Some Implications for Management Development of Research into Managers' Moral Dilemmas

In this paper, we present two cases of moral dilemmas as told by the managers who had faced them. We analyse the cases, drawing on frameworks developed by Toffler (1986), Kohlberg (1981) and Maclagan (1990). We also comment on the broader findings of the research from which the cases were taken. These analyses and findings and those of other researchers (e.g. Waters et al., 1986) suggest a number of requisite ‘moral attributes’ for managers and have, we argue, significant implications for the curriculum for ethical education and development for managers and intending managers. One is that case material needs to reflect more strongly the actual experiences of practising managers; another is that there is scope for wider use of experiential methods on management ethics courses. We conclude with a call for a multifaceted approach to ethical education as a lifespan process entailing the development of personal and interpersonal skills and qualities, and self-knowledge as well as cognitive skills. While we acknowledge that ethical education needs to take account of learners' differing levels of prior experience, stages of moral development and levels of learning maturity, our over-riding concern is that learners are prepared for and helped to live through the very ‘real’ dilemmas that they are likely to experience in managerial work.     

Beyond the Matrix: Visual Methods for Qualitative Network Research

Network research remains dominated by approaches involving the analysis of numerical data stored in data matrices with the aim of identifying the effects of hidden social structures. While such research has advanced our understanding of social networks at the inter‐personal, inter‐unit and inter‐organizational level, repeated calls have been made for network research to attend to the situated meanings attached to both relationships and network structures. In this article, we advance a nascent literature on qualitative methods for social network analysis by drawing together developments in visual network research from across the social sciences. We introduce a typology of three visual methods for the collection of network data using network maps: participatory network mapping, network map interviews and visual network surveys. Drawing on three empirical examples from our research in the inter‐organizational domain, we demonstrate how these methods can be used for the collection of qualitative and quantitative relational data, and how they can be triangulated with other qualitative methods and social network analysis. We evaluate the merits and limitations of the methods presented and conclude that visual network research is a useful addition to existing methods for network research in business and management studies.     

Learning and development experiences of self-initiated expatriate women in the United Arab Emirates

The article explores self-initiated expatriate women's experiences of working and learning in the United Arab Emirates (UAE). Adler's (Adler, N. 1987. Pacific basin managers: A Gaijin, not a woman. Human Resource Management 26, no. 2: 169–91) seminal study and Tung's (Tung, R.L. 2004. Female expatriates: The model of the global manager. Organizational Dynamics 33: 243–53) research suggest that expatriate women operating in a foreign host culture are categorized as a ‘Third Gender’: host nationals would perceive them as ‘foreign’ first and ‘women’ second, consequently according them different privileged treatment inworkplaces than host national women colleagues. This qualitative study of self-initiated expatriate women highlights how the women's constructions of themselves as ‘foreign’ and ‘female’ in the UAE provide a lens through which they reflect upon their own experiences of learning and development. In the absence of support from their own organizations and/or driven by their own aspirations, the women embarked upon their professional development initiatives; networking, coaching and formal qualifications. Key themes of vulnerability in being a foreigner, gendered workplaces, informal learning and women's agency in their own learning and development emerge from the analysis. The women's experiences suggest that their ‘Third Gender’ identity frames both constraints and opportunities within their social and work environment. The research focus on self-initiated expatriate women developing their professional practice, without the organizational Human Resource Development (HRD) support normally provided for assigned expatriates, is a key contribution to HRD, expatriate and international management literature where gender has tended to be ignored.     

The Blind Spot in Risk Ethics: Managing Natural Hazards

Many risk scholars recognize the importance of including ethical considerations in risk management. Risk ethics can provide in‐depth ethical analysis so that ethical considerations can be part of risk‐related decisions, rather than an afterthought to those decisions. In this article, I present a brief sketch of the field of risk ethics. I argue that risk ethics has a bias toward technological hazards, thereby overlooking the risks that stem from natural and semi‐natural hazards. In order to make a contribution to the field of risk research, risks ethics should broaden its scope to include natural and semi‐natural hazards and develop normative distribution criteria that can support decision making on such hazards.     

Capital Mobilization of Skilled Migrants: A Relational Perspective

A central issue for understanding skilled migration in the management literature is human capital. This emphasis ignores other important forms of capital mobilization that skilled migrants from developing countries deploy in dealing with the barriers to their international career mobility. There is therefore a need to develop a holistic understanding of capital mobilization of skilled migrants. In order to develop a more holistic picture, we deploy a relational and multilevel perspective to explore how skilled migrants from developing countries mobilize capital in their efforts to undertake an international career. Career is a central construct in this study. Drawing on a qualitative study of skilled Lebanese in Paris, the paper offers two main contributions to the research on human resource management, in particular to the literatures on skilled migration and self‐initiated expatriation. First it extends our understanding of the strategies that skilled migrants use to relocate from a developing country to an industrialized country. Beyond the traditional human capital perspective, it offers insights about migrants' capital mobilization experiences of undertaking international mobility. Second, using Bourdieu's theory of capital, it offers a relational explanation of their capital mobilization in a way to encompass micro‐individual, meso‐organizational and macro‐contextual influences that affect their career choices.     

