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1. Philosophy of Management: Volume > 1 > Issue: 3
Editorial: Articulate Action
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2. Philosophy of Management: Volume > 1 > Issue: 3
Ruth Abbey The Articulated Life: An Interview with Charles Taylor
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Charles Taylor is one of the most prolific and wide-ranging philosophers in the English-speaking world today. He writes with authority in the fields of moral theory, political philosophy, theories of language, the history of western thought, epistemology and hermeneutics. Currently an Emeritus Professor of Philosophy at McGill University, he has enjoyed a distinguished academic career which includes being Chichele Professor of Social and Political Theory at Oxford University. He has also been active and influential in the politics of his native Quebec, arguing passionately for recognition of Quebec as a distinct society, but against the province’s secession from Canada. For many years he has been a member of the New Democratic Party. The American philosopher Richard Rorty described him as ‘among the dozen most important philosophers writing today’ and one of North America’s ‘most thoughtful politicians’. He is interviewed here by Ruth Abbey.
3. Philosophy of Management: Volume > 1 > Issue: 3
Robin Attfield To Do No Harm? The Precautionary Principle and Moral Values
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From over 2000 years ago the ideal expressed in the Hippocratic Oath has encouraged doctors never knowingly to do harm: primum non nocere. Over 25 years ago the management writer Peter Drucker proposed it as the basis of a management ethic, ‘the right rule for the ethics managers need, the ethics of responsibility’. He argued then that the rule had wide scope encompassing for instance executive compensation, management rhetoric and the management of business impacts. In 2000 the United Nations Global Compact embodied a Principle 7 enjoining ‘a precautionary approach to environmental challenges’ as defined in Principle 15 of the 1992 Rio Declaration. But what can such precautionary injunctions mean in practice? And what of conflicts with other values? Robin Attfield lays out the key questions he argues need to be asked about the Precautionary Principle if it is to be taken seriously and acted upon soundly. His focus is on the management of vulnerable resources - specifically planetary ecosystems - with whose management knowingly or otherwise we are all concerned.
4. Philosophy of Management: Volume > 1 > Issue: 3
Hans Bolten Managers Develop Moral Accountability: The Impact of Socratic Dialogue
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How can organisations ‘manage for integrity’? Two differing approaches have been called the compliance strategy and the integrity strategy. While the first seeks to instil compliance with externally imposed standards, the integrity strategy seeks to teach ethical decision-making and values as well, so that ‘ethicalthinking and awareness...[are]...part of every manager’s mental equipment’. In this paper the Dutch consultant philosopher Hans Bolten reports on how Socratic dialogue has helped managers develop ethical capacities and responsibility. Drawing on research with dialogue members he concludes that organisationsthat care about ethics cannot rely on abstract moral codes and rules. He argues that they need Socratic dialogue as an instrument if their managers are to shape moral guidelines they both agree upon and can apply in practice. And he shows how dialogue can foster in managers the readiness to give an account of their actions, a readiness implicit in the idea of moral action itself. Thus Socratic dialogue can help create a culture in which morally accountable action is the rule, not the exception, and in which the responsibility to give an account of one’s actions has its rightful place.
5. Philosophy of Management: Volume > 1 > Issue: 3
Jeremy Moon Business Social Responsibility: A Source of Social Capital?
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The widespread association of business with maximising profit has tended to obscure its social dimension. Indeed some writers doubt whether business can ever be socially engaged and others claim that it should not. This paper seeks to show that besides seeking profit businesses can properly practise socialresponsibility, defined as involving themselves in their communities and engaging in non-profit activities. It explores the ways in which business social responsibility can contribute to social capital, the resources created by social bonds which members of a society can draw upon and which make it possible to achieve otherwise unattainable ends.
6. Philosophy of Management: Volume > 1 > Issue: 3
Ashly Pinnington Charles Handy: The Exemplary Guru
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Among many managers Charles Handy might well be described as a ‘world class’ management thinker. He is certainly the first British management author to have achieved international guru status. The author of widely-commended management best-sellers and MBA set texts, known through broadcasting andmanagement videos, he has presented himself more recently as a self-styled ‘social philosopher’. But just how philosophical is he? Does he offer genuinely new ideas? And what explains his vast appeal? Ashly Pinnington considers three works from Handy’s social philosopher period. He argues that they are conservative and focused on the interests of managers and business owners rather than employees or society as a whole. Like a mediaeval friar seeking converts, Handy uses mythic structures and exempla to invest his claims and propositions with plausibility and authority. Drawing on research into management gurus as a phenomenon, Ashly Pinnington concludes that when we read authors like Handy we should attend not merely to the ‘philosophy’ but also to the way narrative techniques are used in conveying ideological and moral messages.
