SCOS Update March
16/03, 2015 | CONFERENCES
Just one lovely item this week:
APROS/EGOS conference, University of Technology, Sydney, Australia, 9-11 December 2015
APROS/EGOS conference, University of Technology, Sydney, Australia, 9-11 December 2015
Item 1:
APROS / EGOS conference
University of Technology, Sydney
Sydney, Australia, 9-11 December 2015
We invite colleagues to submit papers to the following sub-theme within the conference:
Building Change
Convenors:
Gibson Burrell, University of Leicester, United Kingdom
g.burrell@leicester.ac.uk
Mark Mobach, Hanze UAS Groningen, The Hague UAS, Wageningen University, University of Groningen, The Netherlands
mark@noorderruimte.nl
Call for Papers
“Suddenly a young stranger fled into our garden shed. He was followed by a group of aggressive youngsters carrying sticks. When entering our shed, they looked like hungry lions just before a fresh kill. I noticed the light switch to our shed. The only thing I could think of was blinking on and off with the light, hoping to create confusion. Needless to say, it did not work.”
This child, switching a light on and off in a contained space, hoping for desirable behaviour modification, might remind organisational scientists of ‘the experiments of light’ (Homans, 1950) at the Hawthorne Plant. Do organisations today still err in assigning morphogenic properties to spatial designs? Or might it even be possible to use organisational space to create better worlds? But for whom? Do not organisation theorists ‘confuse science with morality’ (Grodzins, 1951)?
Alexander (revealing his totalising valorisation of a temperate climatic zone) contends:
“Almost everybody feels at peace with nature: listening to the ocean waves against the shore, by a still lake, in a field of grass, on a windblown heath. One day … we shall feel the same about our towns, and we shall feel as much at peace in them, as we do today walking by the ocean, or stretched out in the long grass of a meadow.” (Alexander, 1979: 549)
However, ‘natural’ spaces have properties humans are yet unable to design even if architects do their utmost to design organisational spaces that approach this ideal. All over the world the rich and famous of contemporary organisations are immersed in surprisingly beautiful and impressive architectural designs. Buildings like Burj Khalifa, CCTV, Googleplex, and Guggenheim Bilbao are inspiring and energizing. All wonder-full places to be, but also intimidating. Many have devoted time in arguing that such spaces do work for organisations (e.g. Duffy 1997) yet it is evident that buildings cannot change the fundamentals of an organisation. Clearly they most certainly can facilitate, hinder, or frustrate it (Kornberger and Clegg 2003).
We invite papers on (the impossibility of) building change to be grounded empirically, or theoretically, or both. We seek to open the door on the unexplored and thus to discover new connections between organisation and space. However, we also encourage scholars to embed their work in historical examples and to relate to local case practices so as to stimulate cross-cultural and cross-national knowledge sharing. Multiple methodological perspectives on organisational spaces will be highly appreciated as well as work from various disciplines. In this context, we suggest the following considerations for authors:
· Does a well-considered design of organisation and space have the potential to create a better world?
· What is the current scientific evidence that such organisational-spatial interventions can be efficacious, successful, and even ground-breaking? In what way is it vulnerable to critique? Does it suffer from a lack of rigour?
· To what extent is the contribution of buildings to organisational change contrary and deviant, perhaps even irrelevant?
· What previously unrelated sources on the subject, contemporary and historical, might advance our common understanding on the subject of organisational space?
References
Alexander, Christopher (1979): The Timeless Way of Building. New York: Oxford University Press, pp. 549.
Duffy F 1997 The New Office, London, Conran Octopus
Kornberger M and Clegg S (2003) ‘The Architecture of Complexity’ Culture and Organization 9, 2: 75-91
Grodzins, Morton (1951): ‘Public administration and the science of human relations.’ Public Administration Review, 11 (2), pp. 88-102.
Homans, George C. (1950): The Human Group. New York: Harcourt, Brace and Company.
Abstracts of approximately 250 words are welcomed, identified by four or five key words before 1 May, 2015. After approval, manuscripts can be developed from June 12th. The manuscripts should be original in style and content (not under review, accepted and/or published elsewhere) up to 5,000 words (including references) and should be accompanied by biographies of no more than 100 words on each author's personal history and current interests. Timelines are: abstract submission by Friday, May 1, 2015; decisions on proposed abstract by Friday, June 12, 2015; full paper to be submitted by Monday, October 12, 2015; conference dates: December 9-11, 2015.
