Diagnosis of Organizational Culture in Public Sector Undertakings Undergoing Reforms

This study investigates a comparative analysis of civil servants’ perceptions of organisational culture in two public sector undertakings undergoing public sector reform in Fiji, and a public administration industry reference group. Data collected from Fijian civil servants and analysed superficially indicate similarity in cultures and suggested intervention strategies to create the preferred organisational cultures. In addition, the findings show the criticality of deciphering and understanding public sector organisational culture at both the superficial and deeper levels, in order to guide intervention strategies and support sustained organisational change.     

How does decision-making involvement affect perceptions of speed during post-merger integration?

This article offers an empirical demonstration of how different employees perceive the speed of change during the post-merger integration (PMI) process. As such, it adds to the growing body of literature on the speed of integration in the aftermath of a merger or acquisition (M&A). It broadens our understanding of the M&A integration process as it goes beyond binary recommendations of ‘fast’ or ‘slow’ integration by highlighting the relationship between an employee's involvement in the decision-making process and their perception of the speed of change.We conducted a multi-level longitudinal study over a two-and-a-half-year period. Our qualitative research on two not-for-profit, higher education institutions, employed multiple sources of process data. Building from this, our article thus provides not only novel theoretical insights into the PMI process, but equally offers valuable managerial advice on how staff morale, turnover and change resistance might be more efficiently managed during PMI.     

The Problems of Effecting Change Within the British Civil Service: A Cultural Perspective

This paper examines the relatively unexplored area of underachievement in organization change programmes, where the original ambitions of the authors of change fail to be realized at the level of implementation. A case in point is the British Civil Service which after several years of government endeavour has not seen the large-scale, ‘second order’ change that had been expected. The paper offers a cultural perspective on this issue. Using the findings from an in-depth, ethnographic study of one of the newly formed agencies within the civil service, it argues that attempts at change can be frustrated by a ‘cultural infrastructure’ at the local level which acts to neutralize any attempt to change from above - in relative power terms a case of David defeating Goliath. This structure is a social defence against the anxieties and ambiguities brought about by the threat of impending change, and is manifested not as resistance, or even avoidance, but disregard and unstudied indifference. These local cultural orientations are the cause of ‘schematic myopia’ (Harris, 1989) or collective blindness, which prevent those affected from recognizing the significance of a major change initiative. An examination of these cultural processes reveals the inherent weaknesses and limitations of one of the most ubiquitous of change models to be found in organizations today: the top-down, ‘invasionary’ approach to change.     

Characteristics of a central change programme within a governmental bureaucracy: a grounded theory study

Purpose The purpose of the paper is to present a theory of organisational change within the setting of a governmental bureaucracy. Design/methodology/approach Orthodox grounded theory is employed in the setting of a change programme in 12 Audit departments of the Dutch Ministries (public-sector). Findings The examined organisational change has specific characteristics. The Dutch ‘ministerial autonomy’ and the clearly recognizable role types of the key figures involved have a strong impact on the change programme and the realisation of its goals. Research limitations/implications Findings are derived on the basis of a substantive case study of the change programme of the Dutch Departmental Audit function. The research sheds new light on characteristics related to the occupational group of Chartered Accountants and characteristics of a governmental bureaucracy and it helps to understand change programmes within this bureaucracy. Practical implications The grounded theoretical model draws attention to the impact of key figures and circumstances on a change programme within the central government. Originality/value The paper builds on theories of organisational change but applies them in the typical context of the Dutch civil service where ministerial autonomy, on the one hand, and a move in the direction of more centrally organised activities (concern idea), on the other, require a difficult balancing act of all players in the change arena.     

Measuring servitization progress and outcome: the case of ‘advanced services’

The purpose of this paper is to establish a framework for assessing the progress and outcome of a manufacturer’s transformation towards becoming a provider of ‘advanced services’ – a complex bundling of products and services, whereby manufacturers offer capabilities and outcomes instead of products alone. ‘Advanced services’ represent the most complex offering in the current servitization trend amongst manufacturers. However, current performance measures lack the breadth and focus to assess progress or outcomes, and so support research and practice of organisational transformation efforts required. To address this gap the paper investigates how a manufacturer’s efforts to become an ‘advanced services’ provider can be comprehensively measured, and develops a framework for assessing the transformation journey towards becoming an ‘advanced services’ provider. The research method is based on (1) a systematic literature review process to create a comprehensive set of service-related performance measures that are available to assess a manufacturer’s servitization efforts, followed by (2) an engagement with an expert panel to synthesise the identified measures and create a set of ‘advanced services’ performance measures. The proposed framework is presented as a scorecard that can be used in practice to assess the progress and outcome of a manufacturer’s transformation towards becoming a provider of ‘advanced services’.     

