Ken Starkey

University of Nottingham | Notts · School of Geography

The purpose and nature of management scholarship is contested, evidenced by debates about the ‘academic–practitioner divide’ and attendant remedies for addressing it, including mode 2 and mode 3 research, engaged scholarship, evidence‐based management and design science. In this paper the authors argue that, without a culture of dialogical encounte...

The purpose and nature of management scholarship is contested, evidenced by debates about the ‘academic-practitioner divide’ and attendant remedies for addressing it, including mode 2 and mode 3 research, engaged scholarship, evidence-based management, and design science. In this paper we argue that, without a culture of dialogical encounter, manag...

In his commentary on our proposal to reframe the relevance of business and management research by combining design science with critical realism (Hodgkinson and Starkey, British Journal of Management, 22 (2011), pp. 355–369), Willmott (British Journal of Management, 23 (2012), pp. 598–604) commends us for our advocacy of a social science as opposed...

From its earliest days, the field of business and management studies has wrestled with fundamental questions concerning its nature and purpose: for whom and to what ends is scholarly research ultimately directed? However, amid unprecedented changes to the world of work, over the past two and a half decades these questions have become of central imp...

We develop a discourse of strategic management as design, using a conceptual base drawing upon the work of Michel Foucault, as an alternative to the prevailing strategy discourse (strategy as “economizing”). We then use contemporary design theory to theorize strategic management as a design activity in which the focus is on innovation, with the emp...

Every cloud has a silver lining. There could be nomore opportune a time to reflect critically onbusiness schools and the education they (we)profess to provide. It is not clear that LordTurner, Chairman of the UK Financial ServicesAuthority, was directly blaming business schoolswhen he argued that prior to the crisis there hadbeen ‘a fundamental inte...

Adler's (2006) defense of the arts in management education is the starting point for our consideration of debates about the nature of art and design and where they might lead business schools. We argue that the design challenge facing business schools is to create a more holistic view of management and management education, suited to our complex an...

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to argue that the current economic crisis offers an opportunity to rethink the role of the business school and how business schools can reinvent what they do by an engagement with history and the design sciences. Design/methodology/approach – The paper draws on an ongoing research project into the role of the...

This paper develops an argument that leads to a vision of management research as a form of design science. Such an approach to research requires an inversion of the relationship between rigour and relevance. Giving primacy to the pursuit of rigour, as tends to be the current norm, de-emphasizes the importance of relevance and leads to research that...

One of the most eloquent defences of greed appears in Oliver Stone’s film Wall Street, the story of insider trading during a time of stock market boom, and the arrival on the scene of a new breed of businessman, the corporate raider. In a speech to a shareholder’s meeting of Teldar Paper, Gordon Gekko, an archetypal raider planning to take over the...

In this essay, the authors take Jim March's Journal of Management Inquiry essay on the nature of scholarship as their starting point to assess the contribution of the business school in promoting a “utilitarian morality” model of education where knowledge is valued, not for its intrinsic worth, but because of the consequences it produces. In partic...

The paper examines the contribution of the French philosopher Michel Foucault to the subject of ethics in organizations. The paper combines an analysis of Foucault's work on discipline and control, with an examination of his later work on the ethical subject and technologies of the self. Our paper argues that the work of the later Foucault provides...

The paper examines the contribution of the French philosopher Michel Foucault to the subject of ethics in organizations. The paper combines an analysis of Foucault’s work on discipline and control, with an examination of his later work on the ethical subject and technologies of the self. Our paper argues that the work of the later Foucault provides...

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to question the purpose of the business school and its role in management education. Design/methodology/approach – The paper develops an historical analysis of the origins, development and identity of the business school, reflecting the views of the business school's multiple stakeholders. The paper reviews t...

This chapter discusses industry-academic collaborative networks emanating from business schools in the United Kingdom, informed by an analysis of one such network. We set this presentation in the context of debates about business schools that are currently exercising the business and management academic community. These debates focus upon the exten...

New industrial competition has led major automobile manufacturers to re-analyse their approaches to business strategy and industrial relations. This article examines attempts at Ford Motor Co. to adopt its traditional approach to work organisation to its changing business environment.

This article examines the May 1996 Everest disaster through the lens of limits and liminality to provide an alternative interpretation of the significance of the event as a counterpoint to existing accounts. The Everest disaster is an example of management under the most extreme conditions and also an example of a common managerial mindset that is...

This article analyses the link between research methodology and knowledge generation. It argues that the selection of a method of data collection and analysis determines the potential boundaries and depth of knowledge that can be generated. Choice of methodology, therefore, has major constraining or liberating potential. This is illustrated in an e...