7. Philosophy of Management: Volume > 1 > Issue: 3
James McCalman But I Did It for the Company! The Ethics of Organisational Politics
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Organisational politics traditionally gets a ‘bad press’. It has generally been under-researched mainly because of concerns about image. Managers dislike discussing subjects such as organisational politicking, believing that it reflects badly on themselves as managers and on their organisation and they cling to apurely rationalist model of decision-making. Sometimes, even the presence of politics is denied. But, as this paper argues, while some managers may claim to have no taste for politics they readily engage in it and justify it. The processes of managing organisational change more often than not result in conflict andresistance, requiring political engagement in response. This paper analyses political activities in the context of change, using an ethical decision-tree to examine practical cases. It presents them in the managers’ own terms and assesses them against three criteria: utility, rights and justice. The findings raise questions about how managers themselves construe ethical behaviour and about the adequacy of the criteria they use. There is room for further research in this area and analysis of the ethical frameworks used to evaluate what managers do.
8. Philosophy of Management: Volume > 1 > Issue: 3
Richard McKenna, Eva E. Tsahuridu Must Managers Leave Ethics at Home? Economics and Moral Anomie in Business Organisations
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Why is it that some business managers appear to behave differently in private and at work? How, if at all, are the decisions managers make affected by the nature of their organisations? What impact do organisational values have on the moral autonomy of managers? A research project into these questions is now under way in three disparate Australian business firms and this paper sets out the premise underlying it. For purposes of research the general premise is that the moral character of a business influences the moral judgements and actions of its members. More specifically, it is suggested that the economic paradigm renders a business organisation amoral rather than moral or immoral, and as a result moral responsibility comes to be assigned to individual members. However, the socio-cultural nature of such firms interferes with the ability of managers to exercise moral autonomy. Governed as it is by the market or laws of economics, the amoral organisation is likely to transform its members into individuals without moral standards.
9. Philosophy of Management: Volume > 1 > Issue: 2
Editorial: 'Making Sense'
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10. Philosophy of Management: Volume > 1 > Issue: 2
Frits Schipper Creativity and Rationality: A Philosophical Contribution
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Nowadays creativity is fashionable. Writers on management and organisation for example, mention creativity as vital to entrepreneurship. They consider it to he as important as land, labour and capital which form the traditional factors of production And related terms such as 'genius' are in use again. An example of this is the widely read book Built to Last. Moreover, creativity and rationality are presented as alternatives. To be creative, managers are urged to put rationality aside: 'being reasonable does not win the day they are assured and 'all-progress depends on the unreasonable man. This view that rationality and creativity oppose each other is, however, unsatisfactory involving, as it does, a form of epistemological schizophrenia. One excludes the other only if we adopt a simplistic concept of rationality and an esoteric view of creativity. This article, therefore, sets out to clarify the relationship between the concepts of creativity and rationality. Three ideal-type concepts of rationality will be introduced (algorithmic, judgemental, reflective) and their tolerance of novelty discussed. Then two modes of creativity (explorative and transcendentive) are distinguished, followed by a discussion of whether rationality can enhance creativity. I conclude by reviewing some factors involved in creativity, such as tolerance for ambiguity, playfulness and attentiveness, and with a short discussion of the relationship of creativity to power.
11. Philosophy of Management: Volume > 1 > Issue: 2
Michael Fielding Learning Organisation or Learning Community?
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This paper takes a close look at a central aspect of the work of Peter Senge, namely his advocacy of the learning organisation and the 'Communities of Commitment' that he suggests are its central dynamic. Echoing strands of the liberal-communitarian debate. Senge argues for 'the primacy of the whole and 'thecommunity nature of the self as two of the three Galilean shifts which have the potential to enable business to accomplish fundamental changes in our ways of thinking and being which have thus far eluded other agencies of social and political transformation. My concern is that Senge is not at all clear about the relationship between organisation and community, or, indeed, what community actually is. Arguing that his account is disappointingly partial and damagingly flawed, I then suggest a number of sites for future philosophical work for those who wish to develop an emancipatory notion of community. I end by advocating the work of John Macmurray as a major source of philosophical insight and human wisdom, both with regard to community and the development of a person-centred philosophy of work. A second paper will explore some of this ideas on these matters more fully.
12. Philosophy of Management: Volume > 1 > Issue: 2
Chris Provis Why Is Trust Important?
