Background: The field of impact assessment in social enterprises is largely influenced by the top-down demands of institutions like the European Union and other resource-giving institutions. This has caused a one-sided exploration of the topic impact assessment as the perspective of the social enterprises is so far under-researched. Therefore, the purposes, challenges and other experiences the social enterprises face when assessing impact were not yet given enough attention. Purpose: By taking a critical perspective, we seek to inspire dialogue and a change in the practical and theoretical field of impact assessment in social enterprises. We explore the enterprise’s perspective on why they assess their impact and what challenges they face. By that, their voices that have been hidden so far are raised and existing assumptions enriched by the social enterprise’s perspective. Method: To highlight the social enterprises’ experiences when assessing impact, the qualitative research approach Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis was chosen. A purposive sampling strategy led to eight in-depth interviews with people from different German-based social enterprises. Five steps were followed to analyze the data, including a two-stage interpretation process where the researcher’s and participant’s interpretations play an essential role. Conclusion: This thesis shows the importance of including all perspectives in a research field. Our study found that social enterprises can have different reasons to assess impact and face challenges differently than assumed with the previous research focus on the funding perspective. At the same time, they experience the process positively. A model was developed to show the interrelations of the different experiences and influencing factors.

This research presents a critical analysis and original theoretical approach to a complex phenomenon that addresses current gaps in our understanding of the experiences of nurse executives and their organizational positioning in homecare organizations. It reveals how nurse executives experience paradoxical identities of executive and nurse. The competitiveness of homecare as a business and the status of homecare among other healthcare sectors is problematic and exacerbates the tension between those two identities. This qualitative research aims to explore NEs' epistemic and discursive organizational positioning in HCOs. This research also explores how nurse executives enact their moral, socio-professional, political and epistemic agency in homecare organizations in Ontario. The research questions guiding this study were: 1) How do nurse executives enact their agency, identity, values, and means in their organization? 2) What are the daily transactions and negotiations with organizational and systemic entities with which nurse executives engage in their organization? 3) How do nurse executives navigate such complexities to fulfil their organizational responsibilities and enact influence in their organizations? This research emphasized the importance of dominant discourses and practices in homecare organizations, shaping distinct epistemic landscapes that foster specific ways of thinking, speaking, and acting across those organizations and within the healthcare system. Fairclough's Critical Discourse Analysis was used to analyze interviews with nurse executives and selected policy and guidance documents. A theoretical framework combining Critical Management Studies, as informed by Foucault, and the Sociology of Ignorance was used to highlight the complexity of nurse executive power within the context of social structures. This study exposed the relationships and the circulation of knowledge and non-knowledge (i.e., ignorance) and the ability to exercise power within homecare organizations. Findings can contribute to scholarly knowledge about practice, education, policy, theory, and future research perspectives. This research has implications for scholarship about nursing leadership across healthcare and management disciplines by better understanding the power, knowledge, and ignorance dynamics within homecare organizations and the healthcare system.

No description available.

No / There is widespread debate within critical management studies (CMS) as to the possibility of introducing CMS principles and ideas into organizational life. There is similarly a critique of its potential to replace the hegemony of `mainstream' business school thinking with an alternative hegemonic practice. In this article we use a reflexive analysis of our involvement as critical thinkers within the delivery of leadership-development programmes to consider these debates and explore CMS perspectives with participants. Our initial attempts were naive, but a more nuanced understanding given by theorizing our own practices offers some ways of avoiding the substitution of one hegemony with another. Although working as critical thinkers within mainstream programmes will always be problematic, we suggest that using a dialogical approach in leadership training programmes is one way of struggling with the inherent difficulties, while introducing participants to different ways of theorizing their worlds.

