmented institutionalized context public organizations operate in, we observe that the literature has put little attention to this level of analysis as being strategically molded / created by organizations and we answer this gap by mobilizing the perspective of the Negotiated Order (NO) (Beaulieu and Pasquero, 2002; Strauss and al., 1963, Turcotte and Pasquero, 2001). Through this perspective, we analyze how actors negotiate and elaborate local and situated agreements to strategically implement new organizational arrangements in institutional contexts. We propose an additional strategy which rests on the process of constructing (i.e. enacting) stakeholders to build organization as local negotiated order. Through the process of stakeholders’enactment, the actors determined how these stakeholders may be identified and differentiated so as to better channel the institutional logics interplays which shape the actors during negotiations; and we have identified 5 ways of enacting stakeholders. We contribute to the literature on NO by enlightening the political process of NO building and proposing one additional strategy of NO building, as well as to the literature on strategy of public organization by better understanding how public organizations strategically mold the (local) rules of the game through negotiations and consensus.strategic action; institutionalized environment; molding institutionalized environment; the negotiated order perspective, process of enactment of stakeholders.

    Advancing Dispute Resolution by Unpacking the Sources of Conflict: Toward an Integrated Framework

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    Organizational leaders, public policy makers, dispute resolution professionals, and scholars have developed diverse methods for resolving workplace conflict. But there is inadequate recognition that the effectiveness of a dispute resolution method depends on its fit with the source of a particular conflict. Consequently, it is essential to better understand where conflict comes from and how this affects dispute resolution. To these ends, this paper uniquely integrates scholarship from multiple disciplines to develop a multi-dimensional framework on the sources of conflict. This provides an important foundation for theorizing and identifying effective dispute resolution methods, which are more important than ever as the changing world of work raises new issues, conflicts, and institutions

    The Unionization of Clerical, Technical, and Professional Employees in Higher Education: Threat or Opportunity

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    [Excerpt] Union organizing among non-teaching white collar employees of colleges and universities persists. To the discomfort of many university administrators, high visibility union successes at Yale, Columbia, Harvard, the University of Cincinnati, and the University of Illinois were not isolated instances but part of a trend. Professional, technical, and clerical employees\u27 desire for a more effective voice, has combined with the economic insecurity associated with stubborn budgetary pressures, to encourage these workers to pursue union representation. Unions have responded to this opportunity with enthusiasm, experimenting with innovative organizing and bargaining strategies in the relatively open environment offered by institutions of higher education. This chapter presents a sympathetic summary of this phenomenon. It touches on employee motivation to unionize, models of university white collar organizing, responses to unionization by university administrators, and the range of possible bargaining relationships. The concluding section suggests a management position towards organizing and bargaining consistent with the highest standards of the academy. To set the stage, the essay begins with a descriptive review of the extent of unionization

    Information technology as boundary object for transformational learning

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    Collaborative work is considered as a way to improve productivity and value generation in construction. However, recent research demonstrates that socio-cognitive factors related to fragmentation of specialized knowledge may hinder team performance. New methods based on theories of practice are emerging in Computer Supported Collaborative Work and organisational learning to break these knowledge boundaries, facilitating knowledge sharing and the generation of new knowledge through transformational learning. According to these theories, objects used in professional practice play a key role in mediating interactions. Rules and methods related to these practices are also embedded in these objects. Therefore changing collaborative patterns demand reconfiguring objects that are at the boundary between specialized practices, namely boundary objects. This research is unique in presenting an IT strategy in which technology is used as a boundary object to facilitate transformational learning in collaborative design work

    Agent-Based Computing: Promise and Perils

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    Agent-based computing represents an exciting new synthesis both for Artificial Intelligence (AI) and, more generally, Computer Science. It has the potential to significantly improve the theory and practice of modelling, designing and implementing complex systems. Yet, to date, there has been little systematic analysis of what makes an agent such an appealing and powerful conceptual model. Moreover, even less effort has been devoted to exploring the inherent disadvantages that stem from adopting an agent-oriented view. Here both sets of issues are explored. The standpoint of this analysis is the role of agent-based software in solving complex, real-world problems. In particular, it will be argued that the development of robust and scalable software systems requires autonomous agents that can complete their objectives while situated in a dynamic and uncertain environment, that can engage in rich, high-level social interactions, and that can operate within flexible organisational structures

    Mapping trajectories of becoming: four forms of behaviour in co-housing initiatives

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    In order learn about planning in a world increasingly characterised by resource interdependencies and a plurality of governing agencies, this paper follows the processes of becoming for two co-housing initiatives. Self-organisation – understood as the emergence of actor-networks – is the leading theoretical concept, complemented by translation from actor-network theory and individuation from assemblage theory. This theoretical hybrid distinguishes four forms of behaviour (decoding, coding, expansion and contraction) that are used to analyse the dynamics of becoming in the two cases. As a result, information is revealed on the conditions that give rise to co-housing initiatives, and the dynamic interactions between planning authorities, (groups of) initiators and other stakeholders that gave shape to the initiatives. Differences between these actors become blurred, as both try to create meaning and reasoning in a non-linear, complex and uncertain world. The paper concludes with a view on planning as an act of adaptive navigation, an act equally performed by professionals working for planning authorities and a case initiator
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