Browsing Ph.D. theses (MPP/LPF) by Year Published
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How special groups organize for collaborative creativity in conditions of spatial variability and distanceO’Donnell, Shannon (Frederiksberg, 2013)[More information][Less information]
Abstract: The enormous challenges and opportunities impacting the world community today increasingly require people to practice collaborative innovation effectively both in person and across geographic boundaries. Simultaneously, advances in technology such as social networking tools, digital 3-D representations, virtual worlds, and open source practices are inspiring generations of users to develop new kinds of adaptive collaborative networks and capabilities. But when people work across organizational and geographic boundaries, new challenges arise that make it difficult for groups to achieve the levels of excellence they are capable of achieving together in close proximity. Practitioners need help determining how best to perform collaborative creativity given unique and dynamic work conditions. Meanwhile, as new forms of creative group work emerge at an accelerating pace, researchers struggle to keep up with and develop nuanced understanding of the variations in collaborative processes we increasingly see performed. With this PhD research, I aim to increase our understanding of a particular, specialized form of collaborative creativity called “ensembling.” I investigate this phenomenon by studying it in diverse—including “stretched”—conditions. By stretched, I mean that, literally, groups are stretched apart in space as membership size and spatial distance between members increase and work configurations vary. The groups I study are those both capable of achieving and driven to achieve a peak-performance state of ensemble, and do so via the enactment of an interdependent set of methods that call ensemble into being, a process I call ensembling. In their ideal form, these work methods support the emergence of ensemble and result in the creation of aesthetically coherent and novel outcomes that are particularly responsive to the contexts in which they are made. To investigate the phenomenon of ensemble, I first develop a construct of ensemble based on informant descriptions, and use theory and data to develop a detailed description of how ensembling is performed in natural conditions (i.e., in close physical proximity). Then I look at an extreme example in which a set of expert groups’ ability to ensemble was put under stress by an unprecedented work task. In 2009, multiple string quartets (many considered world class) organized to perform a new musical composition. The composition challenged four quartets at a time to perform as an integrated ensemble while sitting apart, in various configurations, and at spatial distances of up to 70 feet. To help them address the difficulties produced by increased membership and distance, the musicians integrated a simple coordinating technology into their process. To learn how participants made ensemble possible given these new conditions, I engaged multiple qualitative methods for generating data and multiple perspectives for interpretation. I first considered their process as an iterative approach to exploring strategies for addressing constraints, in order to show how the methods of ensembling interacted with conditions of increased group size, increased spatial distance and configurational variability, and to elicit their evolving beliefs about what methods made ensemble more likely to occur given these conditions. Then I performed an alternative interpretation, disrupting this logic and exploring the ways in which participants used methods of ensembling—particularly openness to uncertainty and reconceiving—to create unanticipated potentialities for ensemble to emerge despite constraints. I show how they worked with a coordinating technology called a “click-track” in important new ways that went beyond “merely” achieving synchronous coordination to increasing their autonomy, relatedness, and ability to demonstrate artistic virtuosity, enabling them to engage equally in leadership and participation and to play. Finally, performing a comparative analysis across sub-units of the case, including examples of breakdown in the process, I generated additional insights into what conditions, beliefs, methods and behaviors enable or inhibit processes of ensembling. Integrating learning from analysis and interpretation, I propose a new range of conditions in which ensembling is possible, and a revised and expanded description of the methods by which groups ensemble. Conditions can expand to include larger groups with limited-tenure consisting of enduring-tenure sub-groups, multiple task interdependencies at group and sub-group levels, balanced tenure at sub-group level, a balance between proximity and distance, opportunities to work with and