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1 – 10 of over 2000
Book part
Publication date: 25 November 2019

Omar Lizardo

The author distinguishes between state, process, and object perspectives on institutions and institutionalization. While all-purpose process approaches dominate the literature…

Abstract

The author distinguishes between state, process, and object perspectives on institutions and institutionalization. While all-purpose process approaches dominate the literature, the author argues that these are analytically insufficient without theorizing the nature of “institutional objects.” Building on recently developed analytic disaggregations of the culture concept in cultural sociology, the author argues that doings, sayings, codes, and artifacts exhaust the broad classes of potential objects subject to institutionalization processes. The proposed approach provides a coherent ontology for future empirical work, features robust microfoundations, places institutional routines and practices in a material context, and acknowledges the importance of semiotic codes and vocabularies in organizational fields.

Details

Microfoundations of Institutions
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-78769-123-0

Keywords

Open Access
Book part
Publication date: 7 December 2020

Mary Ann Glynn, Elizabeth A. Hood and Benjamin D. Innis

As hybrid organizations become increasingly common, the authors observe that some hybrid forms are becoming institutionalized and legitimated. The authors explore the implications…

Abstract

As hybrid organizations become increasingly common, the authors observe that some hybrid forms are becoming institutionalized and legitimated. The authors explore the implications of the institutionalization of hybridity, addressing both the internal tensions that plague many hybrids and the external tensions stemming from evaluator assessments and stakeholder uncertainty. The authors propose that institutionalization can dampen internal tensions associated with hybridity and also facilitate legitimation and acceptance by external audiences. The authors present identity as a useful theoretical lens through which to examine these questions, as identities are born from, but also have the potential to modify, existing institutional arrangements. The authors present directions for future research at the juncture of identity, hybridity, and institutionalization, suggesting potential avenues of inquiry in this productive stream of research.

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Organizational Hybridity: Perspectives, Processes, Promises
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-83909-355-5

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Book part
Publication date: 21 June 2011

Christopher G. Worley

Purpose – This chapter explores the use of evolutionary and institutionalization models to understand the progression of sustainability in organizations and their contribution to…

Abstract

Purpose – This chapter explores the use of evolutionary and institutionalization models to understand the progression of sustainability in organizations and their contribution to sustainable effectiveness. It describes the evolution of Gap, Inc.'s sustainability approach, its increasingly central role in the organization's strategy and design, and the methods it is using to institutionalize this critical change.

Design – The chapter describes alternative models of sustainability evolution and change institutionalization, and then applies the concepts in those models to understand Gap, Inc.'s sustainability journey.

Findings – The models of sustainability evolution and change institutionalization provide different but complimentary views on the extent to which sustainability is embedded in Gap, Inc.'s organization. These models can be a useful tool for assessing progress and recommending actions to increase the institutionalization of sustainability strategies and initiatives.

Originality and value – The findings of this chapter will help senior executives with responsibility for sustainability implementation. In addition to providing indicators for assessment of progress, findings of sustainability's institutionalization should prove helpful in predicting achievement of sustainable effectiveness.

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Organizing for Sustainability
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-0-85724-557-1

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Book part
Publication date: 28 July 2014

Lars Rademacher and Nadine Remus

The antecedents and typical stages of development of corporate social responsibility (CSR) programs in a given organization or type of organization have been of minor interest in…

Abstract

Purpose

The antecedents and typical stages of development of corporate social responsibility (CSR) programs in a given organization or type of organization have been of minor interest in CSR research. Contrary to that the chapter argues that CSR communication strategies need to take the genesis and drivers of CSR institutionalization into account.

Methodology/approach

The chapter develops a complex set of interrelated drivers for CSR institutionalization from a literature review – among them leadership styles and management fashion. The chapter further discusses the influence of leadership styles and management fashions on CSR institutionalization and focuses on the diffusion of management concepts along a management fashion cycle. It then refers to executive trainers as the key facilitator and promoter of new business concepts and presents data from a first online-survey among German speaking management trainers.

