THE POWER OF WHO WE ARE: HOW ORGANIZATIONAL IDENTITY INFLUENCES IT OUTSOURCING SUCCESS

Corporate Information Technology (IT) functions are under increasing pressure to succeed in their IT outsourcing (ITO) arrangements. This study examines the effect of organizational identity (OI) on ITO success. Building on a recent study confirming the positive role of OI strength on outsourcing success, we ask: Are there specific outsourcing and organizational conditions where organizational identity influences outsourcing success? Using the model from the previous study which substantiated OI’s influence on the pivotal antecedent – effective knowledge sharing – on ITO success, we conduct an empirical examination of 312 IT leaders engaged in outsourcing. We find that OI strength’s mediation effects are present when organizations outsource core functions, maintain a utilitarian OI orientation, and low cultural similarity between client and supplier exist. Understanding that organizational identity is a cultural element shaping ITO related behaviors discourages the development of simplistic “checklists” for practitioners as they seek to maximize the ITO relationships

Estado del arte sobre la investigación en identidad organizacional

Working Paper del Departamento de Organización de Empreses de la Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya sobre la investigación en identidad organizacional.El estado del arte es una forma de aludir a lo que se sabe sobre una materia, lo que se ha dicho hasta el momento que ha sido más relevante. En este sentido la pretensión de este documento es situar al lector interesado en cuál es la situación de conocimiento actual sobre la identidad organizacional. Esta materia ha ido tomando relevancia en la investigación científica sobre dirección de empresas en los últimos años. De hecho, la identidad organizacional se ha revelado como un activo intangible de gran influencia en las organizaciones, hasta tal punto que su errónea evaluación o tratamiento puede conllevar graves repercusiones para la organización, incluso su desaparición. La identidad organizacional ha adquirido el interés científico, si bien los investigadores más relevantes en esta materia coinciden en que los trabajos de investigación no han alcanzado su culminación, más bien se encuentran en fases iniciales y animan a continuar investigando en este área de conocimiento.Preprin

A margem é onde tudo começa e onde tudo acaba: A. Dasilva O. fala ao país pela Rádio Caos

Em meados dos anos 1980, o Porto começou a abrir-se à mudança cultural, musical e estética anunciada pelo (pós)-modernismo. A resistência - e a procura do novo - também começou a fazer-se sentir através de programas de rádio, de fanzines, de concertos e de boletins. Importante era o lema "pelo direito à diferença"2. Nestas movimentações, para além de alguns músicos, destacavam-se certos autores/editores. António da Silva Oliveira (A. DASILVA O., 1958) era uma figura central. Publicava, coadjuvava a publicar e propulsionava projetos dos mais diversos domínios da intervenção cultural. Através da trajetória "maldita", underground de A. Dasilva O., traçaremos um retrato da sociedade portuense na sua transição para a contemporaneidade onde as artes, as músicas e suas subversões desempenha[ra]m um papel central.In the mid-1980s, Porto began to open to the cultural, musical, and aesthetic change announced by (post)-modernism. Resistance - and the search for the new - also began to make itself felt through radio programmes, fanzines, concerts, and bulletins. Important was the motto "for the right to difference"18. In these movements, besides some musicians, certain authors/publishers stood out. António da Silva Oliveira (A. Dasilva O., 1958) was a central figure. He published, assisted in publishing, and promoted projects in the most diverse areas of cultural intervention. Through A. Dasilva O.'s underground 'cursed' trajectory, we will trace a portrait of the Portuguese society in its transition to contemporaneity where the arts, music and their subversions played a central role

Moments of identity:Dynamics of artist, persona, and audience in electronic music

In our account of artistic identities among electronic music artists, we point to the notion of persona as a key element in a triadic framework for studying the dynamics of identity. Building on pragmatist theory, we further draw on Pizzorno’s concept of mask and Luhmann’s notion of second-order observation to highlight the dual properties of persona: whether like a mask that is put on or like a probe that is put out, persona is a part that stands apart. Persona is an object that alter can recognize and by which ego can be recognized; but what is recognized defies the person’s complete control. We thus conceptualize identity as a multi-sided relationship that involves person, persona, and others. Building on our ethnographic research among electronic music artists in Berlin and New York, we characterize this relationship in terms of attachment between artist and persona, between artist and audience, and between persona and audience. These attachments are variable and independent from one another. The resulting model is an analytic tool to examine identity as the ongoing outcome of the three-way dynamics of such shifting attachments. We are attentive to persona because the creation and curation of online profiles have become a pervasive element in many people’s daily interactions in both social and work situations