without technological mediation, and self-determined configuration variability. I show that the emergence of ensemble depends on, for instance, a shared purpose to ensemble, and methods such as a “struggle” phase, episodes of close physical proximity, collective leadership, “dueting” in different configurations, reconceiving constraints, living with the paradox of one-and-four, opening the process to uncertainty and to the emergence of consent, and subliminal technology engagement. Ultimately, these groups demonstrated an increasing ability to adapt to new conditions faster and more creatively, making new configurations possible, and suggesting ways in which ensemble might be performed in other kinds of group settings. I summarize findings in the form of a “framework of ensembling” that is meant to serve as a tool to further enrich our yet nascent understanding of this complex phenomenon and to aid in the exploration of ensembling in contexts outside the usual places we expect it to occur. URI: http://hdl.handle.net/10398/8653 Files in this item: 1
Shannon_O'Donnell.pdf (7.529Mb) -
En socialpsykologisk analyse af forholdet imellem selvledelse, ledelse og stress i det moderne arbejdslivGroth-Brodersen, Signe (Frederiksberg, 2013)[More information][Less information]
Abstract: Afhandlingen rejser et kritisk perspektiv på individualiseringen af sundhedsfremme ud fra en diskussion af ledelse af selvledelse i det moderne arbejdsliv. Det er karakteristisk for den eksisterende danske og internationale forskning i selvledelse, at der er gennemført en begrænset empirisk udforskning af selvledelsens funktion og virke i arbejdslivets praksis. Det er i særlig grad empirisk underbelyst, hvordan variationer i forholdet imellem selvledelse og ledelse indvirker på forekomsten af stresssymptomer. Et nyere dansk empirisk projekt placerer selvledelse, beskrevet som en særlig form for selvorganiseringskompetence, i en positiv position i forhold til at håndtere det grænseløse arbejdsliv. Det grænseløse arbejdsliv beskrives her som det at have frie grænser i forhold til organiseringen af ’arbejdstid og arbejdssted’. Disse resultater udfordrer tidligere studier indenfor arbejdslivsforskning, hvor man i højere grad har set selvledelse koblet sammen med stress og stigende krav til individet (Phil-Tingvad, 2010; Allvin et. al., 2011, Lund & Hvid, 2007). I den internationale forskning beskrives selvledelse som ’Self-Leadership’. Self-Leadership handler om en særlig form for selvkontrol, hvor individet giver sig selv feedback og er selvmotiverende (Neck & Hougton, 2006; Manz & Neck, 2004). Self-Leadership er en teori, der arbejder med selvledelse uden en konkret kobling til arbejdslivet. Teorien beskæftiger sig derfor ikke med selvledelsens sammenspil med ledelsen og herunder betydningen af ledelse som relevant kontekstuelt parameter. Selvledelse bliver set som en eksistentiel form for egenledelse.... URI: http://hdl.handle.net/10398/8626 Files in this item: 1
Signe_Groth-Brodersen.pdf (1.643Mb) -
(Re)assembling work in the Danish PostMogensen, Mette (Frederiksberg, 2012)[More information][Less information]
Abstract: The well-being of employees is currently a central matter of concern both in public and private companies. If employees do not feel well, in the last instance they might experience a burn out or fall ill from stress and thus add to the highly costly yet ever growing number filling up the statistics of this modern epidemic. In short, well-being is key to productivity. For sure this is not a new story, but at the core of organization and management theory: how to best organize the human resources of production balancing off the need for increased productivity and the preservation of physical and mental resources of the worker? In contrast to classic principles such as Taylor’s scientific management, it seems today generally agreed that well-being thrives when work is organized by principles of ‘flexibility’, ‘learning’, ‘empowerment’ and ‘creativity’. However, at the same time workplaces and organizations are under an enormous pressure towards standardization and optimization. This dissertation investigates empirically competing or intersecting ways of organizing well-being and productivity, with an analytic outset in the work task, departing from historically generated, however still prevalent, dichotomies and normativities of standardization and flexibility respectively. The empirical case of the dissertation is the organization of postal work in a big and formerly publicly run distribution company in Denmark. Based on an ethnographic field work and the employment of an auto-photographic method, the dissertation investigates how the current and simultaneous efforts of standardization and flexibility configure the well-being(s) and productivities of postal work. The theoretical framework is primarily informed by Actor Network Theory and the dissertation attend to a detailed