Yes / In recent years, we have witnessed the emergence of ‘critical performativity’, a concept designed to debate relationships between theory and practice and encourage practical interventions in organizational life. Notwithstanding its laudable ambition to stimulate discussion about engagement between CMS researchers and practitioners, we are concerned that critical performativity theory is flawed as it misreads foundational performativity authors, such as Austin and Butler, in ways that nullify their political potential, and ignores a range of other influential theories of performativity. It also overlooks the materiality of performativity. We review these limitations and then use three illustrations to sketch out a possible alternative conceptualization of performativity. This alternative approach, which builds on Butler’s and Callon’s work on performativity, recognises that performativity is about the constitution of subjects, is an inherently material and discursive construct, and happens through the political engineering of sociomaterial agencements. We argue that such an approach – a political theory of organizational performativity – is more likely to deliver on both theoretical and practical fronts than the concept of critical performativity.

Yes / In this rejoinder, we draw attention to some of the possible performative effects of Spicer et  al.’s (2016) commentary and reaffirm the importance, in our eyes, of the fundamentally political and material dimensions of performativity.

M.. Tech. (Human Resource Management, Faculty of Management Sciences), Vaal University of Technology / In today’s globally competitive and modern environments, organisational plans often fail due to the lack of succession planning. However, numerous organisations often fail to prepare for the inevitable departure of employees, especially in strategically high-level positions. Succession planning is a means of identifying critical management positions starting at lower level management and extending up to the highest position in an organisation. Unlike workforce planning, succession planning focuses more on advancing the employees’ skills in order to achieve the organisational objectives. There is no organisation that can exist forever in its present composition as there must be some form of succession or else the organisation will become obsolete. Succession planning plays an imperative role in today‘s competitive world. There are many factors that influence the stability of an organisational workforce, among which are illness and attrition. Another essential factor, which has taken the world by storm, is the retirement of the baby boomer generation in both in the private and the public sector. This is presenting a challenge within organisations, as they are going to lose talented and experienced employees and makes succession planning more needed more than ever before. Succession planning is an ongoing process that assists the organisation to align its goals with its workforce, as well as preserving the best talent for the future. It makes the organisation ready to face the challenges presented by the vacant key and critical positions. Succession planning is one of those human resource planning strategies utilised to forecast the talent demand that the organisation will require for achieving its future goals. The main purpose of this study was to examine the succession planning current practices and internal succession barriers, and determine their relationship with intentions to leave within the public service of a developing country. The research methodology used to conduct the study is a combination of a literature review and an empirical study. The probability sampling technique, which involves using simple random sampling, was utilised to select the sample for the study. The primary data were collected using a structured questionnaire. The measuringinstrument contained 25 items. The instrument was pilot-tested with 87 respondents one month prior to the main survey. The questionnaire was hand delivered to all the participants. For the main survey, data from 250 respondents were collected and analysed. Participants in the study involve officers, managers and directors in the public service of a developing country. Data were analysed with the Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) version 20.0. The Cronbach’s alpha coefficients of the various sections of the measuring instrument were computed to establish construct validity. Content validity of the scale was ascertained by pre-testing the questionnaire with employees in the public service. Exploratory factor analysis was conducted for variables in Section B of the research instrument. Convergent validity was assessed through correlation analysis using Pearson’s correlation coefficient in order to establish relationships between succession planning current practices and intentions to leave, as well as between internal succession barriers and intentions to leave the public service. Analysis was done using descriptive statistics on the demographics information of respondents. The results were also interpreted through the exploratory factor analysis, correlation and regression analysis. The results showed that two major factors of succession planning, namely replacement planning and grooming, correlate negatively with intentions to leave. The internal succession barriers also have a negative correlation with intentions to leave. Subsequent to these findings, it is recommended that the public service implement succession planning appropriately and eliminate the barriers thereof in order to retain its workforce. Based on the findings emanating from the empirical survey it was revealed that if succession planning is implemented appropriately and factors such as replacement planning and grooming are taken into consideration, employees holding key positions may be likely to be retained. Therefore, it was recommended that prior to undertaking succession planning a mission, vision and values that accommodate the contributions of employees should be developed. It was recommended also that when implementing succession planning, clear, transparent and objective criteria should be followed to achieve the optimal results. It is further recommended that the following succession planning best practices should be adopted by the public service to ensure that succession planning is implemented and practised successfully: Facilitation of an outside private consultant − for succession planning to be effective and rewarding in the public service it should be facilitated by an outside private consultant. Understanding of factors that influence succession planning − the public service should understand the necessity to know and address factors that influence willingness to share knowledge by employees. The study concludes by recommending that barriers that hinder succession planning should be avoided by adhering to the following suggestions: Longer terms of appointment should be provided for top public service employees Succession planning should be listed as one of the priorities in the public service strategic plan in order to be included in the budget Young vibrant and competent employees be motivated, groomed and prepared to apply for leadership or key positions in the public sector

