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This study investigates paradox-responding strategies and enabling mechanisms in humanitarian temporary supply networks (TSNs). Given the high stakes involved in life-saving supply networks, understanding how diverse, often under-resourced, organisations jointly tackle paradoxical tensions under time pressure is crucial.

A qualitative single case study approach is adopted and a TSN deployed to meet shelter needs following the 2015 Nepal earthquake is selected as the case. The authors use diverse secondary data sources to establish how the TSN responded to paradoxical tensions.

Results show that paradox-responding in humanitarian TSNs is ongoing, dynamic and a collective effort. Most strategies entail tackling the paradoxical tensions at the same time, using the same TSN structure, but there are differences in the treatment of the paradoxical elements. Additionally, the authors find that the execution of the responding strategies is enabled by the appropriate types of network-level mechanisms which can vary in novelty, complexity, depth and reach.

This study provides rich explanations of paradox-responding and develops insights into collective action within TSNs. However, further research is needed to extend and refine insights given the single-case setting design.

This study develops a framework of paradox-responding strategies and a corresponding mix of enabling mechanisms that can guide decision-makers in the humanitarian sector when deploying TSNs.

To the best of the authors' knowledge, this is the first study that investigates paradox-responding strategies in humanitarian TSNs in particular and enabling mechanisms in general.

The author argues and explains that the indigenous Eastern epistemological frame of yin-yang balancing can be taken as a unique system of thinking toward a meta-perspective. It is not only deeply rooted in the indigenous Eastern culture traditions, but also bears salient global implications, especially in the domain of paradox management. The purpose and contribution of this chapter are twofold: (1) to explain the unique and salient features of yin-yang balancing (the “either/and” system to reframe paradox into duality as partially conflicting and partially complementary, both spatially and temporarily) as compared with the Western logic systems (the “either/or” and “both/or” or “both/and” systems); and (2) to explore the global implications of the “either/and” system for future paradox research, including the three unique themes of overlap between opposites with the “seed” of one opposite inside the other; threshold from the contingent balance between partial separation and partial integration in line with specific contexts through three operating mechanisms, and knot for the special role of third-party to shift paradox from a dyadic level to a triadic and even a multiplex level.

Why is it that highly trained and seasoned executives fail? On the surface, this doesn’t make sense because they are very successful; yet research in the organization sciences provides no shortage of evidence to prove just that. From the classic Mann Gulch fire disaster of Weick’s famous collapse of sensemaking study, to studies of myopia of learning, escalation of commitment, threat-rigidity, dominant logic, the architecture of simplicity, the Icarus Paradox, to core competencies turning into core rigidities, and navigating new competitive markets using “old” cognitive maps, and many more such examples point to a ubiquitous phenomenon where highly trained and experienced professionals find themselves “stuck” in the heat of battle, unable to move and progress. On the one hand, for some, there is a desperate need for change, but are unable to do so, due to their trained incapacities. On the other hand, some simply cannot see the need for change, and continue with their “business as usual” mentality. For both, their visions of the world shrink, they have a tendency to cling onto their past habitual practices and oversimplify the complexity of the situation. In moments like these: DROP YOUR TOOLS and UNLEARN! This book chapter introduces a framework (grounded in clinical psychology) that has had consistent success in helping seasoned executives and key decision-makers open up the alternatives whenever they find themselves stuck with complexity.

That life is inundated with constant push–pull between contradictory demands is indisputable. Different traditions and worldviews inform individuals’ approaches to dealing with the ensuing paradoxes. However, the literature has focused on Western and Eastern philosophies and traditions, while disregarding others such as the Afrocentric. In this chapter, the authors explore Ubuntu, an Afrocentric tradition, as an alternative philosophical underpinning that can inform the nature of paradoxes. Doing so enriches the understanding, problematizing and managing of paradoxes. Central to Ubuntu is otherness: the emphasis on the need of the other that implies focusing on the other; in doing so, the polarities of diverse needs are accommodated, striving for an ultimate goal of harmony. Moreover, the authors elaborate on the hybrid space where collapsing the East–West and the West and non-west dualism allow engagement with a multiplicity of worldviews. In so doing, the authors expand paradox theorizing beyond the orthodoxy of East and West antinomies and challenge the basic assumption in paradox management by asking the question: what if we start from others’ demands?

This paper makes a case for the investigation of organizational paradoxes through the analysis of documents. After having presented what paradoxes are and the methodological challenges of studying them, the paper turns to document research, with emphasis on its potential contribution to paradox research. More specifically, document research typically provides ready-to-code data in a nonintrusive manner, allowing for the potential longitudinal, multilevel and multivoice analysis of organizational paradoxes and their management, in practice. To illustrate this, the purpose of this paper is to explore exemplar research based on multiple approaches to the study of different paradoxes in/around various documents and sets a research agenda.

