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Organizational Actors (organizational + actor)
Selected AbstractsPractice, power and meaning: frameworks for studying organizational culture in multi-agency rural development projectsJOURNAL OF INTERNATIONAL DEVELOPMENT, Issue 5 2003David Lewis Culture has received increasing attention in critical development studies, though the notion that there are important cultural differences within and between development organizations has received less consideration. This paper elaborates elements of a framework for studying organizational culture in multi-agency development projects. It draws on selected writings in anthropology and in organizational theory and suggests that these two bodies of literature can be usefully brought together, as well as on insights from ongoing fieldwork in Bangladesh, Burkina Faso and Peru. At the centre of this framework is the analysis of context, practice and power. Where development projects involve multiple organizations (such as donors, government agencies, non-governmental organizations and grassroots groups) an analysis of cultures both within and between organizational actors can help explain important aspects of project performance. The paper argues that organizational culture is constantly being produced within projects, sometimes tending towards integration, often towards fragmentation. This fragmentation, indicative of the range of cultures within development organizations, is an important reason why some projects fail, and why ideas stated in project documents are often not realized, especially in the case of the newer and more contentious objectives such as ,empowerment'. © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [source] Managing Discursive Tension: the Co,Existence of Individualist and Collaborative Discourses in Flight CentreJOURNAL OF MANAGEMENT STUDIES, Issue 8 2002Ian Palmer Our study of the travel agency Flight Centre began as a case study of a company that appears to be a ,success story' in what is a highly competitive industry. In the course of our study we found that inscribed in Flight Centre were two, differing discourses which appear to co,exist in creative tension throughout the organization. One discourse is competitive individualism and the other collaborative teamwork. Our paper focuses on how Flight Centre has made use of multiple discourses such as these in the process of achieving competitive advantage, and how people manage the differing discursive logics which confront them on a day,to,day basis. The paper proceeds by identifying the social and textual practices which constitute each discourse. It then establishes the discursive co,existence and tension which exists between the two discourses. Study is made of the conditions under which this discursive co,existence is disrupted. We then identify the interpretative routines and practices through which organizational actors maintain and reproduce discursive co,existence. Our paper concludes by considering a variety of implications of studying multiple discourses in organizations. [source] Ethical control and cultural change (in cultural dreams begin organizational responsibilities)JOURNAL OF PUBLIC AFFAIRS, Issue 3 2010Slawomir Magala Ethical control is based on transparent access to the accounts of responsible behaviour on the part of individual and organizational actors. It is usually linked to the idea of a checkpoint: where celibate rules, no sexual interaction can be allowed. However, organizing and managing climates in professional bureaucracies have always led towards the empowerment of the operatives (regional bishops and local parish priests in the case of the Catholic Church). History of the church is repeated by corporate bureaucracies in the wake of the globalized and individualized multimedia communications, ushering in the era of hyper-connectivity and traceability of individual behaviour. From industrial camera records at the parking lot or building entrance to the Google analysis of surfing behaviour, all of us generate public confessions and see more private acts subjected to the public ethical clearings. Universities, like hospitals, airlines and armies before them, had to enter the game of cognitive and institutional conscience game with codes of conduct and other digital tablets with 10 or more commandments. What about the gravest capital and collective sins of our societies translated daily into millions of unethical behaviours? Inequalities and injustices usually circle around gender, race, poverty and nature. Charity begins in heart and mind, but requires cultural change and a humanist coefficient in educational and socializing interactions. Stock options of arts and humanities as the prime suppliers of applied ethical procedures in educational settings should/will go up. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [source] The scope, motivation and dynamic of Guest EngineeringR & D MANAGEMENT, Issue 4 2001Michael Lewis The exchange of technical personnel between organizational actors in a supply network has become known as Guest Engineering (GE). Despite increasing popularity as an inter-organisational arrangement (especially in the automotive sector) it has generated relatively little academic research and therefore this paper seeks to extend our understanding of GE by exploring how its scope is determined, what motivates the participants and how the relationships evolve. The paper draws on extant GE, supply networks and Resource-Based View (RBV) literature to derive research propositions that are used to analyse empirical work carried out with four automotive suppliers and four automotive OEMs. A number of preliminary conclusions are drawn. At a micro-project level, the criticality of the individual ,playing the GE role' is highlighted, as are related concerns that collaborative team structures often fail to address broader social/cultural characteristics. At a macro-project level, the study argues that difficulties and mistrust will often characterise integrated and competitively successful GE relationships. Finally, at a strategic level, GE needs to be understood as a process of resource transfer and transformation, and therefore the management of interdependency and power asymmetry are core considerations in effective adoption. The paper concludes with recommendations for further critical and practical work. [source] Decentralized enforcement in organizations: An experimental approachREGULATION & GOVERNANCE, Issue 2 2008Yuval Feldman Abstract Social enforcement, the decentralized action by organizational actors of monitoring, identifying, and reporting legal violations, is widely recognized as a key factor in ensuring good governance. This article reports on an experimental survey conducted in the US and Israel examining the behavior of individuals when confronting workplace unlawful conduct. The study provides novel insights into the relationships between state based, organization based, and employee based enforcement. It finds that the likelihood and the manner of reporting will vary depending on the type of illegality and are strongly correlated to perceptions of legitimacy, job security, and voice within the workplace. Comparing illegalities, employees prefer to report clear violations by rank and file employees rather than violations by managers. At the same time, external reporting to government or media entities is most likely when violations involve the organization as a whole or implicate top management. The study also finds cultural and gender differences in reporting patterns. Finally, the study provides support for the understanding that social norms are more predictive of social enforcement than expected organizational costs. [source] | |||||||||||||