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Article
Publication date: 1 September 2006

Gina Anderson

This paper aims to explore the ways in which recent “managerial” changes in Australian universities affect academics' experiences of their working lives; and the significance of…

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Abstract

Purpose

This paper aims to explore the ways in which recent “managerial” changes in Australian universities affect academics' experiences of their working lives; and the significance of time and space in academics' resistance to managerialism.

Design/methodology/approach

This paper draws on interviews with 27 academics from eight Australian universities, in which they explored their experiences of managerialism. The analysis reported here focuses on academics' experiences of time and space in the managerial university. A Foucauldian approach to power and resistance underpins the overall research approach employed in this study.

Findings

The paper finds that academics in this study argued that managerial practices in their universities imposed significant time‐burdens in already full workloads. However, many of them also employed time and space – often in highly creative way – in resisting these same practices. Much of this resistance involves academics “fiddling” time and space from themselves in order to fulfil their obligations as teachers and research. Such resistance has implications for further academic demoralisation and burnout.

Originality/value

While other studies have acknowledged academics' opposition to managerialism in their universities, this study focus specifically on the ways in which this opposition is enacted in resistance.

Details

Journal of Organizational Change Management, vol. 19 no. 5
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0953-4814

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 1 September 2006

Joanne Roberts and John Armitage

The purpose of this paper is to question extant categorizations of organization and to introduce the concept of the hypermodern organization. In so doing, it aims to contribute to…

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Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to question extant categorizations of organization and to introduce the concept of the hypermodern organization. In so doing, it aims to contribute to the understanding of the hypermodern organization by means of a case study of the accelerated appearance and disappearance of Enron.

Design/methodology/approach

Consideration is given in the paper to organization and its various forms, namely, the premodern, the modern and the postmodern organization. The hypermodern organization is then introduced and elaborated upon. To demonstrate the contemporary relevance of the hypermodern organization the increasing speed of both the appearance and disappearance of Enron is reviewed. The contribution of an increase in velocity to the disintegration of the hypermodern organization of Enron is considered.

Findings

Existing approaches to organizations and organizational change in the main fail to recognize the context and impact of hypermodernity. To address this, the paper introduces and develops the concept of the hypermodern organization. The relevance of the hypermodern organization to an appreciation of organization and organizational change is demonstrated through an analysis of the accelerated appearance and disappearance of Enron.

Research limitations/implications

The paper introduces a new conception of organization and organizational change. Further research is necessary to verify and build on the findings.

Originality/value

The paper contributes to the understanding of organizations and organizational change. It argues that the information and consumer‐driven societies of the advanced countries are characterized by hypermodernity. Existing approaches to organizations and organizational change essentially disregard the significance and impact of the hypermodern organization. The paper suggests that one of the results of the hypermodern organization is the accelerated appearance and disappearance of business organizations.

Details

Journal of Organizational Change Management, vol. 19 no. 5
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0953-4814

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 22 March 2011

Mervyn Conroy

The aim of this paper is to show how storytelling and MacIntyre's virtue ethics theoretical schema can inform a new approach to management development and coaching. It also…

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Abstract

Purpose

The aim of this paper is to show how storytelling and MacIntyre's virtue ethics theoretical schema can inform a new approach to management development and coaching. It also highlights the potentially collusive nature of a coaching relationship where there is an absence of broader research‐based input.

Design/methodology/approach

The approach has three stages: first, to sample what it means to lead reform implementation through managers' stories; second, to view those stories as passing on or coaching others in the virtues of the institution; third, to suggest an alternative approach to coaching which includes deepening managers' understanding about conflicting moral traditions, ideologies and discourses that often feature in their stories of change.

Findings

The capability to find a way through multiple and conflicting change initiatives appears to be enhanced when managers gain a deeper understanding of the antecedents of the different ideologies at play. It is argued that without the research input and stimulus to understand what is behind change policy, coaching could be submitting to disciplinary power (Foucault, 1980) where both coach and coachee are implicated in a collusive perpetuation of what Žižek calls a “narrative quilting of heterogeneous material into a unified ideological field”.

Originality/value

One suggested avenue for management development and coaching would be to build further on MacIntyre's notion that it is sometimes only through conflict that we learn what our ends and purposes are, with the question, “Of what [wider] conflicts is [my conflict] the scene?” (adapted from MacIntyre).

Details

Journal of Management Development, vol. 30 no. 3
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0262-1711

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 1 April 2006

Jonathan Murphy

The purpose of this article is to contribute to the discussion on criticality in international business by proposing an interconnection between organizational managerialism and…

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Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this article is to contribute to the discussion on criticality in international business by proposing an interconnection between organizational managerialism and the construction of a global managerial order.

Design/methodology/approach

Explores the theoretical divide within critical management studies and the challenge provided to theory by internationalization/globalization. Using the case study of the World Bank, examines its organic drive to global governmentality. Examines relevance of C. Wright Mills's theory of the power élite to the advent of a global managerial élite.

