The iron cage revisited: Institutional isomorphism and collective rationality in organizational fields (Chinese Translation)
01 Jan 2008-
TL;DR: In this article, the authors argue that rational actors make their organizations increasingly similar as they try to change them, and describe three isomorphic processes-coercive, mimetic, and normative.
Abstract: What makes organizations so similar? We contend that the engine of rationalization and bureaucratization has moved from the competitive marketplace to the state and the professions. Once a set of organizations emerges as a field, a paradox arises: rational actors make their organizations increasingly similar as they try to change them. We describe three isomorphic processes-coercive, mimetic, and normative—leading to this outcome. We then specify hypotheses about the impact of resource centralization and dependency, goal ambiguity and technical uncertainty, and professionalization and structuration on isomorphic change. Finally, we suggest implications for theories of organizations and social change.
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Dissertation•
16 Nov 2007
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors propose concurrence multimarches (appelee aussi competition multipoints) dans les secteurs en cours de liberalisation (industries de reseaux).
Abstract: Notre travail de these s'interesse au courant de la dynamique concurrentielle et a l'etude de la rivalite entre entreprises. Il propose d'approfondir ces travaux et notamment la concurrence multimarches (appelee aussi competition multipoints) dans les secteurs en cours de liberalisation (industries de reseaux). En effet les comportements concurrentiels durant les processus de liberalisation restent aujourd'hui encore mal connus. Pour conduire cette recherche, nous avons choisi d'etudier une serie de cas d'entreprises (EDF, Electrabel, Endesa, Enel, Gaz de France, Poweo, Direct Energie...), actives sur le marche francais de l'electricite actuellement en cours de liberalisation (1996 – 2006). Cette recherche qualitative conduite par etudes de cas longitudinales, s'inscrit dans le cadre d'une convention CIFRE (entre le Ministere de la Recherche & la societe Electrabel France) incluant une implication forte dans la vie de l'entreprise et du secteur. Grâce a l'utilisation des sequences strategiques multidimensionnelles, nous avons identifie deux periodes strategiques, caracterisees pour la premiere, par une logique d'affrontement puis la seconde par une logique de retenue mutuelle. Nous defendons l'idee qu'apres une premiere phase d'apprentissage des regles d'un nouveau marche liberalise (affrontement, diversification, internationalisation), les operateurs ont rapidement et collectivement repositionne leurs priorites sur une strategie europeenne focalisee sur la convergence gaz – electricite. La mise en place d'une competition multimarches a entraine l'apparition d'une retenue mutuelle, particulierement profitable pour les grands acteurs. La conduite d'une strategie integree (marche & hors marche) ressort comme une variable importante dans la conduite et la legitimation de ces comportements.
6 citations
Dissertation•
01 Jan 2015
6 citations
Dissertation•
01 Jan 2009
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors explore the implications and competing interpretations of this development via discourse and analysis of conversations between the author (a former industry insider) and 16 senior and influential individuals representing both new and long-established industry stakeholders.
Abstract: Despite evidence suggesting that music is being consumed more than ever, the global market
for recorded music has lost more than one third of its value since its peak in 1999. This thesis
explores the implications and competing interpretations of this development via discourse
analysis of conversations between the author (a former industry ‘insider’) and 16 senior and
influential individuals representing both new and long-established industry stakeholders. The
research finds that music is still highly valued, but that the relative value attributable to
record companies is contested: not only by artists and consumers, but also by many others
who are exploiting new media and technologies to offer products and services which derive
value from music. Many strategic solutions have long been recognized or imagined by record
companies, but have failed to be executed. Such failure is traced to cognitive and social
obstacles to generative dialogue which impede collaboration between powerful stakeholders.
Building from the constructs in the participant texts, a number of identity-bound narratives
are elaborated, including tales attributed to protagonists such as the patron, the inventor and
the curator. From these, the concepts ‘Tin Pan world’ and ‘Wiki world’ are introduced to
frame and illustrate how obstacles to strategic collaboration are rooted in alternative value
systems, producing a dilemma which is as much social and political as it is commercial. On
the one hand is the desire to protect a long-established economic system of patronage and
cultural intermediation based on the principle of intellectual property. On the other is the
desire to disrupt this ideology and its restrictive power relations and narrow cultural
privileges, promoting instead broader civil rights to access and to generate cultural capital in
new ways made possible by developments in media and technology.
The research responds to calls for approaches which can incorporate the sociological and
political dimensions of industrial strategizing. It proposes that the study of discursive practice
and discursive resources together can make complex and unresolved dilemmas more visible
and discussible. Fragmentation of institutional power and the socially-constructed constraints
and enablers of change are themes of relevance not only to the music industry, but also to
other industries which are sustained by intellectual property rights and which face the threats
and opportunities of the so-called convergence in media and technology.
6 citations
Posted Content•
TL;DR: In this article, the authors present empirical evidence challenging this foundational assumption by demonstrating that entrepreneurs play a leading role, not a subordinate role, in sourcing incremental innovations through secondary inventions and design modifications, and nearly 90% of the highest-ranked incremental innovations leading to the commercialization of the mechanized reaper and cloud computing services were attributed to entrepreneurial start-ups.
Abstract: Existing theories of technological innovation posit a split between the incremental innovations produced by large incumbents and the radical innovations produced by entrepreneurial start-ups. This study presents empirical evidence challenging this foundational assumption by demonstrating that entrepreneurs play a leading role, not a subordinate role, in sourcing incremental innovations through secondary inventions and design modifications. Among the highest-ranked incremental innovations leading to the commercialization of the mechanized reaper and cloud computing services, nearly 90% were attributable to entrepreneurial start-ups. Paradoxically, however, an entrepreneurial start-up had only a one in fourteen chance of garnering returns from a reaper innovation and a one in nine chance of gains from a cloud computing improvement.