The impact of Japanese competition has led to attempts by Western organisations to implement elements of Japanese management. The process has been described as‘Japanisation’. Here the authors examine the Japanisation of Rank Xerox and Xerox Corporation. Xerox has benefitted from the learning experience of its Japanese joint venture, Fuji Xerox, and...

The aim of this article is to demonstrate the importance and utility of the notion of organizational culture for scholars and practitioners in the field of information studies. It presents a theoretical and empirical examination of the effects of culture on communication and information in organizations. First, the concepts of organizational cultur...

In recent decades, business schools have become important components of higher education throughout the world. Yet, surprisingly, they have received little serious attention. This book provides a sober and evidence-based assessment, charting the history and character of business schools in the light of current debates about the role of universities...

Much has been written about the implications for employees in the post-corporate era of boundaryless careers. Much less has been written about the problems and challenges facing employers within a boundaryless career context. This paper contributes to both levels of analysis. At the level of the individual employee, focusing upon the middle of the...

This paper examines entrepreneurship education in the light of debates about the future of the business school, the nature of the MBA, with which management education is generally synonymous, and the links that need to be created between teaching and research. There is increasing focus on the general utility of entrepreneurial skills and aptitudes...

The conclusion that organizations need to become more strategically flexible as a response to increasing environmental dynamism and uncertainty has been an important feature of recent contingency theories of organization design. In this literature organizations have been analysed from the perspective of the development of networks of organizations...

Despite its importance, there is relatively little serious academic research into the business school. This article sets out to stimulate debate that will fill this gap. We review the origins and evolution of the business school and debates about management research and teaching in terms of ideals and practice. Increasingly, the role of the busines...

It is ironic that at a moment in history when the business school seems to be enjoying unparalleled success, the role of the business school is being increasingly questioned by some of its leading professors. We examine the debate about the business school and its evolution. While sympathetic to the criticisms levied against the business school we...

The relationship between career and social capital is an important but relatively unexplored research topic. In this article, we draw on the literatures on social capital and careers, and on empirical studies of the shifting nature of careers in financial services and television production firms, to argue that, in labour markets where key skills ar...

Business has changed dramatically over the last two decades: Globalization, cross-national strategic alliances and mergers, privatizations, outsourcing, information technology innovations, and the increasing short term contract culture have all influenced this. In turn, the role of managers has had to adapt and change. The organizations they work i...

This article uses an examination of the changing nature of organization in the UK television industry to reflect on the impact of liminality on learning. We take as our starting point Garsten's (1999) use of the term 'liminality' (being situated 'betwixt and between') to examine individual and organizational learning in the context of organizationa...

This paper argues that social capital is an under-examined but central contributing factor to effective strategic management. In an economy where capitalizing upon knowledge is becoming more important, social capital provides the basis for firms to leverage their existing knowledge resources, and to renew and refresh their knowledge base. We sugges...

We use a narrative perspective to explore the relevance of the sciences dealing with ecology for management theory and practice, presenting the issues of ecoscience from the perspective of green narrative, based on the "evolutionary epic." Adopting an interpretive sensemaking perspective on narrative, we address the narratological basis of the evol...

This paper argues for the distinctiveness of management research and develops a perspective concerning management research policy. It argues that the key defining characteristic of management research is its applied nature, and that its central concern should be ‘the general (engineering) problem of design’. Because a key goal of management researc...

This report examines the relevance gap in management research. Its focus is the nature of knowledge created by research at the interface between business and academia in the context of major changes likely to affect the nature of demand for such knowledge. Management research has been accused of a lack of relevance to managerial practice and of too...

It is possible to identify a number of phases in Michel Foucault's work, associated with an apparently shifting focus of concern. We argue that, beneath the differences that distinguish these phases, he demonstrates a lifelong engagement with a small number of core concerns. The main focus of this article is Foucault's later work. Here we identify...

No abstract available.

The last decade has seen a wide range of experiments in health care reform intended to contain costs and promote effectiveness. In the USA, managed care and disease management have been major strategies in this endeavour. It has been argued that their apparent success has strong implications for reform in other countries. However, in this paper we...

Since the mid 1980s, organization theorists have highlighted the emergence of the networked model of organization as a response to global competition and pressures for increased market flexibility. Cultural industries have not been immune from this development. In this paper, we examine the shift from hierarchy to network in the U.K. television ind...

Organizations are prone to ego defenses, such as denial, rationalization, idealization, fantasy, and symbolization, that maintain collective self-esteem and the continuity of existing identity. These defenses are dysfunctional when they militate against necessary organizational change. Maladaptive identity defense mechanisms can be mitigated th...

This fiction represents scenes from an imaginary MBA class's reaction to the showing of the Oliver Stone film, Wall Street, to explore different perspectives on the meanings of work and society in the light of Max Weber's pessimistic vision of the inexorable rise of capitalism. It is meant to end on an optimistic note.