investigation of how well-being and productivity are enacted in the daily work practices and the constant shifting/delegation going on between the inscribed postal worker of work tools, standard procedures and management programs on the one side and the routinized bodies of the postal workers on the other. Most of the time this results in ‘working compatibilities’ silently enacting bodies-with-standards that are both productive and well. At other times, however, controversy and conflicts arise, pointing to the fact that the presence of multiple modes of organizing are not always productive. The empirical chapters departs from selected auto-photographs that prompt different unfoldings of the way postal work is organized – or sought organized – and the way well-being and productivity arise as effects of these organizations. In this unfolding the analysis proceed on a tension between phenomenological and actor-network theoretical readings of empirical material creating a patchwork-like assemblage of postal work. This involves a stitching together of highly mundane, corporeal practices and material such as bicycles and kickstands, personal experiences, the researcher’s interpretations, the technical scripts of electric bikes, the norms of postal workers, the discourse of management and the political-economic developments of European postal markets. Through the empirical chapters, the dissertation depicts postal work not as a story of standardization versus flexibility, but as a constant ‘juggling’ and balancing act between them. This is not a story of humanization or the opposite, it is both at once. It is not a story of stabilization or perpetual change, it is both at once. It is a story of the hanging-togetherness of an organization that displays multiple versions of well-being and productivity as well as multiple controversies as a result of this. Depending on the stakes one has in this complex organizational set-up, whether one is the postal worker, the local manager, the HR consultant or perhaps the customer, preferences will differ, and indeed this is an important discussion. What is the better way to organize postal work? The analysis presented in the dissertation will not deliver the answer to this, but hopefully make the discussion a more qualified one, by displacing old truths. Having as point of departure and final emphasis a heuristics of the work task, the thesis aims to contribute to a specification of organization theory, HRM and work environment theorizing, which otherwise tend to have lost its primary object: work. URI: http://hdl.handle.net/10398/8589 Files in this item: 1
Mette_Mogensen.pdf (9.923Mb) -
A study of corporate branding strategies at Novo NordiskHolm Hansen, Jacob (Frederiksberg, 2012)[More information][Less information]
Abstract: The inspiration for this project came from a practical and a theoretical interest in how strategies are anchored in organisations. In 2005 a colleague and I published a book about strategic leadership communication (Bordum and Holm Hansen 2005). It was an inquiry into how the power of strategic statements, such as vision, mission and values, are rooted in the underlying forces of communication and actions among the stakeholders of organisations. It demonstrated that the drivers of successful leadership are based on persuasive communication and action. This project takes this line of thought further through a conceptual and empirical inquiry. It is motivated by an interest in basic knowledge about corporate branding as an integrative phenomenon. Corporate branding is often understood as a strategic activity that creates attention and value for a company. The strategic and managerial approaches are generally dominant in theory and practice, where they suggest various prescriptions for success with a corporate branding project. Such approaches often build on assumptions about control where certain consecutive steps automatically lead to a powerful brand. While there are many possible approaches to corporate branding, it seems that the question of integration is a salient issue that characterises the phenomenon in different ways. For instance, corporate branding is said to integrate various academic disciplines, provide an integrated profile of a company, integrate internal and external stakeholders, etc. The particular focus here is encouraged by questions and reflections about how corporate branding as an integrative activity can be analysed and understood through a pragmatic theory of communication. URI: http://hdl.handle.net/10398/8456 Files in this item: 1
Jacob_Holm_Hansen.pdf (5.526Mb) -
Managing and Researching Inclusive SchoolsRatner, Helene (Frederiksberg, 2012)[More information][Less information]