Underground testing : name-altering practices as probes in electronic music

Name-altering practices are common in many creative fields – pen names in literature, stage names in the performing arts, aliases in music. More than just reflecting artistic habits or responding to the need for distinctive brands, these practices can also serve as test devices to probe, validate, and guide the artists’ active participation in a cultural movement. At the same time, they constitute a powerful probe to negotiate the boundaries of a subculture, especially when its features are threatened by appropriation from the mass-oriented culture. Drawing evidence from electronic music, a field where name-altering practices proliferate, we outline dynamics of pseudonymity, polyonymy, and anonymity that surround the use of aliases. We argue that name-altering practices are both a tool artists use to probe the creative environment and a device to recursively put one’s creative participation to the test. In the context of creative subcultures, name-altering practices constitute a subtle but effective form of underground testing

Developing skills to perform hybridity

Thesis: S.M. in Management Research, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Sloan School of Management, February 2018.Cataloged from PDF version of thesis.Includes bibliographical references (pages 29-32).Multivocal identities have often been thought to provide social actors with more resources and opportunities over time than other "limited," singular identities. However, less is known about how organizations actually accomplish embodying multiple identities. By looking inside a hybrid organization, this paper uses ethnographic data to document how an organization successfully sustains its hybridity despite challenges associated with making multiple identity claims. The paper analyzes how the organization socializes individuals to perform its particular hybrid organizational identity. A common practice known as demonstrations served as an integrative practice-based mechanism enabling actors confronted by distinct social worlds, and norms, to enact otherwise competing roles and framings of their work so that their performances did not convey incompetence or betrayal of alternative normative expectations. The findings show that to successfully perform the organization's hybrid identity, the actors developed a transferable skill set, which enabled them to credibly deliver on their manifold roles as academic researchers, social hacktivists, and commercial product designers.by James Whitcomb Riley.S.M. in Management Researc

How Cinderella Became a Queen: Theorizing Radical Status Change

Using a case study of the Italian spirit grappa, we examine status recategorization - the vertical extension and reclassification of an entire market category. Grappa was historically a low-status product, but in the 1970s one regional distiller took steps that led to a radical break from its traditional image, so that in just over a decade high-quality grappa became an exemplar of cultured Italian lifestyle and held a market position in the same class as cognac and whisky. We use this context to articulate "theorization by allusion", which occurs through three mechanisms: category detachment-distancing a social object from its existing category; category emulation-presenting that object so that it hints at the practices of a high-status category; and category sublimation-shifting from local, field-specific references to broader, societal-level frames. This novel theorization is particularly appropriate for explaining change from low to high status because it avoids resistance to and contestation of such change (by customers, media, and other sources) as a result of status imperatives, which may be especially strong in mature fields. Unlike prior studies that have examined the status of organizations within a category, ours foregrounds shifts in the status and social meaning of a market category itself

Differentiation in Markets: A Study of Social Structure and Politics.

In the last half century, the American consuming public has fragmented from relatively concentrated tastes such as a meat and potatoes diet and Walter Cronkite’s CBS Evening News into an abundance of varied and often polarized tastes such as vegan vs. caveman diets and Fox News vs. MSNBC. This growth in the diversity and division of consumer tastes over time is significant because tastes influence the formation of social networks and groups, the structure and regulation of markets, and the environmental impacts of consumption. However, our understanding of the trends in market differentiation and their causes is underdeveloped. Usual explanations emphasize technological improvements but producers can use these technologies to fill retail shelves with either diverse or redundant products, and there is much variation among technologically-similar markets. Instead, I theorize how market structures and political pressures combine to persistently extend differentiation. In three sections, I unpack these dynamics by charting trajectories in market diversity, identifying internal market mechanisms, and analyzing how external social groups affect market differentiation. The last section examines the case of the environmental movement and natural products in order to better understand the consequences of entanglement between movements and markets. This dissertation contributes to our understanding of differentiation in consumer society, as well as to broad literatures on market organization, innovation, social movements in markets, and cultural systems.PhDSociologyUniversity of Michigan, Horace H. Rackham School of Graduate Studieshttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/113287/1/schifelt_1.pd

Doctor of Philosophy

dissertationThis dissertation investigates the competitive environment of craft based specialist organizations. These are often characterized as entrepreneurial, craft based firms that leverage a collective identity of authenticity (and include, but are not restricted to: microbreweries and microdistilleries, artisan cheese producers, custom snowboard, surfboard and bicycle manufacturers, farm to table restaurants, and organic food producers). In this context, I investigate how these entrepreneurial firms leverage reputation, identity, and legitimacy to compete with much larger organizations, despite their inability to garner competitive advantages based on scope and scale economies. The findings are consistent with the notion that craft based organizations operate much differently than mainstream markets