Mike Zundel

The Role of Analogy and Metaphor in the Framing and Legitimization of Strategic Change

Strategic change initiatives disrupt established categories of stakeholder understanding and typically present a problem of justifying and legitimizing the change to stakeholders in order to gain their buy-in and support. While it has been suggested that the analogical or metaphorical framing of strategic changes is crucial in that it fosters understanding and creates legitimacy for the change, we set out to specify the conditions and uses of analogical and metaphorical framing in effecting support for strategic changes. Specifically, we argue that (a) analogies are more effective in the context of additive changes, whereas metaphors are more apt for substitutive changes, and that (b) relational analogies and metaphors are generally more effective in securing support for strategic changes, as opposed to analogies or metaphors that highlight common attributes. We also argue that the overall effectiveness of analogies and metaphors in the framing of a change is furthermore dependent on (c) the degree to which these frames are culturally familiar to stakeholders and (d) the extent to which they connect with the prior motivations of stakeholders.

Not quite a revolution: Scrutinizing organizational neuroscience in leadership studies

Several provocative studies on organizational neuroscience have been published of late, many in the domain of leadership. These studies are motivated by the prospect of being able to better explain what causes and constitutes ‘good’ leadership by examining brain activity. In so doing, these studies follow an established path in organizational research that seeks to reduce complex social phenomena to more basic (neurological) processes. However, advocates of organizational neuroscience reveal very little about the fundamental problems and challenges of reductionism. Therefore, our aim in this article is to scrutinize the reductionist assumptions and processes underlying the fast-evolving domain of organizational neuroscience as it is applied to the study of leadership. We maintain that without explicit consideration of, and solutions to, the challenges of reductionism, the possibilities to advance leadership studies theoretically and empirically are limited. In consequence, inferential ambiguities that flow from such insights run the danger of informing organizational practice inadequately. Thus, we find suggestions that we are at the brink of a neuroscientific revolution in the study of leadership premature, and a sole focus on neuroscience, at the expense of insights from other social science disciplines, dangerous.

Walking to learn: Rethinking reflection for management learning

This article investigates possibilities for reflection when understood from within a world that is practically experienced rather than theoretically contemplated. Based on an analysis of space and time in Descartes, it suggests that prominent conceptions of reflection in management learning remain static and lifeless. Drawing on the work of Heidegger it introduces the metaphor of ‘walking around’ to suggest an alternative understanding of reflection which is sensitive to the worldly immersion and finitude of being and begins to outline implications for management learning.

Theorizing as Engaged Practice

This paper examines the relationship between theory and practice and suggests that organization studies remain largely preoccupied with a notion of ‘theory’ as an abstract, generalized concept. This preoccupation ignores the essentially engaged character of all practices, including those of academic theorizing. Drawing on the premises of practice theory, we outline a view of theorizing as engaged practice. In doing so, we are faced with two key implications. First, this view emphasizes the activities that make up the practice of ‘theorizing’, thus shifting the focus from reifying separations of distinct realms of ‘theory’ and ‘practice’ towards an appreciation of the myriad of overlaps between academic and organizational practices. Second, the practice perspective forwarded in this paper illuminates the problems experienced in attempts to transfer academic work to organizational practice. We suggest that this perspective invites us to more fundamentally revise our understanding of the possibilities of relevance for organization and management studies towards ‘lighting up’ new ways of seeing, instead of attempting to offer solutions to immediate ‘practical’ concerns.

Using History in the Creation of Organizational Identity

Abstract Organizations frequently draw on history as a resource, for instance when attempting to establish or maintain identity claims. However, little has been done to review the advantages and problems of such use of history and it is not clear how using history impacts on the appreciation of history itself and, ultimately, on the insights that may be gained when engaging with the past. To begin to address these questions we distinguish two related uses of history as a resource for organizational identity: as a means of committing external audiences and, as a way of finding inward commitment. We theorize these two uses by drawing on speech act theory to develop a taxonomy of uses of history and to elaborate the opportunities and challenges that come when historical narratives are fashioned in the service of identity. We conclude with a further insight gained from speech act theory that suggests an engagement with history that requires sensitivity to prevailing conventions at the moment of these historical acts. We argue that appreciation of asynchronous historical conditions and contexts affords new insights through the difference these pose to current and instrumental concerns that otherwise guide the fashioning and interpretation of historical ‘facts.’