Abstract: This thesis examines “reflexivity” as the key theme for understanding how Danish school managers work with the currently influential political vision of including students with special needs in the common school (educating children aged 5-16). Despite repeated attempts to realize the vision of inclusion, the number of students referred to special pedagogical services, and thus segregated from the common school, has continued to grow, especially since 1995. There is a widespread consent that this development is due to the schools’ practices and socially constructed categories of “special needs” and “normalcy.” Pedagogical scholars and recent policy initiatives posit that schools can achieve the much-wanted cultural change towards inclusion if teachers reflect (more) on their mindsets and practices. When advocating inclusion, scholars often refer to school managers as “leaders of meaning construction,” thus emphasizing their importance in facilitating cultural change. Existing knowledge practices are depicted as too “durable” with the unintended side-effects of segregation and budget overruns, and school managers are, following, encouraged making teachers change their practices through (self-) reflexivity. URI: http://hdl.handle.net/10398/8459 Files in this item: 1
Helene_Ratner.pdf (2.848Mb) -
Towards Relational Leadership In the Cultural SectorFriis Møller, Søren (Frederiksberg, 2012)[More information][Less information]
Abstract: The thesis is an inquiry into how leadership is performed narratively in the cultural sector. Chapter 1 draws the cultural sector as a narrative landscape, and the reader is invited on a tour around this narrative landscape as seen through the eyes of some of the top guns in the cultural sector. Seen from this vantage, leadership in the cultural sector seems to be predominantly performed by relating narratives with reference to the metanarrative of the Enlightenment. The inquiry, however, draws on Lyotard (1984) to argue that such extralinguistic legitimization is in a crisis of legitimacy, wherefore the inquiry embarks on a problematization of the dominant understanding of leadership in the cultural sector with the activist aspiration of suggesting a postmoderning understanding of leadership in the cultural sector being performatively legitimized. Chapter 2 argues in favor of a relational, non-entitative understanding of narratives and it points to emplotment as a process of finding the best fit. This relational understanding of narratives allows the project to inquire into leadership performed narratively in all kinds of empirical settings, not confining itself to formal leadership contexts. Chapter 3 offers a genealogic approach to what the project has defined as the dominant narrative in the cultural sector, the narrative of art for art’s sake (the AFAS narrative), which the project argues function as an implicit standard. This includes notions of aesthetic autonomy such as suggested by Kant in 1790, artistic freedom and art for its own sake such as claimed by artists in the Romantic era, and the arm’s length principle as the ‘constitution of cultural policies’ in the post WW2 Western world. Chapter 4 provides an overview of alternative voices which have challenged the dominant narrative. These include post colonial studies, cultural entrepreneurial studies and consumer behavior studies which in various ways propose alternative ways to lead and support the cultural sector. Chapter 5 links the discussions in chapter 3 and chapter 4 to leadership studies, notably to discussions of leader-centered orientations versus leading relationally orientations. The chapter concludes by suggesting a new sensibility towards understanding leadership and meditates on how this might be achieved, paying attentions to the possibilities of overcoming the putative crisis of legitimacy the inquiry is placed in. Chapter 6 relates a case-study of Malmoe City Library which endeavors into a difficult, yet very promising process of reformulating what a library may become in a contemporary context. This process challenges the dominant narrative and thus the current understanding of what a library should be, and this deviation from the dominant narrative challenges leadership. Chapter 7 assembles three different approaches to challenges the dominant narrative and to make new interpretive resources available to the understanding of leadership in the cultural sector. First, givrum.nu, a social movement working with arts, second, Mogens Holm, a leader in the cultural sector in a transition phase, and third, Copenhagen Phil, a classical symphony orchestra striving to avoid becoming a parallel society phenomenon. These case studies are conducted as written interviews with the cases, in an attempted un-edited form to also introduce relational processes informed by a power with relation to my own research project. Chapter 8 reflects on the case-studies in chapter 6 and chapter 7 in light of the two approaches to leadership discussed in chapter 5. It does so by linking my study to relational leadership theory in order to see how this theoretical field might inform my inquiry and how my inquiry might inform this field. It equally offers five possible reconstructions of the cases before concluding the research project by summing up contributions to the empirical field and the research fields, as well as by pointing to areas which could be further developed in future research. In line with the aspirations of the relational constructionist framework of the project, the inquiry does not offer a conclusion. Instead it encourages further reconstructions, thus submitting itself to the performative legitimization it argues in favor of. URI: http://hdl.handle.net/10398/8590 Files in this item: 1
