The generation game: governing through bio-politics

An increasingly popular management tool is to stratify a workforce along generational lines, to distinguish its qualities and differentiate orientations to work. From this, a range of organisational practices, ranging from leadership styles to reward systems are tailored to fit specific generational characteristics. We term this practice ‘management-by-generation’ and examine how it has the potential to govern as a bio-political technology. The article develops nascent work within organisation studies on governmentality and bio-politics to demonstrate the powerful potential of management-by-generation to govern in contemporary organisations. In line with other Foucauldian studies on ageing, it also contributes to the research on generations in demonstrating how a bio-political construction of generation allows management-by-generation to govern effectively, while more sociologically informed conceptualisations of generation could be a source of contestation to this emerging technology

Expert authority in crisis: Making authority real through struggle

here is an emerging consensus both within the social scientific research community and more widely in the public domain that expert authority is “in trouble.” However, there is much greater disagreement over the scope and scale of this trouble and what it might mean for the nature, status, and significance of expert authority in the 21st century. This paper identifies and assesses three different narratives concerning the crisis in expert authority. These constitute the delegitimation narrative, the demystification narrative, and the decomposition narrative. They can be seen as responses to the breakdown in the implicit social contract between experts, publics, and states under the extreme and continuous pressures exerted on expert authority by disjunctive change. We evaluate these various interpretations of the crisis in expert authority, particularly in terms of what they suggest about the future potency and stability of the concept of expert authority. In this process of evaluation, we also highlight the emergence of reflexive expert authority and its implications for organizational governance as potential outcomes of this ongoing crisis in the legitimacy and status of expert workers. Consequently, the paper provides a general analytical framework for understanding the emergent narratives around expert authority in democracies and highlights how all three narratives point to serious problems in sustaining this authority in the face of destabilizing change. Furthermore, in developing the notion of reflexive expert authority, we contend that theorization of expert authority needs to privilege the deeper dynamics of trust and control at the core of its analytical focus within organization theory

Becoming a profession: crafting professional identities in public relations

Since its beginnings in the WWI propaganda machine, public relations (PR)has had a murky image as the influential force at the sidelines of powerful groups in society. Despite this shadowy existence, the predominant professional body for PR, the Chartered Institute of Public Relations (CIPR)has looked to professionalise the industry. This research explores how these tensions and ontradictions play out in the construction of professional identities by examining the on-going construction, contestation and attempted closure of a professional body within a wider web of power relations, and its relationship and resonance with those practicing PR. Utilising a combination of interviews, participant observation and document analysis, the thesis argues that discourses circulating in texts generated by the CIPR constructs the subject position of the PR professional as someone who is committed to continual development and learning through the professional body’s credentialised resources. Nevertheless, this professional subject position isn’t always salient in practitioners’ identity work where the majority of ractitioners draw on alternative discourses that centre on their level of experience and access to powerful networks. The dominant subject position that PR practitioners construct in their identity work is that of shapeshifter: someone who continually adapts their performance of identity with different audiences in order to do their job. This indicates that the CIPR needs to consider how its professional subject position can reflect practitioners’ experience of their work as centring on relationships and adaptation to different contexts. As such, this research contributes to the literature on identities and knowledge work by highlighting the importance of the shapeshifter identity whilst also providing a more nuanced appreciation of how ambiguity operates in knowledge workers’ identity construction. It also contributes to the sociology of the professions by demonstrating that closure and credentialism are not the most salient discourses for the modern professional. Keywords: identities, profession, knowledge work, becoming, P

A Parameterized Delamination Model for Use in Complex Damage Characterization of Composite Laminatesin Ultrasonic Inspections

Ultrasonic damage detection and characterization is commonly used in nondestructive evaluation (NDE) of aerospace composite components. However, in real materials and structures, the dispersive waves can result in complicated behavior, particularly in the presence of complex damage scenarios and structural components. Accurate three dimensional finite element models (FEMs), using PZFlex, of guided wave interactions with realistic damage scenarios can be used to study quantitative NDE ultrasonic damage detection techniques numerically, to supplement or replace expensive experimental testing. Novel data analysis techniques such as filter reconstruction imaging methods can be used to create practical comparisons between experimental and simulated data. To compare experimental and simulated data, however, the FEM must accurately simulate the physics of an ultrasonic inspection. This requires that information about the damage be known a priori (e.g. through CT scans of the laminates). While possible in a research setting, this is typically not the case for real inspections in which the goal is to characterize the unknown damage. This work will describe a means of parameterizing a FEM of a composite laminate for use in a damage characterization scheme. The FEM is parameterized with a multidimensional damage model capable of describing the complex amage typical of low impact strikes in composites. The damage under consideration in this work is described by the spiraling, multilayer delamination depicted in Figure 1. Experimental laser Doppler vibrometer (LDV) wavefield data and the FEM simulated vibration responses are postprocessed using the 3D Fourier transform so that the wavenumber-frequency spectra can be readily compared, building on the results and methodsin. The purpose of the parameterized damage model is for use in a probabilistic damage characterization methodology, discussed in a companion presentation. The composite laminate model and the ultrasonic inspection are simulated using PZFlex and allows for iterative refinement of the damage. The increasing model fidelity enablesfast localization ofthe damage followed by subsequent refined characterization

