Search results

Presents three autobiographies to show the link between personal experiences and consulting. All are stories of personal change and involve the processes of feeling, reflection, voice and nurturance (FRVN). Gives an example of a consultation to show how FRVN became an underlying process. Presents definitions of FRVN and shows how these relate to personal involvement. Stresses that authenticity is central to effective consulting and that it is through the process of FRVN that this can be achieved.

This study addresses recent changes in the career development climate in the USA in which individuals have ultimate responsibility for managing their own careers. We examined empirically the relationship between a relevant set of skills relating to self‐knowledge, interpersonal knowledge, environmental knowledge and effective career management. Data were gathered from 446 students and graduates who had completed a 28‐week, two‐semester managerial skills course within the past five years. The correlation and regression results provide strong support for the hypothesized relationships. The findings reveal that reported acquisition and utilization of skills relating to self‐knowledge, interpersonal knowledge, and environmental knowledge are associated with personal learning, goal setting, career strategies, and career decision making. Implications and directions for future studies are discussed.

Presents a case description of a non‐profit educational agency whose organizational culture is based on the feminist values of caring, voice and self‐reflection. Grounded theory analysis of intensive interviews, focus groups, observations and organizational documents reveals how these values are embodied in the organization′s management practices and change processes. The case strongly suggests that a commitment to feminist values can prove highly generative of a wide range of desirable organizational competences.

EEO and the management of diversity Volume 8 Number 5 of the Journal of Organizational Change Management contains an article by Maria Humphries and Shayne Grice entitled “Equal employment opportunity and the management of diversity: a global discourse of assimilation?”

The case is set in the Fall of 2008 as Susan Schor, Chief Culture Officer, at EILEEN FISHER Inc. is meeting with the other two members of the Facilitating Leader Team, Jim Gundell, Vice President of Retail and e-Commerce and Jonci Coukier, Vice President of Design and Merchandising Processes, as well as founder, Eileen Fisher. Faced with significant projected financial loss in 2009, Susan reflected on the evolution of the company as influenced by her perspective with her organizational behavior expertise and collaborative leadership that embraced a values-based culture. Stories, voices and structures are examined in this retrospective view as Dr Schor sets the stage for how this example of best practice leadership will tackle the challenge at hand.

The research for this case was conducted over an 18-month period with over 40 interviews, extensive observation of the various teams at EILEEN FISHER Inc., and review of corporate communications, publications and other secondary sources. This case focuses on stories and voices that explain the unique leadership of EILEEN FISHER. The use of extensive quotes allows for an authentic “hearing” of the experiences and values as well as allowing the students to better understand the nature of qualitative data. Some of the discussion questions are posed as experiential exercises as this method allows the students to better relate to understand and apply values concepts.

Graduate and undergraduate organizational behavior, leadership, retail management and ethics.

During the downturn in the economy, EILEEN FISHER Inc., which had been experiencing significant growth in the years leading up to 2008, had to take some widespread organizational strategic action or potentially lose $11 million. Eileen Fisher and the Facilitating Leadership Team (FLT) met to reflect on the actions that were taken in the last 18 months in order to reshape their organization. From the beginning, the FLT had been transparent with the 800 employees in the organization, informing them that they were facing serious losses. They shared not only identified issues, but their deep faith in the EILEEN FISHER collaborative culture a faith that was reflected in their first step to planning. Turning to the employees, they had asked, What should we do? Teams throughout the company figured out new ways of working and recaptured EILEEN FISHER's profit. Reflecting on the reshaping of EILEEN FISHER and the many actions taken, the FLT team wondered if the creation of the new normal was sound and sustainable for the future. Students must evaluate the effectiveness of EILEEN FISHER's leadership system and determine whether the company can survive the economic downturn while remaining true to the company's core values.

The case is a field-research case and was funded as part of a sabbatical to study leadership at EILEEN FISHER Inc. The primary goal of the long-term project was to research and write cases on socially minded women leaders through an inclusive conceptual lens. Extensive planning with the Chief Culture Officer at EILEEN FISHER resulted in an 18-month deep dive with over 40 in-depth interviews, extensive observation of many different teams and meetings particularly the monthly Leadership Forums, thorough review of internal communications as well as review of other secondary research.