Søren_Friis_Møller.pdf (1.809Mb) -
Industrirådet og efterkrigstidens Danmark 1945 - 1958Lind Larsen, Morten (Frederiksberg, 2012)[More information][Less information]
Abstract: Velfærdsstaten befinder sig i et vadested. Befolkningen bliver ældre, og finansieringsgrundlaget skrumper. Det giver grundlag for diskussioner om, hvorvidt kursen skal justeres eller lægges radikalt om, og hvordan forholdet skal være mellem rettigheder og pligter i fremtiden. I de aktuelle diskussioner om den danske velfærdsstats fremtid er det et tilbagevendende spørgsmål, hvordan den danske velfærdsstatsmodel er opstået, og hvad der egentlig er dens centrale bestanddele. Den danske velfærdsstats rødder kan naturligvis trækkes langt tilbage, men der er efterhånden enighed om, at de første årtier efter befrielsen står som helt centrale i forhold til den moderne danske velfærdsstats historie. I perioden fra 1945 til slutningen af 1950’erne blev en række væsentlige forudsætninger således skabt for, at den moderne velfærdsstat kunne realiseres i 1960’erne og 1970’erne, hvor omfattende velfærdsreformer blev gennemført og en stor offentlig sektor etableredes. URI: http://hdl.handle.net/10398/8399 Files in this item: 1
Morten_Lind_Larsen.pdf (1.475Mb) -
En undersøgelse af det intense arbejdslivKirkegaard, Line (Frederiksberg, 2012)[More information][Less information]
Abstract: Denne afhandling tilbyder et diagram over eksistensformen for en gruppe højt profilerede management konsulenter. Den tilbyder et diagram over et moderne selvforhold. Den tilbyder en fortegnelse over, hvordan en gruppe højt profilerede management konsulenter griber de kriterier, de bliver udsat for i sit deres liv og den eksistensmåde, der hermed muliggøres. Med dette ønsker jeg at bidrage til de eksisterende work-life balance teorier. Min vej ind i teorierne er nemlig, at logikken i mit empiriske materiale forekommer så forskelligt fra de traditionelle work-life balance teorier, at disse ikke lader sig forene. Jeg foretager derfor en analyse af den eksisterende litteratur, og rejser i den forbindelse en grundlæggende kritik af work-life balance teorierne, for at operere med falske problemstillinger på en måde, så svaret allerede indgår i de spørgsmål, der stilles... URI: http://hdl.handle.net/10398/8390 Files in this item: 1
Line_Kirkegaard.pdf (1.175Mb) -
Lateral Strategies for Scientists and Those Who Study ThemGorm Hansen, Birgitte (Frederiksberg, 2011)[More information][Less information]
Abstract: The thesis Adapting in the Knowledge Economy investigates the strategies deployed by academic scientists when trying to adapt and maneuver within an increasingly complex mixture of scientific, industrial and governmental agendas. Chapter one “From insights to invoice” summarizes the last decade of Danish research policy as a tendency towards intensified focus on interaction between the university and “outside” actors. Looking at Danish policy documents and interview data the chapter shows how policy changes responded to an idea of “ivory tower” researchers isolating themselves in Danish universities. Furthermore, the interaction agenda was motivated by the perception that knowledge was produced but not sufficiently used. Strongly influenced by the concept of the knowledge economy and that of mode 2 knowledge production, policy changes were directed at bridging a gap between the producers and the consumers of knowledge. A series of reforms and initiatives were launched to facilitate more interaction between science and industry as well as more responsiveness towards societies’ problems on behalf of the universities. This interaction agenda was coupled with an increase in the economic investment in research and an increased focus on competition between researchers in order to ensure high quality in knowledge production.... URI: http://hdl.handle.net/10398/8346 Files in this item: 1
Birgitte_Gorm_Hansen.pdf (1.768Mb) -
The Economic and Artistic Constitution of a Social PhenomenonWymann, Christian (Frederiksberg, 2011)[More information][Less information]
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A History of Danish School Governing from 1970-2010Grønbæk Pors, Justine (Frederiksberg, 2011)[More information][Less information]