Exemplar research on paradoxes using organizational documents as central data are presented. This highlights the range of documents and analytical strategies that can be used to explore organizations’ discursive management of paradoxes, as well as the roles documents can play in organizational contexts marked by different types of paradoxes.

A research agenda is developed, formulated around the needs to study paradoxes within documents and around them; grasp the discursive strategies deployed in documents to deal with paradoxes and/or the action of documents in contexts marked by paradoxes; follow the organizational processes involving documents, paying special attention to the paradoxes surrounding the development, adoption and appropriation of documents; and compare paradoxes in documents and those around the documents’ mobilization.

Despite growing interest in organizational paradoxes, reflections on methodological approaches to exploring them remain scarce and alternative methods largely unexplored. This paper makes the following proposition: organizational documents (strategic plans, annual reports, policies, websites, etc.) can provide a valuable entry point to explore organizational paradoxes.

The highly unpredictable, complex, and dynamic business environment forces companies to innovate constantly. One organizational response to coping with environmental pressures is organizational ambidexterity, that is, the ability to pursue simultaneously the exploitation of existing capabilities and the exploration of new opportunities. It has an impact on the way of working, and consequently, organizations need to reevaluate their talent strategies. With this conceptual contribution, we first provide a fresh view on talent and talent management (TM) by suggesting an ambidextrous TM approach, including novel TM practices that have been rather neglected in the so far dominant traditional TM approach. It centers on the system-controlling element of an ambidextrous mindset. Second, in a theory-based framework, we explain how dynamic TM capabilities (hybrid, dual, and ambidextrous TM), which represent processes for deploying, developing, and shaping talent, can contribute to gaining competitive advantages in various ambidextrous structures reflecting the complexity and dynamism of and within human resource (HR) ecosystems. The authors advance the under-researched process perspective on TM by using the lenses of the HR ecosystems discussion, insights from a dynamic view on the person–environment fit, and dynamic capabilities. The authors conclude with a broad agenda for future research in TM in dynamic environments.

The purpose of this chapter is to examine how leaders furthered the development of a social enterprise in response to paradoxes. Data on leadership practices were collected through interviews and observations in an Italian Healthcare network over the organization’s first two years. The data indicate that leaders addressed paradoxes in developing several critical resources by using both top-down influence and bottom-up participation. Leaders used top-down practices to further organizational development along a known path when they could leverage technical expertise or a vision to address a source of tension. Bottom-up practices, on the other hand, permitted the discovery of new paths that had not been previously identified. Leaders leveraged such responses where tensions appeared intractable. Implications for managers and organizational development and change practitioners are discussed.

OWING to the comparatively early date in the year of the Library Association Conference, this number of THE LIBRARY WORLD is published so that it may be in the hands of our readers before it begins. The official programme is not in the hands of members at the time we write, but the circumstances are such this year that delay has been inevitable. We have dwelt already on the good fortune we enjoy in going to the beautiful West‐Country Spa. At this time of year it is at its best, and, if the weather is more genial than this weather‐chequered year gives us reason to expect, the Conference should be memorable on that account alone. The Conference has always been the focus of library friendships, and this idea, now that the Association is so large, should be developed. To be a member is to be one of a freemasonry of librarians, pledged to help and forward the work of one another. It is not in the conference rooms alone, where we listen, not always completely awake, to papers not always eloquent or cleverly read, that we gain most, although no one would discount these; it is in the hotels and boarding houses and restaurants, over dinner tables and in the easy chairs of the lounges, that we draw out really useful business information. In short, shop is the subject‐matter of conference conversation, and only misanthropic curmudgeons think otherwise.

Informal payments in health care exist in many countries around the world. However, the prevalence of informal payments varies between countries. A distinction between illegal or unethical informal payments like bribes and corruption, and legal and ethical forms of informal payment like giving gifts is not always easy to make. Illegal and unethical practices include, for example, buying medical certificates, bid rigging during procurements, or selecting service-providers for a hospital based on personal connections. A conceptual global definition of informal payments in health care is not feasible because informality depends on local regulations, values, and traditions. In this chapter, we provide an up-to-date understanding of informal payments in health care (including corruption, fraud etc.) by distinguishing micro, meso, and macro levels of informal payments. We argue that informal payments that occur at these levels cannot be unified under one umbrella of corruption because the various forms of informal payments in health care differ in nature, scope, and damaging effects.