Evidence‐based Management in Practice: Opening up the Decision Process,Decision‐maker and Context

Evidence‐based management (EBM) has been subject to a number of persuasive critiques in recent years. Concerns have been raised that: EBM over‐privileges rationality as a basis for decision‐making; ‘scientific’ evidence is insufficient and incomplete as a basis for management practice; understanding of how EBM actually plays out in practice is limited; and, although ideas were originally taken from evidence‐based medicine, individual‐situated expertise has been forgotten in the transfer. To address these concerns, the authors adopted an approach of ‘opening up’ the decision process, the decision‐maker and the context (Langley et al. ( 1995 ). ‘Opening up decision making: the view from the black stool’, Organization Science, 6, pp. 260–279). The empirical investigation focuses on an EBM decision process involving an operations management problem in a hospital emergency department in Australia. Based on interview and archival research, it describes how an EBM decision process was enacted by a physician manager. It identifies the role of ‘fit’ between the decision‐maker and the organizational context in enabling an evidence‐based process and develops insights for EBM theory and practice.     

Perceptions of Civil Servants Toward Privatization and Development: A New Exploratory Study

This study examines the perceptions of civil servants towards privatization with respect to national development. Using case studies and official interview data, it also examines the efficacy and effectiveness of privatization programs in a developing country, Bangladesh. The study rejects the conventional beliefs about the role of bureaucracies as anti-privatization by revealing that civil servants of Bangladesh have positive perceptions towards privatization with respect to national development. The study, however, finds no significant differences in the perceptions of different levels of civil servants towards privatization with respect to national development; they all share a common goal. Research demonstrates that civil servants generally believe that privatization positively affects economic, social, political and administrative development, although it negatively affects equity, fairness and social justice issues by widening the gap between the rich and the poor. Additionally, the study demonstrates that privatization is not conducive to employee empowerment.

The façade of consultancy in the Fiji public service

In any common definition consultancy entails the provision of advice to improve the status quo. This paper examines the notion of consultancy in the Fiji public service and highlights the consultancy qualities and their contextual application in Fiji's case. The examination of the role of internal consultancy necessitates a discussion of the general framework of Fiji's political system, in particular the decision-making process, and the cultural values and practices dominant in the public service. The contemporary notion of political neutrality of the public service requires that civil servants are endowed with the qualities of ‘disinterestedness’. The character of the public service is, therefore, emphasised as ‘precise, soulless and machine-like’. This, however, is difficult to achieve in a society divided in two along ethnic lines. The paper argues that while civil servants carry out consultancy functions they are not recognised as such and the boundary between consultancy and project management is blurred by the job and work environment in the public service.     

Triaging overflow: A case study of the ‘Gateway Assessment’ in the UK Citizens Advice Service

This article explores the impact upon the work of the UK Citizens Advice Service of the ‘Gateway Assessment’ system, a ‘triage device’ rolled out across Citizens Advice Bureaux in England and Wales from 2007 onwards designed to deal with an overflow of client needs.The paper addresses the history of ‘triage’ as a method for dealing with an excess of problematic bodies, before describing how a demonstrable need for systems to organise an overflow of advice needs within Citizens Advice Bureaux led to the emergence of triage as a ‘technique of government’ that would re-shape the advice process. Yet, as an attempt to regulate ‘from above’ the front-line of the Citizens Advice service, it met forms of resistance as existing practices of advice work and local situations fell into conflict with the inflexibility of the Gateway Assessment Process. The paper describes how implementation of the Gateway Assessment involved acts of compliance and acts of resistance, followed by a jostling between actors and a reshaping of the spaces of regulation, resulting in the ‘Gateway Plus’ model in which triage can slip into advice where necessary. We argue that this process displayed a conflict between a framing of overflow as an excess of countable bodies and one of problem-bearing subjects, the latter being derived from the relational and voluntary practice of advice.     

Materializing Strategy in Mundane Tools: the Key to Coupling Global Strategy and Local Strategy Practice?

While much of the literature on strategy and strategy as practice (SaP) focuses on traditional strategic tools, technologies and discursive practices of managers, this paper extends the understanding of strategic change implementation by proposing that mundane material tools, understood as text, translate global strategic discourse in ways that make sense to workers and orchestrate successful global strategy implementation at the local level. Based on a rich case study within one branch of a national bank, this paper demonstrates how a middle manager's materializing practices developed local strategy practice while simultaneously transforming work and producing strategic figures or indicators that satisfied senior management's global strategic change objectives. The contributions of this paper are threefold: (i) it advances the understanding of the multimodality of materiality by identifying the influence of three types of mundane tools produced locally by a middle manager as he performed his sense of the senior managers’ strategic discourse; (ii) it reveals how these three types of physical texts materialized the manager's sense of this discourse, facilitating frontline workers’ engagement and coupling materiality and orality in a coherent way that allowed workers to embody the company's global strategy in their ‘sayings and doings’; and (iii) it highlights the importance of managers’ ability to materialize a strategic discourse.     