Abstract: In Denmark, as in many other welfare states, we strongly believe that problems within the public sector can be solved by means of better management. For quite some years it has been assumed that management leads to more control over and better quality of welfare. Politicians and public servants have therefore been concerned with how the individual hospital, nursing home and school can develop its management. This has created a somewhat strange problem: How is it possible from a position at the top of a governing hierarchy to create management capacity from below? This thesis is about how Danish local government, municipalities, have developed understandings of governing relations between themselves and the public school over the last 40 years. The thesis tracks how municipalities have gradually assigned organizational independence to the individual school and increased their expectations of its self-management.... URI: http://hdl.handle.net/10398/8355 Files in this item: 1
Justine_Grønbæk_Pors.pdf (4.586Mb) -
En analyse af coachingsdiskursens genealogi og governmentalityHede, Tobias Dam (Frederiksberg, 2011)[More information][Less information]
Abstract: Formålet med denne afhandling er at undersøge coachingdiskursens genealogi og ”governmentality”, dvs. dens historiske formationer og normative basis som ledelsesmodel og praksisregime. Problemfeltet formuleres igennem det såkaldte ”symmetriproblem”. Den væsentligste udfordring heri er spørgsmålet om, hvordan en coach kan bistå et andet menneske med at åbne sig for og vende sig imod det, der er væsentligt for den enkelte selv, og det fællesskab, han eller hun definerer sig i forhold til. I det perspektiv er symmetriproblemets analysestrategiske funktion at være samlebetegnelse for tre ”problematiseringslinjer” i coachingdiskursens genealogi og governmentality, der konstituerer sig igennem diskursive strategier for: 1) Ledelse, 2) erkendelse og 3) subjektivitet. Ud fra det perspektiv besvarer afhandlingen følgende research question: Hvordan problematiseres, idealiseres og tilegnes coaching som samtalekunst og ledelsesdisciplin på baggrund af symmetriproblemet? Afhandlingens formål og problemfelt vil i det følgende blive udfoldet i en mere generel indledning ud fra fem overskrifter: 1) Motivation af problemfeltets tilblivelse, aktualitet og relevans; 2) analysestrategisk greb; 3) genstandsfelt; 4) erkendelsesinteresser og forskningsbidrag, samt 5) analysestrategiens disposition og empiriske design. URI: http://hdl.handle.net/10398/8279 Files in this item: 1
Tobias_Dam_Hede.pdf (5.700Mb) -
Social innovation i en forretningsmæssig kontekstSønderskov, Thomas Stengade (Frederiksberg, 2011)[More information][Less information]
Abstract: Hvilken funktion og rolle har ledelse for CSI? Med afsæt i ovenstående forskningsspørgsmål rapporterer denne afhandling fra et 3-årigt aktionsforskningsprojekt med et forandringsintenderende sigte inden for forskningsfeltet social innovation. Afhandlingen placerer sig i forlængelse af ovenstående interesse og udfolder social innovation i relation til ledelse i en forretningsmæssig kontekst – et forskningsområde, der internationalt også kaldes Corporate Social Innovation (CSI),(Kanter 1999, Jupp 2002). URI: http://hdl.handle.net/10398/8329 Files in this item: 1
Thomas Stengade Sønderskov.pdf (3.748Mb) -
Et mixed method studie, der belyser læringskonsekvenser af et lederkursus for et praksisfællesskab af offentlige mellemledereMoesby-Jensen, Cecilie K. (Frederiksberg, 2010)[More information][Less information]
Abstract: The English title of this dissertation, which in the outset was an integrated part of a larger intervention study on the effects of team manager training, is: Social learning and shared practice. A mixed method study showing the learning consequences of a training course for a community of practice of public middle managers. Due to the growth of the elderly population in Denmark and, simultaneously, the fact that a large part of Danish health care workers soon face retirement, in addition to the challenge regarding the recruitment and the holding on to employees in the public health care sector in Denmark in the coming years, this sector is confronted with the task of creating and sustaining sought-after workplaces and one way of doing this is by organizing the work in a efficient and attractive way for the employees, for instance in compliance with the idea of teamwork. This entails change, education and learning, and this dissertation investigates, in a case-study, the social learning consequences of a training course for middle managers in the Danish health care system, and thus poses the research question: What are the intended and unintended learning consequences of the training course ”Managing teams”?.... URI: http://hdl.handle.net/10398/8049 Files in this item: 1
Cecilie_Moesby-Jensen.pdf (3.331Mb) -
Flexibility, performance and commitment in work-life managementRaastrup Kristensen, Anders (Frederiksberg, 2010)[More information][Less information]
