Search results

For the last four decades, the alignment of strategy and digital technology has persisted as one of the most critical and bothersome issues for senior government executives. Against this backdrop and drawing on the fruits of an extended program of collaborative research between 1995 and 2020, this chapter draws attention to how government organizations foster effective alignment and how this is achieved through four distinct cycles of alignment work. Considering that this work is heavily people- and organization-centric, the chapter calls for greater involvement of organization development and change scholars and practitioners in this important area of organizational life and work.

Sustainable management requires companies to build up new knowledge to acquire the competencies needed for action. This chapter aims to deliver knowledge about sustainability and knowledge for sustainability. Firstly, we systematically analyse the sustainability literature in the social sciences through a bibliographic analysis and topic modelling using VOSviewer and Mallet software. We outline research directions, themes and critical contributions for each research cluster identified. Additionally, we categorise over 30 definitions of sustainability identified by Meuer, Koelbel, and Hoffmann (2020). Secondly, we enumerate knowledge types needed for effective sustainability transitions of organisations. We trace typologies of sustainable business models and their distinct evaluations of sustainability. In this chapter, we argue that integrating the triad of social, ecological and economic goals is central for sustainability attempts as well as long-term thinking. Therefore, our research offers a comprehensive overview of sustainability in the social sciences supporting researchers and practitioners to navigate this miscellaneous and scattered field. Accordingly, our study is precious to young scholars researching sustainability who want to use the term in an informed and meaningful way.

Research on organizational change and development is limited in how it addresses the processes that encompass change initiatives. In this chapter, we explore one dimension of these processes, the ways that research frames relationships between planned and emergent organizational change. We discuss five ways in which organization development (OD) research has addressed dichotomies between planned emergent change: separation, selection, integration, transcendence, and connection. We suggest that the most effective approach for considering this dichotomy is likely to be one that connects planned and emergent change over time. We further suggest that a means by which connection can usefully be created is through attention to a transient outcome of change attempts, the vitality associated with a change initiative at any moment. We present an example of how a connection frame was utilized in an extended research project. We also suggest an analytic framework and specific research methods consistent with a connection frame. In doing so, we suggest how the adoption of a connection frame by OD researchers and practitioners may lead to a more complete picture of organizational change.

Change in the public sector appears to be often met with practices borrowed from the private sector. However, implementing private sector practices is challenging (Brown, Waterhouse, & Flynn, 2003), as, for example, the range of stakeholders and their legitimate demands are greater in the public sector (Wæraas & Byrkjeflot, 2012; Leitch & Davenport, 2002), and due to the political nature of affairs, there is more complexity and uncertainty (Sanders & Canel, 2013). In fact, when it comes to change, the public sector can be very different from the private sector due to its often more bureaucratic processes, political nature of decisions and obligations for both transparency and equality.

This chapter focuses on three core areas of organisational change communication: organisational culture, employees and management. The chapter reports findings from a systematic literature review of articles from 1990 to 2016 using thematic analysis in order to answer three research questions: Is change in the public sector different from change in the private sector? What is the perceived role of communication for public sector change efforts? What insights can be found from previous literature about three topics connected with change communication: employees, organisational culture and management?

To begin, we ask whether it is actually true that public sector change differs from private sector change. Then we will examine the results of the literature review on each of these three aspects: (1) organisational culture, (2) public sector employees and (3) change management. We will summarise our findings and will conclude with three propositions for future studies on public sector change communication, which all highlight the rising importance of engagement.

Since the 1950s the process of information technology (IT) related change in organizations has been problematic regularly resulting in reports of persistent underperformance and failure, a situation well supported by empirical research. On closer inquiry it emerges that this plight is a product of the behavioural patterns of both the executive and IT occupational communities with their respective economic and technical mindsets. This article not only makes explicit the plight with IT related change and its behavioural underpinnings but also establishes the role of clinical inquiry, as an action research form of organization development, in fostering a more systemic approach to change. The article makes explicit the dual roles of organizational scientists in this domain which involves simultaneously attending to effective social action and the development of robust social theory.

In this chapter, the authors explore entrepreneurial change in Stanton, a rural small town in New Zealand. This once-prosperous place has suffered economically and socially as its past core industries have vanished, and it can now be considered as a depleted community. Yet in recent years, the town has seen a rejuvenation, in part due to the endeavours of Sue, a high-profile entrepreneur from outside the town who has set up several businesses in the town and indeed in other small towns in the region. Theoretically, the authors take an entrepreneurial identity perspective in examining how Sue’s arrival has changed the town; the authors examine how her entrepreneurship was perceived as legitimate. The authors use a qualitative methodology based on semi-structured interviews. The authors contribute in demonstrating how an ascribed entrepreneurial identity can not only enable but also hinder change in this community, generating confidence and emotional contagion around entrepreneurship, and also uncertainty and resentment. In doing so, the authors challenge the universality of entrepreneurship benefits.