Beyond trust: towards a practice-based understanding of governing ‘network organizations’

In recent past the concept of the ‘network’ or ‘network organization’ has emerged as one of the most prominent concepts for thinking, understanding and conceptualizing the coordination of ‘productive activities’. In the literature on network organizations, ‘trust’ is commonly understood to be the main coordinating mechanism of this organizational form. Highlighting the problematics involved in this prime focus on trust, this study combines practice-based theory (Schatzki in Social practices: a Wittgensteinian approach to human activity and the social, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2008) and a Foucauldian understanding of governing to contribute to a more differentiated understanding of the coordination of everyday activities in network organizations. By focusing on how the ‘network organization’ and its subjects are ‘produced’ in power-infused practices, this study provides insights into the complexity of mechanisms involved in such organizations. Empirically this is illustrated at the example of a consulting company which describes itself—internally and externally—as ‘network organization’. Based on an ethnographic participant observation and in-depth semi-structured interviews, the analysis of the case questions the centrality of trust as coordinating mechanism and provides deep insights into the constitution of this specific ‘network organization’.     

Exploring how complex solution-based capabilities (CSC) are developed and integrated in engineering companies

Abstract

This paper explores how engineering companies develop and integrate solution-based capabilities for complex ‘one-off’ or small-batch production. Although there is extant literature on developing a stand-alone service, product and process capabilities, an integrated solution-based capability for effective execution of complex ‘design-build’ projects is currently underdeveloped. For such firms to be successful in delivering complex solutions, there is the need for organisational structured routines and processes which we conceptualise as complex solution-based capabilities (CSC). The study was based on a multiple case study using in-depth semi-structured interviews with managers and engineers. Primary data collected were complemented by documentary evidence, for triangulation and validity. The data were analysed using thematic analysis to develop a framework of CSC. The findings show that the case study companies have developed and integrated CSC through organisational routines and processes of make-to-concept approach, value creation and strategic coordination. Implications and future research are discussed.     

‘Space,the final frontier’? Social movements as organizing spaces for applying HRD

This article suggests a qualitatively different type of ‘space’ that fits the classic definition of what constitutes an ‘organization’, but that is frequently rejected as being beyond the scope of HRD because it does not fit preconceived notions of an ‘organization’. In this article, I describe how social movements are spaces analogous to organizations that can enrich our understanding of HRD principles and that may benefit from our professional experience in fostering learning and development for and within organizations. Using concepts of sensemaking in the organizing process (Weick, K. E. 1979. The Social Psychology of Organizing. 2nd ed. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications) and concepts of space (Foucault, M. 1986. “Of Other Spaces.” Translated by J. Miskowiec. Diacritics 16 (1): 22–27; Lefebvre, H. 1991. The Production of Space. Translated by D. Nicholson-Smith. Oxford: Blackwell), I show how the social movement, Occupy Wall Street, can be seen as an important site of HRD practice and research.     

The relationship between organisational change and being a perpetrator of workplace bullying: A three-wave longitudinal study

ABSTRACT

While research has unravelled the association between organisational change and being a target of workplace bullying, scholars have still to shed light on the perpetrator perspective of this association. In the current study, we further the literature by investigating the relationship between exposure to organisational change and being a perpetrator of workplace bullying. We introduced perceptions of psychological contract breach as a mechanism that accounts for the process in which exposure to organisational change leads employees to direct bullying behaviours to other members of the organisation. Using three-wave longitudinal data from 1994 employees we estimated a between-subjects mediation model controlling for autoregressive effects. Results confirmed our hypothesis that exposure to organisational change at Time 1 was positively related to being a perpetrator of workplace bullying at Time 3 through perceptions of psychological contract breach at Time 2. These findings suggest that organisations should invest in factors that lower employees’ likelihood to perceive psychological contract breach in the aftermath of organisational change because these perceptions may indeed result in the enactment of workplace bullying towards other members of the organisation.     

OR,organisational design and adaptivity

The purpose of this paper is to discuss the need for fundamental research of an OR/systems nature into organisational design. This is illustrated through the work of a research team from the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis which recently visited the Tennessee Valley Authority as the first part of a comparative study of the organisational problems of regional development. Emphasis is laid on the need for organisational adaptivity, defined as the ability of an organisation to adapt in the face of unpredictable external change. Attention is also given to the need for ‘consistency’, so that elements within the organisation are constrained to operate to the advantage of the whole.     