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There is now a bewildering array of literature about trust, written from a variety of disciplinary orientations. However, much of the literature skirts around the fact that trust is closely tied to some ethical judgements. When we discuss trust and trustworthiness, our language spans the gap between fact and value, and that is sometimes forgotten when emphasis is given to the instrumental benefits of trust and trustworthiness. It is important to remember that sometimes trust is good not as a means to an end, but as something that is intrinsically important. Similarly, trustworthiness is inherently part of being a good human being, and focussing on trustworthiness as a means can impede attaining it either as an end or a means. A 'balanced scorecard' approach to evaluating organisational performance needs to take account of trust and trustworthiness as components of performance, as something of inherent value, not just as means to it. Further, in many contexts the assessments we make in coming to decisions require us to make judgements about trust and trustworthiness as a basic consideration, without coming to prior judgements about distinct factual issues. This emerges in workplace negotiation, when negotiators have to make decisions about how frank and open to be with other parties.
13. Philosophy of Management: Volume > 1 > Issue: 2
Deborah Blackman, James Connelly Learning from the Past: Collingwood and the Idea of Organisational History
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Through a consideration of the views of R. G. Collingwood on historical knowledge and conceptual change, this paper addresses organisational issues such as history, culture and memory. It then subjects the idea of learning histories to critical scrutiny. It concludes that, because of their potential to become framing mental models, they may be in danger of failing to achieve the purposes for which they are used.
14. Philosophy of Management: Volume > 1 > Issue: 2
Sheelagh O'Reilly Reason as Performance: A Manager's Philosophical Diary - Part 2
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15. Philosophy of Management: Volume > 1 > Issue: 2
Doris Schroeder Homo Economicus on Trial: Plato, Schopenhauer and the Virtual Jury
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The concept of Homo economicus, one of the major foundations of neoclassical economics and a subset of the ideology of laisser-faire capitalism, was recently charged and tried in the island high court. Using the island's virtual jury system for the first time, the accused was tried before a jury of three - Plato, Schopenhauer and feminist economists - chosen by him while under a veil of ignorance of the charge. All three returned guilty verdicts. Plato's was prescriptive: 'One ought not to be like Homo economicus'. Schopenhauer's verdict was descriptive: Human nature is not Homo economicus'. The feminist verdict was both. Following the trial - described as a thought experiment - the island's resident philosopher put forward two claims: (a) Neoclassical economists base their theories on a deficient depiction of humankind (descriptive misconception) a claim supported by a witness expert in experimental economics; (b) The depiction holds a dominant but unjustified position in various discourses such as welfare state debates because it is promoted by a small but highly influential group of economically privileged, university-educated whites, namely graduates of economics, a claim supported by the sociology expert witness.
16. Philosophy of Management: Volume > 1 > Issue: 2
Nathan Harter Luxury, Waste, Excess and Squander: Leadership and The Accursed Share of Georges Bataille
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Part of the Renaissance genius was to look at familiar things in unfamiliar ways. Although a variety of approaches to the study of leadership are becoming familiar, it still helps to consider new ones. Of use in such moments are the works of unfamiliar writers who have spent considerable energy thinking from analien perspective. One does not have to accept their assertions uncritically in order to profit from reading them, yet it does take courage sometimes to start down a strange path.In the spirit of applying new ideas to familiar themes, this article interprets volume one of Georges Batailles The Accursed Share in the light of the phenomenon we refer to as leadership. Bataille, who was born in 1897 and died in 1962, certainly qualifies as a writer with an alien perspective. He has the potential to offend. At times, he becomes positively cryptic, as in asserting 'that the sexual act is in time what the tiger is in space.' Nonetheless, the book itself develops a plausible line of reasoning.Society, it argues, is determined by how it disposes of energy. And since energy that cannot be used will be squandered, it matters how a society chooses to do this. Bataille argues further that moments of true 'sovereignty occur when we squander what would otherwise have been useful This paper summarizes theargument of The Accursed Share and applies it to the outpourings that followers make to leaders. Rather than regard these uneven relationships as examples of utilitarian reciprocity, perhaps we can tap into the idea that attentiveness to leadership is more in the form of an offering or sacrifice to something that expresses us, as an excuse to display exuberance. This approach promises insight into issues of charisma, followership as self-denial, and mass psychology. It also pertains to the tendency of followers to turn against leaders in ritual sacrifice as meaningful superfluity.
17. Philosophy of Management: Volume > 1 > Issue: 2
Jim Platts Knowledge in Action: A response to Jos Kessels 'Socrates Comes to Market'
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18. Philosophy of Management: Volume > 1 > Issue: 2
Yvon Pesqueux Philosophical Perspectives on the Company
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19. Philosophy of Management: Volume > 1 > Issue: 2
Richard Norman Equity as a Social Goal by Cathy Buchanan & Peter Hartley
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20. Philosophy of Management: Volume > 1 > Issue: 2
Paul Griseri Popular Management Books: How they are made and what they mean for organisations by Staffan Furusten
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