Leadership and the three faces of integrity

Recent scholarship in business and leadership strongly suggests that integrity is not fundamentally a moral concept. This paper presents an account of leadership integrity that defends its ethical meaning while identifying important cognitive structures that clarify the confusion surrounding integrity attributions. The paper begins with a brief review of historical, philosophical, and business discussions of integrity. Using the insights from these discussions, I argue that integrity is fundamentally, but not exclusively, a moral concept that supports the ethical claims of leadership theories. I then review current leadership theories and derive a definition of integrity as a moral concept. Using this definition, I explain how a leader's integrity is founded on identity-conferring commitments to values and then describe three types of leadership integrity to better understand these constructs. I conclude with a few research questions that seek to advance leadership integrity research with the goal of advancing our understanding of ethical leadership.     

The use of qualitative case studies in top business and management journals: A quantitative analysis of recent patterns

The use of case studies as qualitative research strategy in social sciences seems to have increased recently, but there are no studies that empirically verify such claim. By explicitly focusing on the field of business and management studies, we aim to investigate the extent of publication and the main features of qualitative case studies published in the 20 highest impact factor business and management journals. The paper discusses the correlation between a journal's ranking and the extent of case studies it published, and between selected features of case studies (e.g. research purpose, design and data sources). Moreover, we shed light on how the identified features of a case study impact its probability of being published.Methodologically, we analyse by means of correlation and regression statistics, as well as clustering techniques a total of 19 features in the 352 qualitative case studies published between 2002 and 2011 in our sample of top business and management journals.     

Ethical Considerations in Management Research: A ‘Truth’ Seeker''s Guide

Within a growing Knowledge-Management context, it would appear that Management Research calls for researchers to explicitly understand their own values, have increasing capacity for reflexivity and anticipate various ethical dilemmas that emerge from the research endeavour. This paper provides an overview of the philosophy of ethics and focuses on a researcher's ethical reasoning. It provides a framework for understanding causes of ethical dilemmas in the context of management research and provides strategies for a way forward through such dilemmas. The paper, finally, outlines exercises pertinent to research ethics and ‘hands on’ research praxis. This revised version was published online in July 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

Ethical Considerations in Management Research: A ‘Truth’ Seeker's Guide

Within a growing Knowledge-Management context, it would appear that Management Research calls for researchers to explicitly understand their own values, have increasing capacity for reflexivity and anticipate various ethical dilemmas that emerge from the research endeavour. This paper provides an overview of the philosophy of ethics and focuses on a researcher's ethical reasoning. It provides a framework for understanding causes of ethical dilemmas in the context of management research and provides strategies for a way forward through such dilemmas. The paper, finally, outlines exercises pertinent to research ethics and ‘hands on’ research praxis.     

Developing a factor model of coal miners’ attributions on risk-taking at work

This paper details a survey of coal miners’ views on the bases for risk-taking. While literature exists on the subject of risk-taking in mines, comparatively few studies have sought to elicit the views of mine personnel themselves. An 83-item questionnaire, grounded upon insights from an earlier qualitative study, was developed and distributed to a sample of mine personnel (N=932). Results were analysed by means of principal components, factor analysis, an iterative refinement of the data set resulting in the development of a three-factor model that was considered to reflect potentially important dispositional influences on risk-taking amongst operational staff in mines. Derived constructs, identified as time pressure, management commitment and confidence in ability to control risk, were found to possess moderate to high levels of internal consistency (α statistic) and high face validity. Findings are discussed with reference to insights from both cognitive risk research and more recent work within the safety culture/climate framework.     

The Ethics of Management Research: An Exploratory Content Analysis

Management academics have tended to rely on ethics codes developed by social researchers in related fields to inform their research practice. The point of this paper is to question whether this remains a viable approach in the current climate that is characterized by a significant increase in ethical regulation across the social sciences. We suggest that management researchers face ethical issues of a different nature to those most frequently confronted by other social science researchers, and argue for more explicit acknowledgement of contextual factors involved in management research. An exploratory analysis of the content of ethics codes formulated by nine social scientific associations is undertaken to identify the main ethical principles they cover and to analyse their underlying ethical tone. Drawing attention to the principle of reciprocity, which is found in very few codes, we suggest that an ethics code could be used to formulate new ways of thinking about management research relationships. Despite the risk that ethics codes may encourage instrumental compliance with minimal ethical obligations, we suggest they also have the potential to reflect a more aspirational agenda. The development of an ethics code for management research should therefore be seen as a potentially worthwhile project.     