Returnable transport packaging in developing countries: drivers,barriers and business performance

Abstract

This study, drawing on natural resource-based view, identifies drivers, barriers and the potential benefits of returnable transport packaging (RTP) – that is, the repeated use of packaging items – and conceptualises RTP as a technology and resource that supports organisational competitiveness. Specifically, it investigates the impact of RTP adoption on business performance, the effects of drivers, barriers and size of organisations. The data collection took place in Nigeria and South Africa. The findings suggest that RTP has a significant positive impact on business performance. Whilst prior studies seem to suggest that shrinkage and attrition are the major problems identified with the usage of RTP, our findings indicate that there are several other barriers affecting RTP adoption and the resultant performance advantage. The results also show that there is an increasing move towards adoption of RTP but some organisations are faced with financial constraints, especially the small and medium size enterprises. In addition, the results show that RTP is largely a ‘sustainability facing’ initiative with adopters motivated primarily by potential environmental, economic, social and operational benefits of adoption.     

The Challenge of Coordination in Central Government Organizations: The Norwegian Case

This paper addresses coordination problems in central government by focusing on the Norwegian case. The main research questions are: What are the experiences of civil servants concerning horizontal and vertical coordination, and internal and external coordination? What is the relative importance of structural, demographic and cultural variables for explaining variations in civil servants’ perception of coordination? The data base is a questionnaire to civil servants in ministries and central agencies in 2006. The main findings are that there are more problems with horizontal coordination than with vertical coordination; that coordination problems are bigger in central agencies than in ministries; and that a low level of mutual trust tends to aggravate coordination problems.     

Linking organisational commitment with continuous learning through peripheral vision and procedural memory

Under some circumstances such as the lack of commitment of peers or the imposition of excessive authority, many employees tend to turn a blind eye to either the development of new, more effective procedures or recognise that new or modified customer needs have developed. In these situations, organisational commitment is a preliminary step not only to the effective implementation of current procedures but also to questioning values of the organisation and future needs of customers. This study proposes that organisational commitment helps alleviate these problems by maintaining an ambidextrous perspective between procedural memory and peripheral vision to promote continuous learning. This research has therefore been conducted to explain both conceptually and empirically how peripheral vision could interact with and influence procedural memory, and hence facilitate continuous learning (CL) within the business. While peripheral vision is often associated with developing and supporting knowledge structures for the exploration of new opportunities and with identifying and addressing new clients, many consider these knowledge structures as examples of organisational routines and procedures, and thus as aspects of the ‘procedural memory’ of an organisation. To contribute to the understanding of these relationships, this study addresses two questions: (1) Are outcomes of CL processes within the organisation determined by the presence of organisational procedural memory – both skills and knowledge, and (2) Does an improved peripheral vision result in higher levels of learning? After using PLS-SEM on a sample of 203 employees of Spanish banks, our findings support the theory that peripheral vision facilitates the emergence of new and unconventional behaviours within a culture, which in turn has a positive effect on the firm’s continuous learning.     

Alternative operations strategy processes: do they matter?

Abstract

With the increasing significance of business model innovation, and due to the ongoing difficulties encountered in executing formally developed strategies, there is a strong case for studying the functional-level strategy processes from fresh perspectives. This paper examines the significance of alternative operations strategy (OS) processes and organisational context and explores how they relate to operations performance. The empirical evidence was drawn based on the statistical analysis of data collected through 242 survey responses from the senior management staff of the Canadian oil and gas industry. The evidence drawn from the empirical study confirmed that alternative forms of OS development do indeed exist in practice and that certain organisational factors have a direct influence on OS processes. The analysis discerned four strategy process configurations representing singular and multiple combinations of the three process modes identified through the literature review. The results explain the differences between these process configurations in terms of certain contextual factors and operations performance. The findings of this study help advance the understanding of OS processes and may contribute to theory building, particularly what is known as ‘mid-range’ theory, as the evidence was built through the analysis of a relatively large sample of data drawn from an industry sector that has not been reported on in previous studies.     

浅析从严治理与人本管理在公务员管理中的契合

当前，从严治理公务员队伍，改进公务员作风，严惩公务员腐败，已经成为公务员管理的主题。如此同时，在现代人本管理的总体潮流的影响下，在公务员管理中注入人本管理的理念和方法，体现人性化关怀与尊重，保障他们的合法权利对于调动公务员的工作积极性与创造性是十分必要的，因此，本文就如何实现从严治理与人本管理在公务员管理中实现完整的契合和互补进行探讨。