This case was written for advanced undergraduate or graduate organizational management, retail management and strategic change students. The case is best taught later in the course where students are asked to connect various leadership or strategic change theories with organizations and outcomes. The theoretical readings are more suited for advanced leadership students and are a springboard for in-depth analysis and further assignments. The case demonstrates the power of a values-based organization and how this values-based leadership style can be used to reshape an organization. This case can also be used for a retail management course to look at a values-based organization in the retailing industry. Most retailers in the industry have traditional hierarchical organizations; this case shows that there are alternative business models and newer leadership frameworks that explain EILEEN FISHER's management. Retailers are also impacted by every downturn in the economy and challenge to consumer confidence. This case shows how a retail organization can reshape itself with a new value proposition as a result of a downturn in the economy. It also demonstrates how employees can take action and redefine an organization.

The purpose is to present proposals to foster what we call a socially meaningful transparency practice that aims to enhance public understanding of data-based systems through the production of accounts that are relevant and useful to diverse publics, and society more broadly.

The authors’ proposals emerge from reflections on challenges they experienced producing written and visual accounts of specific public sector data-based systems for research purposes. Following Ananny and Crawford's call to see limits to transparency practice as “openings”, the authors put their experience into dialogue with the literature to think about how we might chart a way through the challenges. Based on these reflections, the authors outline seven proposals for fostering socially meaningful transparency.

The authors identify three transparency challenges from their practice: information asymmetry, uncertainty and resourcing. The authors also present seven proposals related to reduction of information asymmetries between organisations and non-commercial external actors, enhanced legal rights to access information, shared decision making about what gets made transparent, making visible social impacts and uncertainties of data-systems, clear and accessible communication, timing of transparency practices and adequate resourcing.

Socially meaningful transparency aims to enhance public understanding of data-based systems. It is therefore a necessary condition not only for informed use of data-based products, but crucially for democratic engagement in the development of datafied societies.

The paper contributes to existing debates on meaningful transparency by arguing for a more social, rather than individual, approach to imagining how to make transparency practice more meaningful. The authors do this through their empirical reflection on our experience of doing transparency, conceptually through our notion of socially meaningful transparency, and practically through our seven proposals.

The US feminist art movement of the 1970s is examined through selected works written by artists, critics, and historians during the 1990s. Books, exhibition catalogues, dissertations, and articles place the movement within the broader contexts of art history and criticism, women’s history, and cultural studies. The art includes painting, drawing, collage, mixed‐media, graphics, installations, video, and performance. An increasing historical perspective allows scholars to examine the movement’s institutions and unresolved issues surrounding class, race, and sexual preference. Background is provided by an introductory essay, which summarizes the movement’s facets of protest, pedagogy, networks and professional associations, and art making while noting examples of publications and institutions that form part of the record of the movement. This article will be useful to librarians and scholars in art, women’s studies, history, sociology, and cultural studies.

The spread of capitalism has been associated with the adoption of egalitarian achievement‐oriented values. Perhaps it is this emphasis on reward for personal achievement that led some economists to investigate the causes of women's unequal economic and social status in nineteenth century Europe. A handful of those economists underscored the discrepancies in the treatment of men and women in the workplace, a treatment which resulted in significantly lower wages for women than men.

Capitalism has proved to be by far the best society at producing surpluses. Other societies at particular points in history have been effective, too. For instance Ancient Egyptians were obviously good at it, directing their surplus into building pyramids and great monuments. The Mayans, Incas and Aztecs were good at it too, in the same way as were the Neolithic builders of Stonehenge in England, the Callinish stones in the Hebrides and Carnac in Britanny. Capitalism, however, is unique in the sense that its capacity to produce surpluses far exceeds that of any other period or system. In addition, the capitalist system involves a threefold possibility for the utilization of the surpluses: consumption by individuals, consumption by the state for civil and military purposes and reinvestment by capitalists to produce more surplus. The balance among these three determines the stability of the system and the pace of growth. Consumption by the state is the least new phenomenon; here again, the pyramids of the Aztecs, Mayans and Egyptians are examples. What is new, and certainly new on the scale we now observe, is that the capitalist system is dependent on those individuals who collectively make up the absorptive class, and on the host of small and medium capitalists and the huge corporations to reinvest the surplus to make more capital. However, the system as a whole serves to destroy the surpluses when capitalist processes are such that the capacity to consume diminishes in relation to the quantities produced.