Abstract: This thesis offers a critical contribution to the theories of work-life balance. Within the contemporary theoretical perspectives on work and life the individuals are constructed as being responsible for work-life balance by turning it into a problem of the personal behaviour, decisions, psychological traits and family condition of the human subject. In this sense the everyday problem of balancing between work and home is reduced to be primarily an individual problem and decision. When the problem of work-life balance is raised in this way, it is difficult for companies to offer managerial and organizational solutions that do not automatically exclude this as an individual problem. It might be possible for managers and organizations to help the employees in achieving work-life balance, but it is fundamentally a challenge that the individual employees must solve. The thesis offers a different perspective on the relation between work and life. This perspective is not based upon the individual employees’ perception and hence constitution of work-life balance. Instead, it is argued that the constitution of the relation of work and life is to be found in its effects. These effects are not established in the constitution of the boundary between work and home, but are rather recognized by how the employees determine and define activities and tasks as work. For example, is it work to send email in the evening? Is it work to read an article at the weekend? Is it work to update a profile on Facebook? The question is therefore ‘what is work?’ and not ‘what is the boundary between work and home?’ URI: http://hdl.handle.net/10398/7973 Files in this item: 1
Anders_Raastrup_Kristensen.pdf (4.374Mb) -
Change management challenges in the Danish police reformDegnegaard, Rex (Frederiksberg, 2010)[More information][Less information]
Abstract: Since its commencement in January 2007, the Danish police reform has been a hot topic in the media, at universities, dinner parties, and in waiting rooms. The general perception of the police reform is that it is a failure. During 2008, the reform has been subject to much public debate, which has linked many unfortunate cases of police neglect with the police reform. Furthermore, the public debate has created a picture of a police not in control and with the reform to blame. Given this troublesome context of the police reform, the question which everyone is asking is: why did it go wrong? Along with the question of: whose fault was it? The current thesis does not provide one single answer to the chaotic situation surrounding the police reform. Neither does it place the responsibility of the unforeseen consequences of the police reform. Rather, this thesis focuses on unforeseen consequences of the reform in regards to change management and organizational implications. This thesis is submitted as a doctoral thesis at Copenhagen Business School in completion of a three-year Ph.D. study. The thesis is the result of a longitudinal research study on change management challenges in the Danish police reform. The study rests on a multi-sited methodology compromising an array of research methods such as interviews, field studies, presentations, meetings, written document studies, etc. over the course of the three years’ duration of the study. The study draws from different strands of literature, primarily change management literature and institutional literature, including resource dependency theory. The research question, which guides the thesis, is as follows: What are the change management challenges and the organizational implications of introducing a reform, which has a functional-rational logic of modernization and efficiency to the Danish police, which is a strongly institutionalized organization? The research question has been answered through the analysis, which is divided into three sections: - Change management in the reform, - Content of the police reform, and - The external control of the police. URI: http://hdl.handle.net/10398/8008 Files in this item: 1
Rex_Degnegaard_endelig.pdf (4.848Mb) -
Relasjonen mellom virksomhetsledelse og kontraktshåndtering, belyst via fire norske virksomheterSimilä, Jan Ole (Frederiksberg, 2010)[More information][Less information]