A Model-based, Bayesian Solution for Characterization of Complex Damage Scenarios in AerospaceComposite Structures

Ultrasonic damage detection and characterization is commonly used in nondestructive evaluation (NDE) of aerospace composite components. In real materials and structures, the dispersive wavesresult in complicated behavior in the presence of complex damage scenarios. Model-based characterization methods utilize accurate three dimensional finite element models(FEMs), using PZFlex, of guided wave interaction with realistic damage scenariosto aid in defect identification & classification. This work builds on the results and methods in [1] and describes an inverse solution for realistic composite damage characterization by comparing the wavenumber- frequency spectra of experimental and simulated UT inspections. The FEM is parameterized with the damage model described in a companion presentation [2], capable of describing the complex damage typical of low impact strikesin composites (Figure 1). The damage is characterized through a stochastic solution, enabling uncertainty quantification surrounding the characterization. Typical Bayesian methods, such as Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC), are computationally costly and cannot be easily parallelized. In this work, we present a Sequential Monte Carlo (SMC) scheme in which the complex damage parameterization is formulated as a set of random variables, propagated using importance sampling and MCMC-based rejuvenation mechanismsto characterize the composite damage and quantify the uncertainty surrounding those estimates. SMC enables increasing FEM fidelity during the solution, allowing for fast optimal global localization and subsequent damage characterization refinement

Climbing to freedom on an impossible staircase: Exploring the emancipatory potential of becoming an entrepreneur-employer

This article contributes to critical discussions questioning the emancipatory potential of entrepreneurship by examining the experiences of men and women entrepreneurs who have recently become employers in South Wales, the United Kingdom. Our research uses a co-creative visual method based in interpretative phenomenological analysis (IPA) to explore transitions from entrepreneur to entrepreneur-employer in everyday contexts. Findings demonstrate how initial emancipatory experiences become increasingly bounded when becoming an entrepreneur-employer. This exposes a Catch-22 of entrepreneuring-as-emancipation as a symptom of neoliberal entrepreneurial discourses that constrain what entrepreneurs are encouraged to do: grow. We find a plurality of particular emancipations, but conclude that within a developed context entrepreneurship, and more specifically, becoming an entrepreneur-employer is a relational step through which perceived constraints become more readily experienced and emancipation never fully realised

Embracing indeterminacy: on being a liminal professional

The rise of the corporate profession has contributed to a more varied and ambiguous professional terrain that is increasingly seen to be indeterminate and fluid. This paper advances the current debate around the development of corporate professions, exploring how practitioners respond to this environment. Drawing on research with public relations practitioners, the paper shows how the idea of being a liminar facilitates the formation of a professional identity in conditions of high indeterminacy. In taking an individual level of analysis of professions, the paper suggests that indeterminacy is a more resonant feature for corporate professionals than previously suggested in the research, but that this indeterminacy is navigated in professional identity construction through ‘being a liminar’, and thus greater nuance may need to be recognized in the conceptualization of both corporate professions and corporate professionalization. It also demonstrates the use of liminality as a discursive resource in identity construction and with it, challenges the common association of liminality with self‐doubt and existential anxiety. In turn, the paper considers the implications of the liminal professional identity for the future of contemporary professions, and for understanding the liminal experience

Reframing and reacting to employees' responses to change: A focus on resistance

Background A hallmark of a leader is their ability to manage change—an ever-present feature of organisational life. Indeed, all improvement requires change, and in this context navigating employees’ responses to progress change is a key part of leadership. To support this, research and leadership development have historically focused on how leaders can reduce resistance to change. This review highlights the value of reframing classic conceptions of resistance to change as something negative. Result Widening understanding of non-acceptance responses to change supports the provision of broader, yet more meaningful advice to leaders and managers about how to engage with employees in ways that can support improvement. To do this, the article identifies why resistance is important in the contemporary context and then outlines three current broad views within research on resistance to change identified by Robyn Thomas and Cynthia Hardy. These influence how resistance is seen and therefore how it is approached. The article considers what leaders can learn and do to more effectively navigate employees’ responses to change, and how reframing resistance applies to the specific context of healthcare

A Model-Based, Bayesian Solution for Characterization of Complex Damage Scenarios in Aerospace Composite Structures

Ultrasonic damage detection and characterization is commonly used in nondestructive evaluation (NDE) of aerospace composite components. In recent years there has been an increased development of guided wave based methods. In real materials and structures, these dispersive waves result in complicated behavior in the presence of complex damage scenarios. Model-based characterization methods utilize accurate three dimensional finite element models (FEMs) of guided wave interaction with realistic damage scenarios to aid in defect identification and classification. This work describes an inverse solution for realistic composite damage characterization by comparing the wavenumber-frequency spectra of experimental and simulated ultrasonic inspections. The composite laminate material properties are first verified through a Bayesian solution (Markov chain Monte Carlo), enabling uncertainty quantification surrounding the characterization. A study is undertaken to assess the efficacy of the proposed damage model and comparative metrics between the experimental and simulated output. The FEM is then parameterized with a damage model capable of describing the typical complex damage created by impact events in composites. The damage is characterized through a transdimensional Markov chain Monte Carlo solution, enabling a flexible damage model capable of adapting to the complex damage geometry investigated here. The posterior probability distributions of the individual delamination petals as well as the overall envelope of the damage site are determined