Index Terms – ADVANCE, faculty careers, balancing family and careers, transitional support, women in science, women in engineering. Prepared for the volume Learning from Advance, to be edited by Abigail J. Stewart and Janet E. Malley, to be published by the University of Michigan Press. This chapter draws some material from an earlier paper on the

This is a chapter about power in groups and organizations. In the following pages, we suggest that the analysis and exploration of the complexities of organizational power by managers and workers is both necessary and useful. We begin by discussing three of the prominent theoretical perspectives on power from the literatures of social and organizational psychology and critical management studies. We then outline some of the dilemmas and challenges faced by executives, managers and workers around empowerment, disempowerment and organizational democracy. Then, building on the seminal works of Follet, Deutsch, Tjosvold, Clegg, Mumby and others, we offer a framework of organizational power which views power as a multifaceted phenomenon; as thoughts, words and deeds which are both embedded within and determining of a complex network of relations, structures and meaning-making processes at different levels of organizational and community life. Such a framework enables us to understand the relational aspects of power and authority within the context of the macro structures and ideologies that give them meaning. It can also help identify those domains in organizations where the potential for sharing cooperative power is, in fact, not

In survey research with nearly 500 professional and technical workers in relatively small, new, and insecure biotechnology firms, I find that there is nothing like a clear or consistent “social contract ” emerging between workers and employers. Specifically, three-quarters of workers do not expect employers to provide a lifetime job, though more like half of them had expected that when they began working; women are slightly more likely to believe long-term employment should or could be provided than men are. However, I found that workers do feel ties to individual firms for reasons related to their specific work and its meaning to them, their closeness to particular coworkers and managers, and their relationship to a host of work-family issues, particularly their ability to control the pace, place, and timing of work. In addition, they value some firm-specific financial incentives (401-Ks, stock options, etc.) but these are secondary to their day to day work and life issues. Layoffs still generate dismay and distress among these so-called "boundaryless " workers, even when they believe there is a compelling business reason for them. More perceived control of work and real access to

1 I want to acknowledge the expert research assistance of Barbara Brandt, author of Whole Life Economics (1997). She made key contributions to the development of the ideas presented here, as well as providing most of the documentation for the Stage 3 shifts discussed. 1

Although both feminist theory and critical theory focus on social and economic inequalities, and both have an agenda ofpromoting system change, these fields ofinquiry have developed separately and seldom draw on each other’s work. This paper notes areas ofcommon interest. It assesses the validity ofcritiques offeminist theory, such as claims that it focuses on privilegedwomen and does not challenge existing hierarchical arrangements. Because these critiques do not accurately describe much of contemporary feminist scholarship, this paper argues that synergies between critical theory and feminist theory could and should be explored.