In today's global political and media climate, the stakes are high for corporations, local or otherwise, to create and maintain an `ethical' perception of not only their daily business activities and how they can benefit society or protect the environment, but also their enduring characteristics or `corporate identity' (Conrad, 2011) for numerous, sometimes conflicting stakeholder audiences (Cheney, 1983). This dissertation examines how such forms of `socially responsible' corporate identities are created and maintained through the use of persuasive language. In particular it examines the role and implications of rhetoric within the contexts of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR), as well as Creating Shared Value (CSV) the latest management phenomenon embraced by academics and corporations alike (Porter & Kramer, 2006, 2011). The use of a critical rhetorical approach as both theory and praxis to these topics supports the idea that CSR rhetoric is a fruitful avenue for firms to generate a particular form of `ethos' or social legitimation as reparation for the consequences of their actions (i.e. Ihlen, 2009, 2011). Meanwhile I illustrate how the conception of shared value itself functions as a rhetorical `toolkit' of success or explicit set of instructions for corporations to follow that informs them on how to present to their stakeholder audiences what is supposedly a mutually beneficial social and economic agenda. While both approaches initially appear to be widely divergent, both purse the same goal: to produce positive conceptions of a firm's identity as a form of rhetoric. Through the case studies presented here, I show how such rhetoric works to promote a sense of `identification' (Burke, 1950) with stakeholder audiences through the common ground technique (Cheney, 1983) or `god' terms (Burke, 1945) as a tactic of appeal wherein firms express concern for their stakeholders and the environment as a way of engaging their `buy-in.' Such a symbolic tactic takes place on a global stage and thus despite utopian promises of producing value for society, must continue to face the inherent political, historical, and economic issues embedded within the material inequalities between firms and civil society actors. A major contribution of such work is not to provide a `breakthrough' analysis or documentation of corporate efforts towards social responsibility but rather to make accessible to researchers outside of rhetorical studies and even communication studies the importance of the role of rhetoric in constructing corporate identities within the contexts of social responsibility and globalization.

Cette recherche vise à interroger la façon dont des dispositifs organisationnels (formels et informels) façonnent la démarche d’alerte, lancée par un employé qui souhaite témoigner d’une fraude ou d’un manquement à l’éthique organisationnel.Inscrite dans un paradigme interprétativiste, notre design de recherche repose sur des entretiens qualitatifs ainsi que sur des récits de vie conduits avec des lanceurs d’alerte. Nos résultats permettent de montrer l’inopérance des dispositifs formels (outils de recueil de l’alerte) mis en place par l’organisation pour recueillir la parole de l’employé, qui manquent de traiter correctement l’alerte qui leur est signalée ; d’autre part, nous caractérisons l’idée selon laquelle d’autres dispositifs, plus informels, placent eux-mêmes, par leur non-réponse ou réponses ambiguës, l’employé en situation de lancer l’alerte, en dehors des dispositifs qui avaient été mis en place par l’organisation. Enfin, nous interrogeons la possibilité qui est laissée à un employé d’exprimer un doute lorsque celui-ci concerne le bien-fondé éthique de certaines pratiques organisationnelles. / This research aims to examine the way in which organizational mechanisms (both formal and informal) shape the whistleblowing process initiated by employees wanting to expose a fraud or a breach of organizational ethics.Our research design adopts an interpretivist paradigm and is based on qualitative and life-story interviews conducted with whistleblowers. Our results show the ineffectiveness of the formal mechanisms implemented by organizations to collectemployee testimonies (tools for gathering employee warnings), which fail to correctly address the whistleblowing that is signaled to them. We also describe the suggestion that other, more informal, mechanisms, by failing to respond or byproviding ambiguous responses, place employees in a situation where they feel compelled to blow the whistle, outside the mechanisms implemented by the organization. Finally, we examine the possibilities available to employees to express doubts concerning the ethical soundness of certain organizational practices.

