From Smoke and Mirrors to Walking the Talk: Decoupling in the Contemporary World

Coping with institutional complexity: Responses of management scholars to competing logics in the field of management studies

“…This finding suggests that management scholars allow changes to take place at the discursive level of their research while central practices of their research -the methods they use -remain shaped by the logic of basic research. Considering that changes take place largely on a symbolic level, the response of management scholars can be classified as a ''classical'' form of decoupling, that is, policypractice decoupling (Bromley & Powell, 2012;Meyer & Rowan, 1977) or decoupling of talk and action in Brunsson's terms Brunsson (1993Brunsson ( , 2002. If consistency between talk and action cannot be achieved, the actors, in our case management scholars, can resort to justification, that is, to explanations of how ideas are in principle in accordance with planned or accomplished actions.…”

“…Researchers (e.g., Bromley & Powell, 2012, p. 23) argue that the notion of compartmentalization broadly refers to the concept of decoupling as an organization's attempt to separate symbolic compliance from actual practices (Meyer & Rowan, 1977). It also includes another form of decoupling, as developed by Bromley and Powell (2012), in which the means (i.e., policies) that are actually implemented in organizations are decoupled from the ends. Means-end decoupling occurs ''when policies are implemented but the link between formal policies and the intended outcome is opaque'' (Bromley & Powell, 2012, p. 489).…”

The governance of social enterprises: Mission drift and accountability challenges in hybrid organizations

“…The challenge for integrated hybrids is to ensure that the commercial transaction actually leads to social change -whether it is finding an affordable price point for its target market, or producing the right set of products or services in order to achieve desired social outcomes -and that they remain aligned over time. This risk may be conceptualized in terms of means-ends decoupling (Bromley & Powell, 2012) in which the alignment between organizational activities and intended social outcomes breaks down, or where the causal relationship between them is poorly established to begin with. A function of effective governance is to monitor whether revenue-generating activities result in the intended social outcomes.…”

“…In other words, by separating the commercial and social activities, and by monitoring them separately, boards run the risk of failing to recognize contradictions or potential inconsistencies that could harm the overall social purpose of their organization. This risk can be conceptualized in terms of policy-practice decoupling (Bromley & Powell, 2012) where top managers legitimate their commercial activities on the grounds of financially supporting a social mission, but in practice routinely engage in actions that are detached from those social goals or that might prevent the organization from pursuing social goals. Framed another way, managers and governing boards invoke a moral justification for their commercial activities (Kreps & Monin, 2011), but in practice do not scrutinize those commercial activities for risks to the social mission.…”

“…The second condition thus becomes necessary to minimize incentives for the organization to take financial advantage of its beneficiaries. This task can be aided by segmenting the organization's market in order to prioritize those beneficiaries most critical to its social mission and, as discussed in the previous section, by monitoring for any means-ends decoupling of the organization's activities from its social mission (Bromley & Powell, 2012).…”