In the field of HIV/AIDS, social movement organisations (SMOs) have been identified as powerful potential catalysts for change through their impact on formal organisational structures and the policy process. In addition, they have the capacity to be important providers of services in their own right, through the community resources they are capable...

Recent years have seen a resurgence of interest in Durkheimian perspectives on management. P. Dahler-Larsen uses such a perspective to critique theories of corporate culture. He is particularly critical of corporate culture’s claim that the locus of morality can exist in organizations. This, he argues, is inimical to Durkheim’s view of morality as...

This paper sets out to examine the strategic, technological and organizational implications of Piore and Sabel's thesis of ‘industrial divides’— of critical moments in history when the existing logic of organizational and technological development comes to be challenged. This thesis, while very influential in the social sciences, has not received t...

Les AA. examinent de facon critique l'ouvrage J. C. Collins et J. I. Porras intitule «Build to last. Succesful habits of visionnary companies» publie en 1994. Dans ce cadre, Collins et Porras s'interrogent sur les causes de la longevite de certaines entreprises. Ils presentent un certain nombre de donnees collectees concernant 18 groupes industriel...

L'A. porte son attention sur la notion de gouvernance et sur celle de controle managerial. Cette derniere est concue comme la creation de systemes de controle effectif du travail et marque les limites du domaine soumis a l'autorite. Il s'efforce d'eclairer la notion de gouvernance dans le cadre de l'entreprise. Celle-ci implique un processus de pri...

SUMMARY‘Flexibility’ became a management buzz word in the mid-to-late 1980s. Environmental pressures drove firms in many industries towards more flexible structures – away from internal, classical hierarchies towards agent networks brought together on individual project-task grounds. The goal of many organizations, according to proponents of this t...

In explaining the rationale for his classic account of working for Ford, Beynon (1973, 1984) argues that he was filling a gap in our knowledge of the experience of work. While the founders of corporate dynasties such as Henry Ford are public figures, at the time of Beynon's book we knew little of the people who do the work that makes corporations s...

There has been a growing debate about the ethics of management buy-outs (MBOs). One possible criticism of the MBO is that it serves the interests of incumbent management at the expense of shareholders. In this paper we develop the general arguments concerning the ethical aspects of the MBO to include other forms of buy-out beyond going privates and...

The longevity debate about buy-outs has hitherto been restricted. By focusing on large highly leveraged transactions, existing research has taken only a partial view of how long buy-outs last and the factors influencing longevity. This paper develops and tests hypotheses concerning the influences on buy-out longevity across the whole spectrum of ma...

Since 1979 the Ford Motor Co. has attempted to introduce fundamental changes in its corporate strategy, management structure and labour relations. This article focuses on the impact of corporate restructuring on the management of Ford UK. Significant changes in industrial relations and work organisation have been tempered by strong continuities wit...

All three of the 'founding fathers' of social science (Marx, Weber and Durkheim) have played important if contrasting roles in the evolution of management thought and organizational analysis. Of the three, the influence of Durkheim has been relatively less examined. This article argues that the time is ripe for a reconsideration of Durkheim's contr...

Management strategy within the Ford Motor Company has been going through a quiet revolution in the last decade. From being a utility car producer understanding competitive advantage exclusively in cost terms and equating management with control Ford have adopted a long-term strategy of design-led product innovation and promoting high trust labour r...

The debates about organizational responses to economic crisis have focussed on the need for strategic and structural realignment. Work organization is rarely considered as an integral element of competitive strategy. Current shifts in the contours of previously stable mass markets and product and process innovation demand equally profound organizat...

Abstract The purpose of this research is to determine those factors that can give long-term insurers operating in the UK market an efficiency advantage, in terms of their ability to earn extra premium,or investment ,income ,without ,utilising excessive ,resources ,such ,as administrative or selling effort or financial capital. The role of the size...

Abstract This paper ,addresses ,debates ,about ,the business ,school ,from ,the perspective ,of knowledge,production. It sets these ,debates ,in the ,context ,of discussion ,about ,the role of the ,university and ,debates ,about ,the knowledge ,society. The paper ,argues that the business,school,is perhaps uniquely,placed,in the university context...

La ú ltima deada ha sido testigo de una amplia gama de experimentos de reforma de la atenció n sanitaria encaminados a frenar los costos y promover la eficacia. En los Estados Unidos, la atenció n gestionada y la gestió n de las enfermedades han sido importantes estrategias al servicio de ese empeñ o, y se ha alegado que de su evidente é xito se de...

Introducción Las iniciativas de política pú-blica orientadas a contener costos están redefiniendo los límites y la economía de la atención médica en la mayo-ría de los países de la OCDE. Las reformas específicas di-fieren de país en país, pero sus presiones subyacentes re-quieren de los sistemas de atención médica llegar a con-fraternizar con reali...