Abstract: Why do we focus on the internal arrangements of the contractual process from a leadership perspective? Through empirical research where we have asked questions about the internal organizational arrangements, what kind of knowledge the organization need, and how institutional arrangements affect the contract process, we have tried to answer the main research question. We have also carried with us a question of if the organization's attachment to the public or private sector affects the arrangements. I have conducted a comparative case study where data has been generated from two public sector organizations, The National Road Administration, Helsebygg Midt-Norge, one private sector organization, Siemens, and one hybrid organization, NTE. Data was primarily generated from the governance system of the different organizations, and informant interviews. The analysis was carried out by two steps; first an empirical analysis, then a theoretical analysis, based on contractual theory, of the empirical findings. The empirical analysis shows that the organizations share the same thoughts on how to organize the contractual work; the division between the line and the project organization, the distribution of decision-making authority, and the institutionalization of a specific governance system. The organizational processes are formalized, and the governance system gives the clear recommendation on desired actions. The empirical data gives a clear understanding that the contract process is dominated by one profession — the engineers. Regarding the question on knowledge, I found the organizations to be interested foremost on problem solving competencies (engineering competencies). Other competencies, for example economic or legal competencies, where viewed as support competencies. We also found that personal skills in handling the complex and difficult processes and attitude toward ethics seemed to be of importance. On the question on how institutional elements in the organizational environment affected the contract process, we found that the overall interest of the organizations was stability and predictability. We also found that the market mechanisms cause the organizations some worry. In the end, the empirical findings did not give us any strong reasons to differentiate between public sector organizations and private sector organizations in how to deal with contractual work processes. The theoretical analysis has been carried out within classical and relational contract theory. The analysis shows that the empirical findings, to a great extend, can be explained through classical contract theory. It also gives us some ideas on what areas of the theory, especially relational contract theory that should be improved. Regarding the main research question, the conclusions indicate a need to establish a comprehensive approach to the contract process, to ensure a good balance between different partial processes. There also seem to be necessary to work on improvements on contract theory to increase the applicability of the theory, especially the relational contract theory. URI: http://hdl.handle.net/10398/8011 Files in this item: 1
Jan_Ole_Similä.pdf (2.216Mb) -
Førsokratisk informeret, ny-aristotelisk ἦθος-tænkning hos Martin HeideggerMoesby Jensen, Tommy (Frederiksberg, 2010)[More information][Less information]
Abstract: Afhandlingens tematiske sag er en genvindelse af Heideggers tænkning og tænkevej som en før-sokratisk informeret, ny-aristotelisk ἦθος-tænkning og dette som en rekonstruktion af antik selv-ledelses-tænkning. I Komposition, referencer, oversættelser og forkortelser udvikles blandt andet en særlig forbindelse mellem referentialitet og afhandlingens komposition, under inspiration fra Heideggers egen brug af inter- og intra-tekstualitet, og vigtige kilder og formalia præsenteres. Kompositionen og dermed afhandlingens enkelte §’er er tænkt således, at en række temaer gennem afhandlingen ofte forbinder sig med tidligere udviklede temaer, som nu sættes anderledes i spil og ind i nye sammenhænge, og herved oplyses det tidligere og det senere udviklede i en gensidighed. Sagt på en anden måde, så vil en lang række forberedende behandlinger finde en senere udfoldelse, og dette angivet som en tendens i kompositionen....... URI: http://hdl.handle.net/10398/8028 Files in this item: 1
Tommy_Moesby_Jensen.pdf (2.160Mb) -
[More information][Less information]
Abstract: The thesis is a thorough empirical study of discourses, fantasies, and patterns of interaction in highinvolvement knowledge work. My interest in the issue was sparked by a fascination with the intensity and contradictory nature of working life for many high-skilled workers. I was curious about the ambiguities and paradoxes existing within the same dynamic, and I was puzzled by the fact that such tension-ridden and precarious machinery could keep functioning despite its constant episodes of breakdown – be they emotional or organizational. My intention was to find a gaze and a language which could capture these ambiguities and tensions, rather than insisting on classical dualisms such as profit versus meaning, instrumentality versus authenticity, power versus freedom, and influence versus vulnerability...... URI: http://hdl.handle.net/10398/8061 Files in this item: 1
Susanne_Ekman.pdf (2.207Mb) -
Kampagnestyring i Velfærdsstaten: En diskussion af trafikkampagners styringspotentialeSpeiermann, Sabrina (Frederiksberg, 2010)[More information][Less information]
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