Transfer from expatriate to local contracts: a multiple case study of an unexpected career transition

The transfer of company-assigned expatriate employees from balance sheet expatriate contracts to local contracts is an alternative international assignment compensation strategy increasingly adopted by global corporations. Despite its growing popularity, there is a significant lack of research on the impact (both professional and personal) of transferring employees from expatriate to local contracts. The purpose of this qualitative case study was to investigate this emerging international HR trend, with specific focus on exploring the experiences of career transition of company-assigned long-term expatriates (delayed localization) to local contracts at multinational organizations located in Sweden and America. Eight individual cases were analyzed. Findings revealed that localization was an unexpected career transition, a negative type of career shock, characterized by limited support from employers, mentors, and local colleagues. The findings further indicated that localization was a type of career transition rather different from other previous career transitions experienced by participants; it represented a major career and life transition. Based on the findings, we proposed HRD interventions to assist expatriates during the transition from expatriate to local contracts. Areas for future research are also suggested.     

Use of risk assessment and life cycle assessment in decision making: a common policy research agenda.

Quantitative risk assessment (RA) and life cycle assessment (LCA) are both analytical tools used to support decision making in environmental management. They have been developed and used by largely separate groups of specialists, and it is worth considering whether there is a common research agenda that may increase the relevance of these tools in decision-making processes. The validity of drawing comparisons between use of the tools is established through examining key aspects of the two approaches for their similarities and differences, including the nature of each approach and contextual and methodological aspects. Six case studies involving use of each approach in public decision making are described and used to draw out concerns about using RA and LCA in this context. The following categories of concern can be distinguished: philosophical approach of the tools; quantitative versus qualitative assessment; stakeholder participation; the nature of the results; and the usefulness of the results in relation to time and financial resource requirements. These can be distilled into a common policy research agenda focusing on: the legitimacy of using tools built on a particular perspective in decision making; recognition and role of value judgments in RA and LCA; treatment of uncertainty and variability; the influence of analytical tools in focusing attention on particular aspects of a decision-making situation; and understandability of the results for nonspecialists. It is concluded that it is time to bring together the experiences of RA and LCA specialists and benefit from cross-fertilization of ideas.     

Special considerations in conducting bereavement focus groups

Focus groups conducted with grieving people pose special challenges. However, this method can be successfully used in bereavement research especially when group interaction is central to the research aim. This article builds on key articles discussing ethical, methodological, logistical, and analytical issues in conducting focus groups with vulnerable populations (Owen, 2001; Seymour, Bellamy, Gott, Ahmedzai, & Clark, 2002). For bereaved people, vulnerability stems from heightened potential for harm by virtue of participation in sensitive, personal exploration of death-related experiences. We discuss reasons for selecting focus group methods and our experiences with planning and implementing focus groups with bereaved people. Issues found to be highly salient in our work include: team composition, participant recruitment, creating the environment, starting and ending the group, language and listening, managing emotional discussions and time, and analytic considerations. Recommendations are made for effectively using focus groups to generate new knowledge in bereavement research.     

战略承诺约束下的企业战略定位演化效应研究

随着动态导向观在战略管理领域的兴起,战略演化研究开始从高度分散走向收敛,在动态竞争环境下,企业的战略承诺投入、决心和程度的不同可能对战略定位的演化产生影响,剖析这一复杂的动态演化过程更适宜用质化研究方法.基于单一案例进行扎根理论式的实地研究,结合多重案例的跨案例检验,识别战略承诺的构成,探讨战略承诺影响战略定位演化效应的方式.研究结果表明,战略承诺是一个独特的战略要素,它来自于组织战略生成和演化的过程以及他们所促进的微观战略行为的决策过程,它在市场、资源和能力、价值活动以及组织层面的承诺表现影响着战略定位的惯性、一致性、持续性以及适应性演化.     

Phenomenology‐Based Ethnography for Management Studies and Organizational Analysis

This paper introduces phenomenology‐based ethnography as a novel ethnographic approach for research in management studies and organizational analysis and describes three methods that have been developed from this approach: life‐world analytical ethnography, focused ethnography and go‐along ethnography. Phenomenology‐based ethnography has emerged from developments in sociology that draw on ‘social phenomenology’ developed by Alfred Schütz. These developments involve the use of phenomenology‐based ethnographic methods that shift the focus of research onto participants’ subjective experiences of the field further than has been required by other ethnographic approaches. This paper uses a set of dimensions that allow a comparison of these phenomenology‐based methods’ aims, techniques of data collection and analysis, and required effort. These three methods are then compared with current ethnographic methods used in organizational research and management studies. The paper concludes with a discussion that explores and addresses the critique of how phenomenology‐based ethnography conceives the relationship between the researcher and the research subject.     

企业人力资源管理伦理困境结构维度的本土化探索

在探索性因素分析的基础上得出伦理困境结构,由此形成结构模型;然后,运用验证性因素分析对结构模型进行比较验证。研究结果表明,我国企业人力资源管理伦理困境包含4个维度:权利使用、操纵和强制、制度监督、忽视与侵犯员工权益;中国企业存在较为突出的人力资源管理伦理困境,企业管理者应规避管理过程中的非伦理性行为,提高管理效率。