Findings

The chapter clears manager’s role in institutionalization of CSR by contextualizing their behavior in a portfolio of performance indicators. From a management fashion perspective the various forms of explicit and implicit CSR are linked to management styles.

Practical implications

The chapter lays ground for further research of CSR institutionalization and integration into business strategy by providing a conceptualization of CSR drivers and settings that relate to a given organization. As such it is designed as groundwork for a yet to develop CSR scorecard.

Originality/value

The connection between organizational type, organizational environment, leadership behavior, and the chosen CSR approach of a corporation is usually overseen. The chapter aims to uncover this connection.

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Communicating Corporate Social Responsibility: Perspectives and Practice
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-78350-796-2

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Book part
Publication date: 12 January 2021

Arthur Gautier, Anne-Claire Pache, Imran Chowdhury and Marion Ligonie

This paper seeks to understand how new practices that challenge established norms and values become institutionalized by studying the development of corporate philanthropy in…

Abstract

This paper seeks to understand how new practices that challenge established norms and values become institutionalized by studying the development of corporate philanthropy in France over three decades (1979–2011). Our inductive qualitative study uncovers the processes that enable actors at both field- and organizational-levels to enhance a new practice’s internal and external legitimacy, ultimately leading to its institutionalization. In particular, we identify the central role of a community of practice as a bridge between the field-level, purposive interventions (theorizing, influencing policy) of an institutional entrepreneur and the organizational-level, emergent interventions (mobilizing, embedding) of frontline practitioners experimenting with the new divergent practice, thereby enabling its legitimation and, ultimately, its institutionalization. As such, our findings contribute to refining our understanding of institutionalization processes as inherently distributed and to uncovering communities of practice as the missing link between “heroic” entrepreneurs’ interventions and the hidden work of frontline practitioners implementing the new practice.

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On Practice and Institution: New Empirical Directions
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-80043-416-5

Keywords

Book part
Publication date: 16 October 2003

Song Yang

Because job training is so consequential for the success of individual workers, firms, and national economies, understanding the determinants of training differentials is crucial…

Abstract

Because job training is so consequential for the success of individual workers, firms, and national economies, understanding the determinants of training differentials is crucial. This study investigates whether PT (professional/technical) workers receive more training than do manual workers and how the training gap varies under different organizational contexts. I contend that the occupational impact on job training is contingent upon organization bureaucratization and institutionalization. Using the 1996 National Organizational Survey, I find that PT core organizations are more likely to supply formal training to their PT core workers than are manual core organizations to manual core workers. The gap in obtaining formal training between PT core workers and manual core workers expanded when I compared highly bureaucratized PT core organizations with highly bureaucratized manual core organizations. PT core organizations also invested much more money in the training of PT core workers than manual core organizations did to manual core workers, provided that the comparison was among organizations with high levels of bureaucratization or low levels of institutionalization. I conclude that researchers need to investigate organizational contexts to fully explain training differentials among workers.

Details

The Sociology of Job Training
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-0-76230-886-6

Book part
Publication date: 12 January 2021

Sonia M. Ospina, Nuria Cunill-Grau and Claudia Maldonado

This chapter describes an institutional choice that most Latin American countries have taken in the past 25 years: the creation of national Public Performance Monitoring and…

Abstract

This chapter describes an institutional choice that most Latin American countries have taken in the past 25 years: the creation of national Public Performance Monitoring and Evaluation (PPME) systems. We summarize research assessing their institutionalization, identify their shortcomings, and discuss trends demonstrating a potential – not yet realized – to fulfill their vocation as instruments of political and democratic accountability. Despite remarkable progress in their institutionalization, the evidence suggests that the systems fall short in producing strong results-oriented democratic accountability. Key factors hindering this aspiration include the systems' low credibility, problems associated to their diversification, low institutional coherence, and lack of effective coordination mechanisms to improve information legibility, its quality, its usefulness, and thus its use by both public managers and citizens. We suggest that PPME systems depend on environmental conditions beyond government structures and processes and argue that citizen-oriented mechanisms and entry points for social participation around the systems are required to fulfill their accountability function.