Findings

Neither purely realist nor constructivist accounts offer an adequate framework for critical study of international business. Using an approach acknowledging the interweaving of materiality and discourse in construction of a global order, argues that transnational institutions, including the World Bank, play a key role in implementing networked global managerialism. Updates critical élite theory to accommodate globalization and the rise of organized civil society.

Research limitations/implications

Further challenges include mapping global managerial élites and their interconnections.

Practical implications

Critical management researchers should pay more attention to the interconnection between organization‐based theories of control and broader human systems.

Originality/value

Contributes to the application of theories of managerial control beyond the intra‐organizational context.

Details

Critical perspectives on international business, vol. 2 no. 2
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1742-2043

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 22 March 2011

Florence Maria Rudolf Céline Basten

The learning history is designed to describe the coming about of best practices, with their reproduction in mind. This paper seeks to discuss the implications of this instrument…

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Abstract

Purpose

The learning history is designed to describe the coming about of best practices, with their reproduction in mind. This paper seeks to discuss the implications of this instrument and presents a modified version.

Design/methodology/approach

The paper uses a so‐called discursive learning history to zoom in on the interaction between a convergent, official, organisational narrative on the one hand, and people acting according to their own stories on the other.

Findings

Narrative structures help to create an inner logic that helps people to make sense of their organisation. An example is the battlefield metaphor identified in an academic business school.

Research implications

It is not easy to create a comprehensive whole out of a multitude of small, often ill‐aligned contributions. To tackle this problem, the author adjusts the method of the learning history for it to allow analysis of discursive practices.

Practical implications

With this instrument, managers can identify patterns in the complexity of their organisations and understand what seems irrational at first sight.

Social implications

In organisations there is a continuous tendency to create one line into this complexity. This can be disciplining and therewith can provoke all kinds of undesired behaviours.

Originality/value

It is often assumed that one can learn from history. Looking at the past and reconstructing what happened during a significant event seems an ideal way to create the coherent plot one feels comfortable with and learn from for the future. A discursive learning history shows there is more to organisations then meets the eye.

Details

Journal of Management Development, vol. 30 no. 3
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0262-1711

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 1 March 2009

Pete Mann and Jon Chapman

The millennium found the first ever training in Britain of the American Pesso-Boyden System Psychomotor (PBSP) method of adult reparative growth taking place with a dozen…

Abstract

The millennium found the first ever training in Britain of the American Pesso-Boyden System Psychomotor (PBSP) method of adult reparative growth taking place with a dozen experienced leadership development specialists. They quickly proceeded to incorporate this psychodynamic cum systemic approach within their successful practiceportfolios. What is the influence of PBSP on their coaching and personal development work with senior, fully functioning, high performing executives? A qualitative analysis based in their reported practice identifies two specific technical adaptations illustrated empirically and conceptually elaborated in this paper. The authors speculate on the implications of these preliminary outcomes from PBSP practice within the context of tentative neuroscientific understanding and underpinning psychodynamic theoretical assumptions. They conclude questioning a core premise of ‘talk therapy.’

Details

International Journal of Organization Theory & Behavior, vol. 12 no. 4
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1093-4537

Content available
Article
Publication date: 4 January 2008

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Abstract

Details

Journal of Management Development, vol. 27 no. 1
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0262-1711

Article
Publication date: 1 June 1993

Adrian Carr

Organizations, in their structuring and administrative practices,stimulate and promote certain personality traits and attitudes in theindividuals who work in them. Focuses on the…

Abstract

Organizations, in their structuring and administrative practices, stimulate and promote certain personality traits and attitudes in the individuals who work in them. Focuses on the contention that a “psychostructure” is developed which can be identified but may also be the source of anxiety, depression and other psychopathologies. Discusses the results of a recent study of anxiety and depression among principals in public schools within the context of the development of a psychostructure which is reflectant of a particular doctrine of public administration.

Details

Journal of Managerial Psychology, vol. 8 no. 6
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0268-3946

Keywords

Content available
Book part
Publication date: 19 May 2015

Abstract

Details

Inquiry-Based Learning for Multidisciplinary Programs: A Conceptual and Practical Resource for Educators
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-78441-847-2

Article
Publication date: 1 March 2011

Robert D. Eskridge and P. Edward French

Researchers have generally compared council-manager municipalities against mayor-council forms when seeking to measure the efficiency gains envisioned by early twentieth century…

Abstract

Researchers have generally compared council-manager municipalities against mayor-council forms when seeking to measure the efficiency gains envisioned by early twentieth century reformers. Many studies have used per capita expenditure levels of municipalities as a proxy for efficiency, associating lower spending levels with greater efficiency. This study utilizes the “Adapted Cities Framework” advocated by Frederickson, Johnson, and Wood (2004) which classifies municipalities into five, rather than two, institutional types to analyze per capita expenditure data from a national survey of 1,000 small municipalities. Using OLS regression and other statistical analyses, the authors demonstrate that there is a significant difference between the per capita expenditure levels of the five city types. As municipalities more closely conform to the pure reformed councilmanager model of government, higher per capita expenditure levels are evidenced.

Details

Journal of Public Budgeting, Accounting & Financial Management, vol. 23 no. 3
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1096-3367

21 – 30 of 84