Session 2: Organizations over time
Explaining Development and Change in Organizations * Van de Ven &Poole (1995)

* Change: empirical observation of difference in form, quality, or state over time in an organisational entity (may be an individual’s job, a work group, an organisational strategy, a program, a product, or the overall organisation). * Development: change process * Process theory: how and why an organisational entity changes and develops * 4 basic theories explaining change processes in organisations:
*Imminent=bevorstehend
Teleology: * assumes that the entity in purposeful and adaptive * needs creativity
Dialectical:
* e.g. acquisitions: two firms have different “theses” and need to find antithesis * e.g. multinational firm: international and national HQ “compete” * there is no assurance that dialectical conflicts produce creative syntheses * the desired synthesis creates win-win situation * either the maintenance of actual thesis or its replacement with the antithesis creates win-lose * in terms of organisational change: * maintenance of status quo stability * replacement with antithesis or synthesis change
Evolution:
* Variation: Change from current routines and competencies (intentional & blind) * Selection: Elimination of certain types of variations (external & internal selection) * Retention: Selected variations are preserved, duplicated, reproduced * e.g. internal competition about scarce resources * the manager does not select/decide everythingnatural “selection process” for products that don’t fit into the firmlong process and manager has little influence * often depicts global changes in organisational populations * applicable among numerous organisational entities

* differences among the theories: a)process is viewed as a