Seeing the potentialities at the intersection: A reflection on performativity and processuality mindsets

© 2019 M@n@gement. In this paper, we propose to approach performativity and processuality as mindsets. We suggest that researchers interested by or pursuing performative studies should recognize more explicitly the inherent processuality of performativity. After offering broad overviews on performativity and process thinking, we highlight that both mindsets rest on a similar view of reality as processual, and both share a strong commitment to qualitative empirical work. In spite of the differences that exist between the two mindsets-such as their treatment of agency, the place of socio-materiality and their approach to continuity and change-we contend that acknowledging and engaging more directly with processuality benefits performative studies, as it helps these studies to deal with some of the challenges they often face. In doing so, performative studies could refine their analyses of managerial and organizational phenomena and would also increase their contribution to our field

ASP, The Art and Science of Practice: Academia-Industry Interfacing in Operations Research in Montreal

This paper reports on the 40-year experience of academia-industry interfacing in the operations research (OR) field in Montréal. We focus on five spin off companies that academic entrepreneurs from the CIRRELT and the GERAD created between 1976 and 2003: INRO Consultants, GIRO, AD OPT, Omega Optimisation/Planora, and ExPretio. The importance of university spin offs for knowledge transfer is well documented in fields such as biology and nanotechnology; however, few papers have studied university spin offs in OR. Yet, OR has an enormous impact on society, and university spin off firms play a key role in the diffusion of research to the world of practitioners. In this paper, we tell the story of five companies created by academics from two world-renowned OR research centers based in Montréal, and we derive lessons about academia-industry interfacing in the OR field. By so doing, we hope to improve our understanding of the creation of fruitful relationships between academics and OR practitioners

Timing practices and material markers in coordinating collective market patterns

This paper considers the practices of coordination in financial markets that do not rely on a common market device (e.g., trading platform or calculative tool) to organize trading between buyers and sellers. Our case focuses on the coordination of the pricing cycle within the reinsurance sector. Building on social studies of finance, we adopt a practice-theoretical perspective. Our study goes beyond existing work in showing the importance, and inherently strategic nature, of timing practices in financial markets. Specifically, our ethnographic study of coordination in the reinsurance market shows the recursive interplay between four types of timing practices – delaying, readying, rushing and settling – and the various material artifacts that reinsurers (i.e., sellers) create in shaping the unfolding market pricing cycle. We show how market actors shape the temporal flow of the markets by strategically manipulating time, to both position themselves favorably on individual deals and to collectively push the pricing cycle up. In theorizing the interplay between timing practices and material markers in financial markets, our study advance theory on financial market coordination in three ways. First, we bring to the foreground the strategic nature of financial actors’ sociomaterial practices and show how such practices can impact on broader market outcomes, in our case the market cycle. Second, our exploration of material markers extends concepts of materiality in financial markets beyond the technological affordance of a common trading platform or pricing tool. Third, we further our understanding of the complex relationships between the temporality of financial market microstructures and their coordination practices

A Performative Reading of The Work of Communication

The Work of Communication. Relational Perspectives on Working and Organizing in Contemporary Capitalism by Tim Kuhn, Karen Ashcraft, François Cooren , is a welcomed comprehensive and rigorous attempt at theorizing how communication ‘works’ in contemporary capitalism. In this essay, we review what we see as the contributions of this book – as organization scholars interested in performativity – and address the following question: What does this book perform

The Resistible Rise of Bayesian Thinking in Management: Historical Lessons From Decision Analysis

This paper draws from a case study of decision analysis—a discipline rooted in Bayesianism aimed at supporting managerial decision making—to inform the current discussion on the adoption of Bayesian modes of thinking in management research and practice. Relying on concepts from the science, technology, and society field of study and actor-network theory, we approach the production of scientific knowledge as a cultural, practical, and material affair. Specifically, we analyze the activities deployed by decision analysts to overcome the challenges of making a discipline built on Bayes’ legacy scientifically acceptable, managerially relevant, and long lasting. As a novel contribution to the discussion on the “Bayesian revolution,” our study goes beyond institutional accounts of the legitimation of Bayesianism to highlight the role of politics and material artifacts in past and current attempts at importing Bayesianism. Our study also shows the importance of historical continuity in the promotion of Bayesian methods in management

Changing competitive dynamics in the reinsurance industry: implications of changes in buyer behavior for reinsurance executives

This paper explores how reinsurers can meet the rapid changes occurring in their industry, arising from primary industry consolidation, and changes in cedent (insurance firm) buyer behavior toward bundled reinsurance products and alternative sources of capital. The paper makes the following suggestions for reinsurers. Reinsures need to be proactive in responding to changing patterns of premium volume and develop partnerships with global clients. Smaller reinsurers, in particular, will need to look to develop competitive niches and joint-ventures in order to be significant to these large cedents. Furthermore, reinsures need to continue investing in analytical expertise and resources in order to address the complex needs of their clients. Finally, reinsurers will be increasingly required to engage in alternative risk transfer products, and there will be early-mover advantages in doing so meaningfull

Beyond Borders: Charting the Changing Global Reinsurance Landscape

This report is the result of a three-year study of the global reinsurance industry, covering the main stakeholders of cedents, reinsurers, and brokers. It examines the implications of profound change arising from shifts in regulation, consolidation in the key players, and increasing competition both within the reinsurance industry and from alternative capital providers. These changes are driving convergence in a market that was, until recently, characterised by significant cultural variation in buying and selling reinsurance. The findings in this report will help industry participants to take stock of their current position in the industry, the specific types of differentiation available, and how these differentiators can create advantage. Specifically, the report provides evidence-based frameworks and models that firms can use to diagnose their existing strategies and structures and consider alternatives

COMMENTARY: Catastrophe modelling and metaphors in financial markets: COMMENTARY ON "perils of catastrophe bonds" by Etzion, Kypraios, and Forgues

We welcome Etzion et al.’s (2019) effort to critically assess the role of cat models in insurance markets, by combining a sociology of finance lens with statistical analysis. Nonetheless, we believe there are two flaws in their analysis. First, their interpretation of the model-as-engine metaphor, as well as the way they test for this metaphor, is questionable, in part because it is not clear what form of performativity (generic, effective, Barnesian?) is to be expected in the case of cat models and what constitute rigorous tests for these various forms of performativity. Second, we disagree with the broad conclusion drawn by the authors from the statistical analysis, in particular that the predictive performance of cat models is “not demonstrably better than guesswork” and hence, that such models are not (like) cameras. Overall, we find it hard to see how the two main points discussed by the authors – namely that “catastrophe bonds do not lend themselves to analysis through conventional sociological theories of financial markets” (p. 1) and that cat bonds are not appropriate risk transfer instruments to tackle sustainable development goals – are proven through their discussion of cat models via the model-as-engine and model-as-camera metaphors