Browsing by Author "Bertels, Stephanie"

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    Effecting strategic change:The work of strategic champions in shaping narrative infrastructure
    (2018) Schulschenk, Jess; Hamann, Ralph; Bertels, Stephanie
    Organisations are under pressure to expand the boundaries of strategic management to better account for socio-ecological dependencies, and to shape the principles that guide decision-making accordingly. Prior research on strategic change focusses on the role of leadership to sensegive, and the response of organisational members. Within a strategy-asnarrative perspective, narrative infrastructure has been identified as a valuable but underexplored theory to explain how narrative guides the decisions and actions of organisational members and how leaders use narrative infrastructure to sensegive strategic change to the organisation. Yet, we know less on how narrative infrastructure is shifted, and the work of others than leaders to do this. I undertake a grounded study of how strategic champions (individuals working to influence strategic issues) support leadership in initiating and adopting a shift in narrative infrastructure. My analysis reveals that strategic champions undertake six different stages of narrative work: prompting, enrolling, underpinning, reinforcing, reconstituting and revisiting. Across these stages, strategic champions draw on discursive competences to sensegive the new master story to both leaders, and the organisation more broadly. I make two contributions to the research conversation on narrative within strategy-aspractice. First, I extend the metaphor of narrative infrastructure as a set of rails that guide decision-making, and present a more fulsome picture of narrative infrastructure as a rail network - made up of several master stories which may have different, and at times competing, organisational or institutional logics underpinning them. Second, I identify the work of strategic champions to support leadership in prompting, initiating and revisiting a shift in the narrative infrastructure of an organisation, and demonstrate how they build master story legitimacy, understanding and ownership. My thesis also lends insights to practice, identifying the tactics employed and competences to be developed by strategic champions undertaking to expand the boundaries of strategic management and shift the principles that guide decision-making in their organisations.
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    How do privileged insiders become change agents? A study of institutional volition
    (2021) Feront, Cecile; Bertels, Stephanie; Hamann, Ralph
    While we have a sense of why institutionally marginalized individuals or dominant actors become change agents, it is less clear what motivates privileged insiders - those who have reaped advantages from existing institutional arrangements because of their education, their socio-economic background, their citizenship, their gender, or their race. I combine a symbolic interactionist perspective on social conduct with a structural perspective on frames to explore the process of institutional volition and the conditions under which privileged insiders may become engaged in different types of institutional change work to address societal issues. Institutional volition is the reflective process leading people to engage in purposeful efforts to shape or transform dominant institutional arrangements. My study reveals variances in the institutional volition of privileged insiders that explains why some of these actors engage in work to repair institutions, while others engage in work to transform them, either disrupting or creating institutions. My study draws attention to the distinct role of feelings rather than emotions in determining whether and how privileged insiders engage in institutional change work. It also suggests that these actors commit to transformative change when they acknowledge their complicity in the perpetuation of institutional injustices. Finally, I show that privileged insiders need to reframe their role in order to use it as a resource to engage in institutional disruption or creation work.
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    Understanding the antecedents of employee sustainability behaviours: measuring and theorising self- and collective efficacy for sustainability
    (2018) Ferry, Andrea Joy; Hamann, Ralph; Bertels, Stephanie
    Organisations are increasingly committing to ambitious new environmental and social sustainability goals that will necessitate employees across the organisation changing their workplace behaviours. While both practitioners and scholars recognise the benefit of integrating sustainability into everyday work, we have less of an understanding about the antecedents of employees' sustainability behaviours. The psychological literature identifies efficacy - the perception of one's own ability (self-efficacy) and one's group's ability (collective efficacy) to complete a task successfully - as a measurable predictor of behaviour. It also empirically identifies efficacy builders and theorises judgements that give rise to efficacy. Yet, efficacy (at least that which is strongly predictive of behaviours) is task specific and we lack constructs for self- and collective efficacy for sustainability (SES and CES), and their corresponding measures. We also lack an empirically grounded understanding of the judgements that give rise to an individual's SES and CES. This results in two questions: 1) How do we define and measure SES and CES, and 2) what are the judgement factors that lead to SES and CES? To address the first question, I defined these constructs and developed and refined two scales (one each for SES and CES). I undertook preliminary item testing and refinement, assessed scale reliability and validity (Cronbach's alphas of 0.926 for SES and 0.941 for CES), and established construct, convergent and divergent validity through two rounds of testing with acceptably-sized samples. I then trialled the scales in a live corporate environment (Finco) with 781 respondents, further establishing face validity and practical workability. I also conducted a smaller test with MBA students (n=72) to collect qualitative data related to the scales' items. The result is an abbreviated five-item version and a full nine-item version of each of the SES and CES scales, accompanied by implementation guidance. To address the second question, I analysed the qualitative data collected during the scale trialling, as well as data from twelve interviews with Finco and MBA survey respondents. This resulted in a model highlighting eight judgement factors that give rise to SES and four for CES. I thus offer a scholarly and practically relevant set of constructs, measures, and antecedents to assess and enhance employees' efficacy for sustainability behaviours.