Cette thèse contribue aux réflexions critiques sur l’autonomie et le travail en se plaçant sous le prisme encore peu exploré du travail non subordonné en coopérative d’activité et d’emploi (CAE). Les travailleurs non subordonnés sont des individus qui souhaitent vivre de leur savoir-faire et de leurs compétences sans passer par le cadre salarial traditionnel. Ils trouvent eux-mêmes leurs opportunités de travail rémunéré en proposant des biens ou des services à des clients. La thèse s’intéresse à l’expérience qu’ils font de l’autonomie à travers la problématique suivante : dans quelle mesure la non subordination permet-elle aux travailleurs de conquérir de l’autonomie individuelle et collective dans un système néolibéral caractérisé par la figure de l’individu-entrepreneur ? Elle s’appuie sur une démarche inductive dans le cadre d’une enquête ethnographique. Elle s’inscrit dans l’épistémologie constructiviste et les théories critiques en management. La thèse étudie d’abord la dimension individuelle de l’autonomie en se penchant sur le travailleur non subordonné en tant que figure. En particulier, elle compare cette figure à celle de l’individu-entrepreneur néolibéral et mobilise le concept de micro-émancipation. La thèse examine aussi la dimension collective de l’autonomie au niveau global de la gouvernance de la CAE et au niveau des collectifs d’entrepreneurs-salariés qui se forment en interne. Le cadre théorique de l’anarchisme, très peu mobilisé en sciences de gestion, s’avère fécond pour l’analyse. Parallèlement à la réponse à la problématique, la thèse apporte trois contributions. Premièrement, elle propose une cartographie des situations de travail contemporaines qui montre le caractère obsolète de la distinction entre statut salarié et statut indépendant. Deuxièmement, elle établit une typologie des trajectoires professionnelles des travailleurs non subordonnés en CAE : profils « souffrance dans le salariat », « sans emploi », « nomade » et « entrepreneur ». Troisièmement, elle fournit des pistes managériales pour aider des collectifs de travailleurs à se structurer de façon non hiérarchique. / This thesis contributes to critical reflections on autonomy and work through the study of non-subordinated work in business and employment cooperatives (BEC). The concept of non-subordinated workers, close to that of freelancers, refers to individuals who attempt to forge a living out of their skills outside of the traditional salaried worker system. They find themselves their work opportunities by offering their goods and services to clients. The thesis explores the kind of autonomy that these workers practice by asking the following question: to what extent does non-subordinated work allow workers to attain individual and collective autonomy in a neoliberal system characterised by the individual-entrepreneur figure? It is based on an inductive approach carried out during an ethnographic study. It belongs to the constructivist epistemology and to critical management studies. To begin, the thesis studies the individual dimension of autonomy by looking into the non-subordinated worker as a figure. In particular, it compares this figure to that of the individual entrepreneur and builds on the concept of micro-emancipation. The thesis also examines the collective dimension of autonomy at the level of the governance of the BEC and at the level of the non-subordinated workers’ collectives that are created within the cooperative. Anarchism, rarely used in management sciences, proves to be an interesting analytical framework for the analysis. In parallel, the thesis provides three contributions. Firstly, it establishes an overview of contemporary work situations that demonstrates, amongst other things, that the distinction between the legal status of an employee and that of a self-employed person is outdated. Secondly, it proposes a typology of non-subordinated workers’ career paths which includes four profiles: “suffering in the salaried worker system”, “unemployed”, “nomadic”, “entrepreneur”. Thirdly, it offers managerial advice to help collectives of non-subordinated workers organise in a non-hierarchical way.