Self-organization, evolutionary and revolutionary change in organizations

Sundarasaradula, Doy; Hasan, Helen; Walker, David S.; Tobias, Andrew M.

doi:10.1002/jsc.739

Cited by 10 publications

(6 citation statements)

References 43 publications

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“…Modeling organizations as self-organizing systems can be a useful tool in examining and elaborating organizational change theories (Sundarasaradula et al, 2005). Formal modeling of organizational adaptation processes requires one to lay out the assumptions explicitly and provides a means for the generation and examination of the outcomes and predictions that follow from these assumptions.…”

Section: The Nk Model Of Organizational Adaptationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Exploratory and Exploitative Adaptation in Turbulent and Complex Landscapes

Uotila

2017

European Management Review

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Using a simulation of organizational adaptation in turbulent and complex landscapes, I examine how the optimal balance between exploration and exploitation is influenced by the organization's task environment. I find that, contrary to conventional wisdom, increasing exploration relative to exploitation is not always the optimal response to increased environmental turbulence or complexity. Turbulence is found to have a curvilinear effect on the optimal share of exploratory versus exploitative adaptation, with the relative importance of exploitation greatest at moderate degrees of turbulence. While environmental complexity is found to have a generally positive effect on the optimal share of exploration, the effects of complexity and turbulence are found to interact and, jointly, to increase the relative importance of exploitative adaptation over exploratory adaptation. These findings suggest that the proper exploration–exploitation balance depends, in complex ways, on the pressures for global versus local adaptability posed by the interaction of turbulence and complexity.

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Section: The Nk Model Of Organizational Adaptationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Exploratory and Exploitative Adaptation in Turbulent and Complex Landscapes

Uotila

2017

European Management Review

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“…It has been suggested that CT should best be regarded as a metaphor (Smith and Humphries, 2004;, a metaphorical device , a lens (like chaos or chaordic systems) (van Eijnatten and van Galen, 2002;Fitzgerald and van Eijnatten, 2002) or an analogy (Sundarasaradula et al, 2005). Indeed Lissack (1999) argues that it is more a collection of ideas than a theory.…”

Section: The Nature Of 'Theory' In Complexity Theorymentioning

confidence: 99%

Complexity Theory, School Leadership and Management: Questions for Theory and Practice

Morrison

2010

Educational Management Administration & Leadership

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Complexity theory (CT) has had a meteoric rise in management literature and the social sciences. Its fledgling importation into school leadership and management raises several questions and concerns. This article takes one view of CT and argues that, though its key elements have much to offer school leadership and management, caution has to be exercised in accepting CT too readily, as it: (1) is unclear on its own novelty, nature and status; (2) can be regarded as disguised ideology in conflating description and prescription; (3) confuses explanation with prediction; (4) is relativist, undermining its own status; (5) contains problems in its advocacy of self-organization; (6) neglects the ethical and emotional dimensions of leadership and management; and (7) risks exonerating school leaders and managers from reasonable expectations of accountability and responsibility. The article concludes that there are questions to CT at the levels of theory, ontology, deontology and ethics, but that it offers useful challenges for school leadership and management.

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“…Key elements are that it is frame-breaking change and that it is implemented rapidly (Tushman et al, 1986;Fornaciari, Lamont, Mason, & Hoffman, 1993). Revolutionary change is closely linked and often equated with transformation (Romanelli & Tushman, 1994;Tushman & O'Reilly III, 1996;Taylor, 1999;Sundarasaradula, Hasan, Walker, & Tobias, 2005). In this study revolutionary change refers to the process of change whereas transformation is more related to the content of the change.…”

Section: Revolutionary Changementioning

confidence: 97%

Toward a Dynamic Description of the Attributes of Organizational Change

Maes¹,

Hootegem²

2011

Research in Organizational Change and Development

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The literature on change is characterized by an opposite, dichotomist view on the subject. Many authors describe only one or some of these characteristics and attribute a normative value to it. When discussing one of these attributes they will make a deviating classification in the way in which change arises. Although types and attributes of change are largely studied in the change literature, there is no general agreement on the attributes that can best describe the different types of change. The purpose of this chapter is to try to consolidate the vast literature on the types and attributes of change in order to find a more homogeneous set of attributes.From an extensive literature research on change articles and books from 1970 onward, eight dimensions of change attributes were found that are able to describe the characteristics of a change in a dynamic way.In order to overcome the dichotomist view, organizational change is approached not as a process changing a system but as a system by itself. Although the borders between the change system and the system to be changed are not always easy to perceive, this view seems to create a richer picture on change. A systems approach allows to define the attributes of change in a holistic way that captures the always paradoxical state change is in. TYPES AND ATTRIBUTES OF ORGANIZATIONAL CHANGEBased on our analysis of the literature on change, the following picture of the types and attributes can be drawn: A majority of articles are about some type of transformation and the difference with adaptation. Beside this the distinction between planned change and emergent change has been investigated many times. A lot of attention is also being paid to the distinction between discontinuous and continuous change as well as to the absence of change: stability or inertia. Incremental change as opposed to revolutionary change is also the subject of discussion. Finally, we found four additional attributes that received less attention in the change literature. We will now enter at length into these aspects. TransformationWhereas the adaptation perspective was a dominant perspective in the sixties and seventies, organizational transformation (OT) appeared in the eighties as a response to a new global economic perspective which started to affect more and more organizations (Singh, House, & Tucker, 1986). As the environment became more complex, adaptation was not enough, organizations needed to transform themselves (Fletcher, 1990). Johan Adams ' Transforming Work (Adams, 1984) was one of the first books to explore the concept of transformational change, quickly followed by several others who further developed the subject (

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Self-organization, evolutionary and revolutionary change in organizations

Cited by 10 publications

References 43 publications

Exploratory and Exploitative Adaptation in Turbulent and Complex Landscapes

Exploratory and Exploitative Adaptation in Turbulent and Complex Landscapes

Complexity Theory, School Leadership and Management: Questions for Theory and Practice

Toward a Dynamic Description of the Attributes of Organizational Change

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