6 citations
Posted Content•
01 Jun 2015
TL;DR: In this article, a qualitative study of a case of an inter-professional association on diversity management, four boundary spanning roles are identified in relation to the shaping/sensing and seizing of opportunities.
Abstract: Our article contributes to the understanding of the micro-foundations of dynamic capabilities by showing how middle managers adopting the role of boundary spanners influence the organizational capacities to sense/shape and seize opportunities. Organizations should constantly monitor their environment in order to detect and create opportunities. How such access, detection and creation actually occur still needs to be investigated. Boundary spanners are individuals with rare competencies who link the organization to its environment. They play an important role in knowledge transfer, diffusion and exploitation. They also influence innovation and organizational change. However, not all boundary spanners are equal when it comes to succeeding in these functions, sometimes despite high expertise and individual talent. Research has explored the characteristics and levers of performance of boundary spanners. As few studies have done, we propose to analyze how boundary spanners influence the important dynamic capabilities of sensing/shaping and seizing opportunities. From a qualitative study of a case of an inter-professional association on diversity management, four boundary spanning roles are identified in relation to the shaping/sensing and seizing of opportunities. Our study contributes to the understanding of perceptions and practices which influence the performance of boundary spanners. It also provides insights on how boundary spanners can help their organizations capture and capitalize upon opportunities.
6 citations
References
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TL;DR: This article synthesize the large but diverse literature on organizational legitimacy, highlighting similarities and disparities among the leading strategic and institutional approaches, and identify three primary forms of legitimacy: pragmatic, based on audience self-interest; moral, based upon normative approval; and cognitive, according to comprehensibility and taken-for-grantedness.
Abstract: This article synthesizes the large but diverse literature on organizational legitimacy, highlighting similarities and disparities among the leading strategic and institutional approaches. The analysis identifies three primary forms of legitimacy: pragmatic, based on audience self-interest; moral, based on normative approval: and cognitive, based on comprehensibility and taken-for-grantedness. The article then examines strategies for gaining, maintaining, and repairing legitimacy of each type, suggesting both the promises and the pitfalls of such instrumental manipulations.
13,229 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, a theory of stakeholder identification and saliency based on stakeholders possessing one or more of three relationship attributes (power, legitimacy, and urgency) is proposed, and a typology of stakeholders, propositions concerning their saliency to managers of the firm, and research and management implications.
Abstract: Stakeholder theory has been a popular heuristic for describing the management environment for years, but it has not attained full theoretical status. Our aim in this article is to contribute to a theory of stakeholder identification and salience based on stakeholders possessing one or more of three relationship attributes: power, legitimacy, and urgency. By combining these attributes, we generate a typology of stakeholders, propositions concerning their salience to managers of the firm, and research and management implications.
10,630 citations
TL;DR: The authors applied the convergent insights of institutional and resource dependence perspectives to the prediction of strategic responses to institutional processes, and proposed a typology of strategies that vary in active organizational resistance from passive conformity to proactive manipulation.
Abstract: This article applies the convergent insights of institutional and resource dependence perspectives to the prediction of strategic responses to institutional processes. The article offers a typology of strategic responses that vary in active organizational resistance from passive conformity to proactive manipulation. Ten institutional factors are hypothesized to predict the occurrence of the alternative proposed strategies and the degree of organizational conformity or resistance to institutional pressures.
7,595 citations
TL;DR: This article conducted a meta-analysis of 52 studies and found that corporate virtue in the form of social responsibility and, to a lesser extent, environmental responsibility is likely to pay off, although the operationalizations of CSP and CFP also moderate the positive association.
Abstract: Most theorizing on the relationship between corporate social/environmental performance (CSP) and corporate financial performance (CFP) assumes that the current evidence is too fractured or too variable to draw any generalizable conclusions. With this integrative, quantitative study, we intend to show that the mainstream claim that we have little generalizable knowledge about CSP and CFP is built on shaky grounds. Providing a methodologically more rigorous review than previous efforts, we conduct a meta-analysis of 52 studies (which represent the population of prior quantitative inquiry) yielding a total sample size of 33,878 observations. The meta-analytic findings suggest that corporate virtue in the form of social responsibility and, to a lesser extent, environmental responsibility is likely to pay off, although the operationalizations of CSP and CFP also moderate the positive association. For example, CSP appears to be more highly correlated with accounting-based measures of CFP than with market-based ...
6,493 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors consider structural inertia in organizational populations as an outcome of an ecological-evolutionary process and define structural inertia as a correspondence between a class of organizations and their environments.
Abstract: Considers structural inertia in organizational populations as an outcome of an ecological-evolutionary process. Structural inertia is considered to be a consequence of selection as opposed to a precondition. The focus of this analysis is on the timing of organizational change. Structural inertia is defined to be a correspondence between a class of organizations and their environments. Reliably producing collective action and accounting rationally for their activities are identified as important organizational competencies. This reliability and accountability are achieved when the organization has the capacity to reproduce structure with high fidelity. Organizations are composed of various hierarchical layers that vary in their ability to respond and change. Organizational goals, forms of authority, core technology, and marketing strategy are the four organizational properties used to classify organizations in the proposed theory. Older organizations are found to have more inertia than younger ones. The effect of size on inertia is more difficult to determine. The variance in inertia with respect to the complexity of organizational arrangements is also explored. (SRD)
6,425 citations