Details

The Emerald Handbook of Public Administration in Latin America
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-83982-677-1

Book part
Publication date: 6 June 2006

Jeffrey W. Lucas and Michael J. Lovaglia

The processes of legitimation and institutionalization are difficult to study because they are hard to measure. Instead, theories of legitimacy use its elements to explain various…

Abstract

The processes of legitimation and institutionalization are difficult to study because they are hard to measure. Instead, theories of legitimacy use its elements to explain various effects. We propose that these effects are due to the trust-building aspects of legitimation and institutionalization. If research can establish the trust-building nature of legitimation, then theoretical research programs in the area may progress more rapidly. Research on leadership in groups can be used to assess fundamental questions of legitimacy and trust because group leadership represents an interface between research on organizations and basic group processes. We describe an experimental setting to investigate legitimation, institutionalization, and trust.

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Advances in Group Processes
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-0-76231-330-3

Book part
Publication date: 3 May 2018

George Joseph and Anwar Hashmi

The chapter first draws concepts underlying legitimacy theory (Suchman, 1995) to provide a basis to understand alternative approaches to the development of ethical cultures in…

Abstract

The chapter first draws concepts underlying legitimacy theory (Suchman, 1995) to provide a basis to understand alternative approaches to the development of ethical cultures in global organization. The chapter then illustrates the institutionalization of Codes of Ethics through a “management” approach drawing from Simon’s Levers of Control as a framework to contextualize experiences of a large global conglomerate. The chapter adopts the case approach, applying the case of the Tata Group to highlight the integration of external institutions into the institutionalization process. The management of business ethics (MBE) can provide a basis to institutionalize ethics in global firms to create an internal culture consistent with ethical goals of the corporations that may also be different from the external environment. The MBE includes the application of managerial techniques and information technology to institutionalize ethics in organizational culture. Management Accountants can have a significant role in supporting this endeavor, given their expertise in measurement and control. The code is only one aspect through which firms develop their identity. Information on the case was unevenly distributed. For example, there was voluminous information on the code and its implementation. Therefore, some subjectivity was necessary in selecting relevant items. The chapter, to my knowledge, provides unique insights into the theoretical and practical aspects of institutionalizing ethics in corporate cultures using Codes of Ethics.

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Research on Professional Responsibility and Ethics in Accounting
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-78754-973-9

Keywords

Book part
Publication date: 19 June 2012

Antonio Leotta and Daniela Ruggeri

Purpose – In the last decades, Italian healthcare organisations have been subject to important normative changes, aimed at increasing their efficiency. As a response, performance…

Abstract

Purpose – In the last decades, Italian healthcare organisations have been subject to important normative changes, aimed at increasing their efficiency. As a response, performance measurement and evaluation (PME) systems have been introduced. The present study attempts to examine PME system changes as institutional processes. In studying such processes the healthcare literature acknowledges the presence of two logics: managerial and professional, as peculiar to healthcare settings, whose convergence or divergence can explain the success of any institutional process.

Design/methodology/approach – We adopt Busco et al.'s (2007) framework as an approach for unbundling PME system change into four relevant coordinates, namely: (1) the object (PME system), (2) the subjects (institutional forces), (3) the place and time of change (the managerial and professional logics) and (4) the how and why change happens (change as an institutional process). We conducted a longitudinal case study at a large teaching hospital in Southern Italy, directed to interpret PME system changes during the period from 1998 until 2009.

Findings – Our observation distinguishes episodes of successful institutional processes, where the introduced innovations are transformed into objectivated practices, from episodes of missed institutionalisation, where new procedures were rapidly abandoned.

Research and social implications – This theoretical framework can be useful for interpreting the PME system changes in different institutional contexts.

Originality – The Busco et al.'s framework allows us to understand PME system changes by integrating the perspectives from Neo-Institutional Sociology, representing healthcare organisational responses to external institutional pressures, and Old-Institutional Economics, conceptualising PME system changes as an institutionalisation process.

Details

Performance Measurement and Management Control: Global Issues
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-78052-910-3

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