Organizing reflexivity in designed change: the ethnoventionist approach

Abstract

Purpose: The objective of this paper is to reflect upon the role of intervention-oriented scientists in the process of organisation development. The paper seeks to contribute to the growing interest in design studies for organisation development and argues that a focus on reflexivity is missing in current debate. The aim of the paper to develop critical reflexiveness for organization design studies by introducing the ethnoventionist approach.Approach: The paper discusses the ideal forms of clinical inquiry, participative action research, ethnography, and the ethnoventionist approach. The ethnoventionist approach is described by its central aspects: a focus on reflexivity, a management (but not managerialist) orientation, commitment to obtaining a deep understanding, connecting the multi-layered context, and studying in pre-arranged longitudinal intervals. Findings:The ethnoventionist approach uses organisational ethnographies to facilitate intervention strategies intended to improve organisations. An example of such an approach in the design of new collaborative practices in the Dutch construction sector is drawn on. Implications:The essence of the ethnoventionist approach is to obtain a deeper understanding of organisational change. The ethnoventionist approach helps to overcome a lack of attention to management in current ethnographic bodies of knowledge and to deepen existing management approaches to change dynamics.Practical implications: Ethnoventionist approaches can be very useful for intervention oriented studies of change processes which require high levels of engagement and which produce high quality ethnographic data.Originality: This paper explores a new research approach that has not been discussed previously.

Community engagement in project organization research: the contextualization of the research process

“…It stresses the situational and multifaceted character of meaning which is shared and traded in the research process (Pettigrew, 1985;Flyvbjerg, 2006). Engaging practitioners in a dialogue is seen as a suitable way for academics to understand the underlying values of an organization and, by doing so, to become a change reflector and co-owner of managerial problems (Van Marrewijk et al, 2010). Collaboration refers to the joint work of academics and practitioners which may occur in different phases of the research process.…”

“…At the beginning, these reflections remained uncommented, but in the course of time they were increasingly received as contributions to the on-going discussion about the collaboration between both parties. The academics became insiders of the pilot project, and actionable knowledge was jointly generated through the discussion and sense-making of the observations made by the academics and fed back to the practitioners (Van Marrewijk et al, 2010). It covered the specific problems related to opposing positions taken by team members of the pilot project that had become apparent during the regular meetings.…”

Conflicting Subcultures in Mergers and Acquisitions: a Longitudinal Study of Integrating a Radical Internet Firm into a Bureaucratic Telecoms Firm

“…The consultant, who is generally hired by top management to investigate or solve a problem, adopts a clinical perspective to collecting data by means of a relatively quick scan or a limited number of interviews (Schein, ). The ethnographer's insights into boardroom activities, organizational politics, what is discussed during informal gatherings and problems of implementation help to provide a deeper understanding of organizations (van Marrewijk, Veenswijk and Clegg, ). Schein () stresses that clinical and ethnographic perspectives result in the researcher developing a different relationship to the object of study and can result in different findings.…”

Social impact and the justification of action research knowledge

“…Otherwise, each research group was free to develop its own framework. When Marrewijk, Veenswijk, and Clegg (2010) criticize the notion of democratic dialogue for being an insufficient framework for organization development, they are right, but they have also misunderstood. Democratic dialogue is an institutionally anchored set of minimum critical conditions for cooperation, not a ''full package for change.''…”