New article published in European Management Review co-authored together with John Amis. We argue that far too often is context relegated to the background in our field research and writings. Deep understanding and expertise of context is imperative for better theorizing. We present implications for theory, methodology, and community.
An article in the Süddeutsche Zeitung about technology and entrepreneurship in times of crisis can be accessed here.
Spoke with Daniela Kolbe, Member of Parliament and Head of the AI ‘Enquete-Commission’, on the present and future of AI. Eloquently moderated by Katharina Heckendorf.
We live in troubled times. For long, humanity has sustained itself from the world’s resources. Recently, however, excessive production and consumption has threatened the “planetary boundaries” that sustain our existence, resulting in catastrophes such as biodiversity loss and the current climate crisis that we are in. At the same time, populism, extremism, and the polarization of societies is on the rise and social cohesion is under threat, with digital technologies allowing orchestrated misinformation campaigns to aggravate and challenge peace, democracy and social stability. In the context of these and other major societal concerns, it is apposite to ask what is the role of institutional theory in general, and in this case institutional logics in particular, in furthering our understanding of these so-called ‘grand challenges’.
This is what Laura, John and myself try to do in this article.
Grand challenges are fundamental societal concerns, and as such affect all of us in one way or another. We believe in the explanatory power and potential of the institutional logics perspective to further contribute to our understanding of some of the most pressing issues of our time. For this, we advocate for further reflection on four analytical dimensions: macro-level positioning, contextuality, temporality, and value plurality.
First, the notion of macro-level positioning links organizing principles to macro-level orders and embeds them in the interinstitutional system. It also embraces the environment as a key concern and logic. Second, contextuality moves away from a rather Northern-centric focus and takes into account the plurality of logics and their interaction across interinstitutional systems. Third, temporality is about the consideration of changing logics and logic constellations over time. Finally, value plurality brings back attention to the value-ladenness of logics themselves and offers a means to question concepts such as ‘the market’ and the market logic.
Integrating these four dimensions, we contend, will contribute towards a transformative institutional logics perspective in the sense that they offer key implications for our engagement with grand challenges. It will further open up opportunities for institutional scholars to make substantive contributions to society’s most pressing concerns.
In a new article Stephan Bohn, Nicolas Friederici and myself argue that some platforms become systemically relevant in a crisis, so we need regulation that takes this into account before and during the next crisis. The short piece was published open access in Internet Policy Review here.
Entrepreneurs can respond to opportunity in three ways: business-as-usual, pivoting, and new venture creation. This article in LSE Business Review is co-authored with Pegram Harrison.
Numerous digital platforms have emerged as a go-to response to the Covid-19 crisis – building on conventional platform characteristics, but using alternative, more inclusive organisational models.
Platforms face opportunities of market, motivation & momentum to address spatial, social & scale/speed challenges.
By offering the innovations that people most need right now, more inclusive platform alternatives may now have an opportunity to step up and secure a more significant role in the platform economy of the future.
The article is co-authored with Nicolas Friederici and Philip Meier.
Tackling COVID-19 requires coordinated, collaborative, and collective efforts that take into account other grand challenges including climate change. So how does this crisis relate to other grand challenges and how should we deal with the coronavirus that has triggered it?
New post by Patrick Haack and myself at Business & Society.
Together with Leonhard Dobusch I have published a brief reflection piece in MIT Sloan Management Review on organizational coping-strategies with the Corona crisis from reactive to proactive. We offer four strategies for transforming organizations in such unprecedented times. The article can be found here.
Enjoyed teaching a seminar that conjoins research on organization, social entrepreneurship and innovation (OSEI) with methodologies to study these topics empirically. Sessions were divided into two parts. The first part engaged with research topic specifics such as organizing in and for society, leading social change, social innovation, social entrepreneurship, new forms of organizing and grand challenges, and scaling social change. It commenced with an overview into the theme followed by short student presentations of research articles and in-depth discussions about articles to unpack their implications, interrelationships and conceptual and practical consequences. The second part prepared students for their own work by focusing on research methodologies such as approaching cases, doing field research, and writing up research reports. The course thus bridged high quality global research and local empirical cases.
Some objectives:
Course schedule:
|
No |
Date |
Topic |
| 1 | 14.10.2019 | Introduction |
| 2 | 28.10.2019 | Organizing in & for Society – Case Selection |
| 3 | 11.11.2019 | Leading Social Change – Methodological Considerations |
| 4 | 25.11.2019 | Social Innovation & Entrepreneurship – Field Research |
| 5 | 09.12.2019 | New Forms of Organizing & Grand Challenges – Research Dynamics |
| 6 | 06.01.2020 | Scaling Social Change – Writing up Research Reports |
| 7 | 20.01.2020 | Re-view & out-look |