The Challenge of Delivering Impact: Making Waves Through the ODC Debate

This article articulates the nature of the challenge of the academic—practitioner “divide” as one of delivering impact. While measurable impact of research on organizational practice is a key indicator of the value of academic work, the authors explore possibilities of sustainable impact by exploiting and maintaining similarities and differences that characterize academic and organizational practice. Drawing on a metaphor of making waves, they suggest that possibilities of academic impact emerge from day-to-day engagements between scholars and organizational practitioners whose efficacy depends on the creation of shared understandings and personal relationships. This also emphasizes the maintenance of differences in perspective, which alert managers and researchers alike to different aspects that lay hitherto concealed in everyday practice. The authors draw insights from organizational development and change research to distil lessons about ways in which collaborative research practice could make waves that energize responses that extend both theory and practice.

Institutional Work in The Wire An Ethological Investigation of Flexibility in Organizational Adaptation

Analysis of institutional work is habitually complicated by the need to combine agentic and structural features. Drawing on the work of Gregory Bateson, the authors suggest that such complications emerge from an error in epistemology whereby the stability and “it-ness” of things is presupposed. As an alternative, they develop a processual analysis that considers the flexibility of adaptation in relational patterns. Here, institutional phenomena are not stable but characterized by regenerative and degenerative cycles of influence that afford or restrict room for maneuver without classifying them “as” something. The authors explicate this by drawing on empirical material covered in the HBO TV series The Wire.

Exploring the practical wisdom of mētis for management learning

This article investigates the nature of practical wisdom in organizational life through the notion of mētis, which we interpret as situated resourcefulness. Drawing on Greek mythology, we explore the nature of mētis and discuss its mythological characteristics in relation to a contemporary organizational episode. We suggest that the consideration of mētis not only highlights the shortcomings of measurement and conceptual order in management, but also allows us to project a more processual managerial response which accepts the fallacy of unilateral control and strives towards a harmonic balance of continually unfolding, dynamic and recursive patterns.

The Utility of Video Diaries for Organizational Research

This article assesses the utility of video diaries as a method for organization studies. While it is frequently suggested that video-based research methodologies have the capacity to capture new data about the minutiae of complex organizational affairs, as well as offering new forms of dissemination to both academic and professional audiences, little is known about the specific benefits and drawbacks of video diaries. We compare video diaries with two established and “adjacent” methods: traditional diary studies (written or audio) and other video methods. We evaluate each in relation to three key research areas: bodily expressions, identity, and practice studies. Our assessment of video diaries suggests that the approach is best used as a complement to other forms of research and is particularly suited to capturing plurivocal, asynchronous accounts of organizational phenomena. We use illustrations from an empirical research project to exemplify our claims before concluding with five points of advice for researchers wishing to employ this method.

What can managers learn online? Investigating possibilities for active understanding in the online MBA classroom

Online MBAs have become integral to business schools’ portfolios and the number of MBA students opting for an online version looks set to grow. In the wake of well-documented critiques of traditional MBA formats, this expansion prompted us to examine the potential for critically reflexive learning ideals in asynchronous MBA learning environments. Building on the Community of Inquiry (CoI) model, we elaborate elements of Bakhtin and Shotter’s dialogism to develop the notion of ‘active understanding’ as a means to study an online MBA classroom. We present two illustrative episodes to show how aspects of active understanding may unfold, and we point to the role of infrastructure, curriculum and instructor interventions in developing more genuine dialogical exchanges. Our findings suggest that online MBA course designers can learn from CoI approaches to which we add that critically reflexive learning is situationally sensitive; requiring the capacity to create and recognize nuance and difference in the written communication; making the other the focus of learning. We conclude with implications for pedagogy and technology infrastructure.