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Innovation as a Loosely Coupled System in Services
- eds) Innovation Systems in the Service Economy: Measurement and Case Study Analysis
, 2000
"... technology policy options in Europe under contract no. ERB-SOE1-CT-96-1015. Contributions of the ..."
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technology policy options in Europe under contract no. ERB-SOE1-CT-96-1015. Contributions of the
When fashion is fleeting: transitory collective beliefs and the dynamics of TQM consulting
- Academy Management J
"... We analyze changes over time in the types of consulting firms offering total quality management services. When TQM was a booming management fashion, consultants tended to be generalists with weak links to the technical foundations of the practice; after the fashion went bust, TQM consulting was incr ..."
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We analyze changes over time in the types of consulting firms offering total quality management services. When TQM was a booming management fashion, consultants tended to be generalists with weak links to the technical foundations of the practice; after the fashion went bust, TQM consulting was increasingly populated by specialists with quality control expertise. These results suggest that fashionable practices can return to their technical roots after the hype is over, reversing the usual institutional trajectory. They also help explain why fashion booms are so fragile and how manage-ment practices can be sustained once a boom is over. Management fashions are a striking feature of contemporary organizational life. Attention rapidly coalesces around a management practice as a pow-erful and robust means of achieving competitive success. But as Abrahamson (1996: 257) argued, the collective belief that a practice “leads rational man-agement progress ” is relatively transitory. Enthusi-
Innovating in reverse: services and the reverse product cycle
- European Journal of Innovation Management
"... technology policy options in Europe under contract no. ERB-SOE1-CT-96-1015. Contributions of the ..."
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Cited by 11 (3 self)
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technology policy options in Europe under contract no. ERB-SOE1-CT-96-1015. Contributions of the
5 Collaboration and the Production of Management Knowledge in Research, Consulting, and Management Practice
"... The world of managers is increasinglyknowledge intensive. Competition isgrowing and large organizations are becoming more global and complex, resulting in a proliferation of new management mod-els and tools. This makes it difficult for man-agers to keep up with the latest developments (Huczynski, 19 ..."
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The world of managers is increasinglyknowledge intensive. Competition isgrowing and large organizations are becoming more global and complex, resulting in a proliferation of new management mod-els and tools. This makes it difficult for man-agers to keep up with the latest developments (Huczynski, 1993). Although the main source C H A P T E R For managers looking for management knowledge beyond their own experience, aca-demics and consultants are two main resources. In this chapter, we focus on academic researchers and management consultants as producers of management knowledge and ask what the two can learn from each other. We suggest that there is a strong potential for collaboration in the triad manager–researcher–consultant, but we also acknowledge the institutional forces that make it difficult and discuss how they may be overcome. The chapter begins with an investigation into the knowledge-creating systems of academia and consulting, goes on to successful examples of knowledge creation in collaboration, and ends with a discussion of the tensions to be overcome, especially in the collabora-tion between academics on the one hand and practitioner-managers and consultants on the other.
Between exploitation and control – Clients ’ conceptions of the consultant-client relationship
"... During the past years, the use of management consultants has increased significantly, giving managers repeated experiences of both hiring and working with them. In an effort to understand the managers ’ use of management consultants, this paper sets out to investigate managers ’ conceptions of manag ..."
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During the past years, the use of management consultants has increased significantly, giving managers repeated experiences of both hiring and working with them. In an effort to understand the managers ’ use of management consultants, this paper sets out to investigate managers ’ conceptions of management consultants, as they are assumed to influence how consultants are used and managed. Based on the study of ten managers, four conceptions of management consultants, their roles and how they should be managed were identified, representing four different kinds of buyers of consulting services – the disappointed buyer, the trustful buyer, the strong buyer and the instrumental buyer. These conceptions and their relations to the three types of buyers found in the literature are described, showing that the instrumental buyer is a “new ” type with no equivalent in the literature. The paper ends with a discussion of possible explanations for the distribution of the conceptions over the ten studied managers, where seven of them could be categorized as strong or instrumental buyers, and what implications this may have on how management consultants are used.
Means of Knowledge Acquisition of Entrepreneurs and Their Success
"... The goal of this paper is to analyze different approaches to acquir-ing new knowledge. We analyze what means of knowledge acquisi-tion are used by entrepreneurs, such as formal education process, one andmore day professional development workshops, professional coun-selors, professional literature an ..."
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The goal of this paper is to analyze different approaches to acquir-ing new knowledge. We analyze what means of knowledge acquisi-tion are used by entrepreneurs, such as formal education process, one andmore day professional development workshops, professional coun-selors, professional literature and information on the world wide web. When making a decision on what means to use in order to increase one’s knowledge, entrepreneurs employ different assessment criteria: time and money investment as well as pedagogical techniques used. Time shortage is the most frequently cited reason that entrepreneurs do not invest more personal resources into knowledge acquisition pro-cesses. The main hypothesis we test, postulates that entrepreneurs who invest more time and money into knowledge acquisition processes are more successful. Success is measured with an average annual degree of growth of sale, profits and number of employees in the last four years and with entrepreneur’s opinion concerning success of the company’s business. Finally, we develop the implication for public policy and ed-ucational institutions on the means that need to be employed so that entrepreneurs would invest more resources in knowledge acquisition processes.
Portraying the Social Dimensions of Consulting with Structuration Theory
"... In this paper, we argue that the consultant-client relationship is of central importance for con-sulting engagements. The paper therefore outlines the social dimensions that are inherent in the consulting system due to its characteristics that create social complexity. To gain further insights into ..."
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In this paper, we argue that the consultant-client relationship is of central importance for con-sulting engagements. The paper therefore outlines the social dimensions that are inherent in the consulting system due to its characteristics that create social complexity. To gain further insights into the social interaction scheme and dynamics of consulting projects, a conceptualization based on an appropriate theoretical model is required. We propose to utilize the Structuration Theory for the compilation of the social context of consulting, as this provides a framework for incorpo-rating the social determinants, focuses on actions of human-beings, and additionally allows the identification of interrelated dependencies of structure and actions.
Trends in IT Consulting in Austria
"... Abstract—IT consultants often take over an important role as an interface between technological, organizational and managerial structures. As a result, the services offered are in many cases assigned to different disciplines which can cause a lack of transparency on the market for consulting service ..."
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Abstract—IT consultants often take over an important role as an interface between technological, organizational and managerial structures. As a result, the services offered are in many cases assigned to different disciplines which can cause a lack of transparency on the market for consulting services. However, not all consulting products are suitable for every company because of different frameworks and business processes. In this context the questions arises as to what consulting products are currently offered and how they can be compared as well as how the market for IT consulting services is structured on the supply side. The presented study aims to shed light on the IT consulting market by giving an overview of the current structure of the supply-side for IT consulting services as well as proposing a categorization of the currently available consulting services (consulting fields) in order to provide a theoretical background for the empirical study. Apart from these theoretical considerations, the empirical results of field surveys on the Austrian IT consulting market are presented and analyzed.
Version: Accepted Manuscript
"... and other research outputs Development on my terms: development consultants and knowledge for development Journal Article ..."
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and other research outputs Development on my terms: development consultants and knowledge for development Journal Article
