In New Directions for Organization Theory, Jeffrey Pfeffer offers a comprehensive analysis and overview of the field of organization theory and its research literature. This work traces the evolution of organization studies, particularly its more recent history, and highlights the principle concepts and controversies characterizing the study of organizations. Pfeffer argues that the world of organizations has changed in several important ways, including the increasing externalization of employment and the growing use of contingent workers; the changing size distribution of organizations, with a larger proportion of smaller organizations; the increasing influence of external capital markets on organizational decision-making and a concomitant decrease in managerial autonomy; and increasing salary inequality within organizations in the US compared both to the past and to other industrialized nations. These changes and their public policy implications make it especially important to understand organizations as social entities. But Pfeffer questions whether the research literature of organization studies has either addressed these changes and their causes or made much of a contribution to the discussion of public policy. New Directions for Organization Theory provides a clear, accessible summary of the current state of organization studies, skillfully synthesizing diverse research and presenting it in an orderly, insightful manner. It offers suggestions for the development of the field, including a call to focus more on issues of design and to use the ability to understand real phenomena to help distinguish among theoretical approaches. A major scholar in the field of organization theory, Jeffrey Pfeffer offers a perspective on its current state that will be of interest and value to scholars and graduate students interested in organizations.

This book is a collection of the best seventeen papers from the first Management Theory Conference held at the University of the Pacific in San Francisco, California, on September 27 and 28, 2013. The authors of these papers are some of the best management researchers in the world, including: Anette Mikes, Robert S. Kaplan, and Amy C. Edmondson (Harvard Business School); Sarah Harvey (University College London); Randall S. Peterson (London Business School); Jack A. Goncalo and Verena Krause (Cornell University); Karen A. Jehn (University of Melbourne); Yally Avrahampour (London School of Economics and Political Science); Tammy L. Madsen (Santa Clara University); and Sim B. Sitkin (Duke University). All of the papers in this book present the latest theoretical developments that were discussed at the first Management Theory Conference. The purpose of the conference was to help address the shortage of new management and organization theories. The mission of the conference was to facilitate, recognize, and reward the creation of new theories that advance our understanding of management and organizations. The conference was held to motivate management researchers to create new theories and to provide researchers with a supportive forum where those new theories could be presented, discussed, and published. Chapter Seventeen is the winner of the Wiley Outstanding New Management Theory Award. Authors Chris P. Long, Sim B. Sitkin, and Laura B. Cardinal present a theory to explain the drivers of managerial efforts to promote trust, fairness, and control. They theorize how superior-subordinate conflicts stimulate managers’ concerns about managerial legitimacy and subordinate dependability in performing tasks, and hypothesize how managers attempt to address these concerns using trustworthiness-promotion, fairness-promotion, and control activities. This book also contains written summaries of the two keynote addresses that were given at the conference by Roy Suddaby (editor of Academy of Management Review) and Jeffrey Pfeffer (Stanford University), which comprise Chapters Eighteen and Nineteen. Professors Suddaby and Pfeffer present a fascinating debate of the future and new directions of management and organization theories.

This book spans seventy years of theory from Max Weber's seminal writings on bureaucratic organization to the latest management thinking represented by Handy, Peters and Waterman. Covering three main areas of interest, those of the structure of organizations, management and decision making, as well as that of organizational behaviour, this thoroughly revised and updated edition contains a vast amount of new contributions. It is a widely acknowledged text in its field, and an essential handbook for all those it concerns. It has also been announced as a core text for Open University courses from January 2008.

2) How has organization theory developed over time, and what structure has the field taken? What assumptions does knowledge produced in organization theory incorporate, and what forms do its knowledge claims take as they are put forward for public adoption? 3) How have certain well-known controversies in organization theory, such as for example, the structure/agency dilemma, the study of organizational culture, the different modes of explanation, the micro/macro controversy, and the differnet explanations produced by organizational economists and sociologists, been dealt with? 4) How, and in what ways, is knowledge generated in organization theory related to action? What features must organization theory knowledge have in order to be actionable, and of relevance to the world 'out there'? How have ethical concerns been taken into account in organization theory? 5) What is the future of organization theory? What direction should the field take? What must change in the way research is conducted and key theoretical terms are conceptualized so that organization theory enhances its capacity to generate valid and relevant knowledge?