APROS / EGOS conference
University of Technology, Sydney
Sydney, Australia, 9-11 December 2015
We invite colleagues to submit papers to the following sub-theme within the conference:
Building Change
Convenors:
Gibson Burrell, University of Leicester, United Kingdom
g.burrell@leicester.ac.uk
Mark Mobach, Hanze UAS Groningen, The Hague UAS, Wageningen University, University of Groningen, The Netherlands
mark@noorderruimte.nl
Call for Papers
“Suddenly a young stranger fled into our garden shed. He was followed by a group of aggressive youngsters carrying sticks. When entering our shed, they looked like hungry lions just before a fresh kill. I noticed the light switch to our shed. The only thing I could think of was blinking on and off with the light, hoping to create confusion. Needless to say, it did not work.”
This child, switching a light on and off in a contained space, hoping for desirable behaviour modification, might remind organisational scientists of ‘the experiments of light’ (Homans, 1950) at the Hawthorne Plant. Do organisations today still err in assigning morphogenic properties to spatial designs? Or might it even be possible to use organisational space to create better worlds? But for whom? Do not organisation theorists ‘confuse science with morality’ (Grodzins, 1951)?
Alexander (revealing his totalising valorisation of a temperate climatic zone) contends:
“Almost everybody feels at peace with nature: listening to the ocean waves against the shore, by a still lake, in a field of grass, on a windblown heath. One day … we shall feel the same about our towns, and we shall feel as much at peace in them, as we do today walking by the ocean, or stretched out in the long grass of a meadow.” (Alexander, 1979: 549)
However, ‘natural’ spaces have properties humans are yet unable to design even if architects do their utmost to design organisational spaces that approach this ideal. All over the world the rich and famous of contemporary organisations are immersed in surprisingly beautiful and impressive architectural designs. Buildings like Burj Khalifa, CCTV, Googleplex, and Guggenheim Bilbao are inspiring and energizing. All wonder-full places to be, but also intimidating. Many have devoted time in arguing that such spaces do work for organisations (e.g. Duffy 1997) yet it is evident that buildings cannot change the fundamentals of an organisation. Clearly they most certainly can facilitate, hinder, or frustrate it (Kornberger and Clegg 2003).
We invite papers on (the impossibility of) building change to be grounded empirically, or theoretically, or both. We seek to open the door on the unexplored and thus to discover new connections between organisation and space. However, we also encourage scholars to embed their work in historical examples and to relate to local case practices so as to stimulate cross-cultural and cross-national knowledge sharing. Multiple methodological perspectives on organisational spaces will be highly appreciated as well as work from various disciplines. In this context, we suggest the following considerations for authors:
· Does a well-considered design of organisation and space have the potential to create a better world?
· What is the current scientific evidence that such organisational-spatial interventions can be efficacious, successful, and even ground-breaking? In what way is it vulnerable to critique? Does it suffer from a lack of rigour?
· To what extent is the contribution of buildings to organisational change contrary and deviant, perhaps even irrelevant?
· What previously unrelated sources on the subject, contemporary and historical, might advance our common understanding on the subject of organisational space?
References
Alexander, Christopher (1979): The Timeless Way of Building. New York: Oxford University Press, pp. 549.
Duffy F 1997 The New Office, London, Conran Octopus
Kornberger M and Clegg S (2003) ‘The Architecture of Complexity’ Culture and Organization 9, 2: 75-91
Grodzins, Morton (1951): ‘Public administration and the science of human relations.’ Public Administration Review, 11 (2), pp. 88-102.
Homans, George C. (1950): The Human Group. New York: Harcourt, Brace and Company.
Abstracts of approximately 250 words are welcomed, identified by four or five key words before 1 May, 2015. After approval, manuscripts can be developed from June 12th. The manuscripts should be original in style and content (not under review, accepted and/or published elsewhere) up to 5,000 words (including references) and should be accompanied by biographies of no more than 100 words on each author's personal history and current interests. Timelines are: abstract submission by Friday, May 1, 2015; decisions on proposed abstract by Friday, June 12, 2015; full paper to be submitted by Monday, October 12, 2015; conference dates: December 9-11, 2015.