This book provides a valuable review of the disciplines of organizational and management history, illuminating the interconnectedness of these disciplines, identifying gaps in the literature, and sketching a model for a unified field of research and study. This co-authored study is a long-awaited theoretical re-evaluation of organizational and management history. The authors explore the disciplinary advantages of a joint approach to these related fields, noting opportunities for future scholarship, from the wider range of industries and case types to the richer theoretical toolbox. Within this framework, the book investigates interdisciplinary methodologies and surveys and analyzes the most promising of the newest theoretical lenses and empirical approaches in the field. The authors address complex issues from a metacritical perspective, from the emergent theorization of time in the context of organizational identity to the conundrum of case selection for empirical studies. Clear and thorough, the volume creates a compelling theoretical framework for future studies. New Directions in Organizational and Management History inaugurates, and sets the stage for, the new series De Gruyter Studies in Organizational and Management History.

The SAGE Course Companion on Organization Theory is an accessible introduction to a challenging subject area. This book helps readers to extend their understanding of theories and make the connection between them and organizational practice. It will enhance their thinking skills in line with course requirements and provides support on how to revise for exams and prepare for and write assessed pieces. Readers are encouraged not only to think like a organizational theorist but also to think about the subject critically. Designed to compliment existing textbooks for the course, the companion provides: - Easy access to the key themes in Organizational Theory - Helpful summaries of the approaches taken by the main course textbooks - Sample questions and answers, with common themes that must always be addressed - Short vignettes and a case study that runs throughout the chapters - Guidance on the essential study skills required to pass the course - `Taking It Further′ sections that suggest how readers can extend their thinking beyond the `received wisdom′ The SAGE Course Companion in Organizational Theory is much more than a revision guide for undergraduates; it is an essential tool that will help readers take their course understanding to new levels and help them achieve success in their undergraduate course.

While there are many textbooks available for courses in organizational behavior there are very few that address organization theory and even fewer that discuss organization development in any significant way. In three sections, this text thoroughly examines organization theory, organization behavior, and organization development. Each section contains key chapters that address foundations, research, and new directions in these domains. Important Notice: The digital edition of this book is missing some of the images or content found in the physical edition.

This handbook presents a major retrospective and prospective overview of the field of organization studies. The text moves from the general to the specific, from the past to the present and from the present to the future. Addressing the established traditions, it examines the questions that the fin de siecle poses for organizations, and for ourselves as organization members and researchers. Central to the enterprise has been a concern to reflect and honour the manifest diversity of the field - including recognition of the extent to which the very notion of a single field of organization studies is itself debated - while also directing attention to the points of intersection and potential dialogue across the numerous conversations that make up this area of study. before examining some of the most significant theoretical paradigms in the field, including organizational ecology, organization economics, institutional theory, and feminism and postmodernism. Part Two addresses a number of the most significant research topics emerging from these broad perspectives, including leadership, decision-making and innovation in organizations, alongside such themes as diversity, globalization and ecology. Part Three reflects on the relationships between theory, research and practice in organization studies.

Between 1970 and 2000, Stanford University enabled and supported an interdisciplinary community of organizations training, research, and theory building. This title summarizes the contributions of the main paradigms that emerged at Stanford in those three decades, and describes the sociological conditions under which this environment came about.

Organization Theory offers a clear and comprehensive introduction to the study of organizations and organizing processes. It encourages an even-handed appreciation of the main perspectives defining our knowledge of organizations and challenges readers to broaden their intellectual reach. Organization Theory is presented in three parts: Part I introduces the reader to theorizing using the multi-perspective approach. Part II presents different core concepts useful for analysing and understanding organizations - as entities within an environment, as social structures, technologies, cultures and physical structures, and as the products of power and political processes. Part III explores applications of organization theory to the practical matters of organizational design and change, and introduces the latest ideas, including organizational identity theory, process and practice theories, and aesthetics. An Online Resource Centre accompanies this text and includes: For students: Multiple Choice Questions For registered adopters: Lecturer's guide PowerPoint slides Figures and tables from the book