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There appears to be widespread belief in training benefits which can be derived from the use of Outdoor Management Development (OMD) despite an apparent lack of valid and reliable research in this area. Problems with operationally defining OMD may have generated some of the confusions and controversy which are evident in the literature. An examination of a widely used model of evaluation suggests that it may be prone to contamination by potential sources of systematic bias. Consequently, results derived from this form of evaluation are difficult to verify. Potential users of OMD may need critically to evaluate the evidence used to support claimed outcomes before deciding to use this form of training. The only current way for practitioners to gain valid and reliable evidence about the outcomes of OMD training may be for them to conduct their own evaluations. Undertakes a wide review of the available literature, providing tables, which shows the general characteristics of the literature sample, and the most commonly cited outcomes.

The management of human resources in the UK public sector has been dramatically transformed in recent years. Discusses the major areas of change in relation to: generalist and specialist personnel roles; relationships between personnel professionals and line managers; and perceptions of personnel activities. Also examines the power ramifications of these changes. Posits that the changes which have occurred to personnel management practice within the public sector have had a detrimental impact on the duties and activities of the personnel practitioner and have also led to a dilution of professional power. Uses a methodology based on sequence analysis to explore the existence of characteristic trends across a range of public sector organizations (n = 14). Interviews with key stakeholders (n = 42) were undertaken, a variety of documentary sources were analysed and, as part of the process of “colligation”, group feedback sessions were held.

How can we take multimodalities (the discursive, material, spatial, visual, emotional, embodied, etc.) of institutions seriously? In contemplating the implications of the “multimodal turn” (broadly defined) for institutional inquiry and theory, I first situate it within its intellectual current in the social sciences more broadly. I then use three ethnographic vignettes from Israeli high-tech conferences, all centering on “place” (as a – presumably first and foremost – geographical and material reality) to highlight the shortcomings of a “weak” multimodal approach and the promise of a “strong” one. Finally, I suggest ways to capture multiple modalities within an integrated account and discuss the challenges entailed in an institutional inquiry undertaken to acknowledge, and conceptualize, non-linguistic realities.

Theory is an essential prerequisite in the development and maturation of any scholarly discipline. This study offers insight into theory development in reverse logistics (RL) studies, provides a synopsis of the theories employed in RL studies, and presents a comprehensive framework for choosing and applying theories in RL studies.

Using the systematic literature review approach, 265 various RL articles were analysed to discover the trend in using theories in RL studies and classify the individual theories employed. The analysis of the theoretical classification is presented to explain the type and frequency of the usage of theories.

The analysis discovered 52 specific theories from the sample. These theories were categorised under various categories: competitive, inventory, economic, decision, etc. The institutional, stakeholder, transaction cost economies, resource-based view, natural resource-based view, dynamic capability, agency and theory of planned behaviour were some of the key theories discovered. Finally, a comprehensive framework is provided to aid researchers in choosing and utilising theories.

This study gives authors, reviewers and editors perspectives on utilising theories in RL studies. It will give them the impetus to develop theories in RL and limit the borrowing or extension of theories from other disciplines to RL studies.

To the best of the researcher's knowledge, this is the first attempt to comprehensively provide an anatomical perspective into theory usage in RL studies. Besides, this study's proposed framework for selecting and using theories is a novelty in the domain of RL.

While Cooperrider (2001, p. 32) suggests that appreciative inquiry is about “the artful creation of positive imagery,” most of the literature that describes the process of artful creation explains it as one in which the organizational members simply talk about these new images, vs. actually engaging in the creation of artistic representations of the desired future. This chapter moves the appreciative inquiry literature beyond the metaphorical understanding of the “art of” appreciative inquiry in order to reveal and explain how practitioners are actually engaging organizations in the artful creation of positive anticipatory imagery. In this chapter, the literature that labels and describes the process of artful creation in organizations is reviewed, described, and synthesized into five propositions – ultimately creating a framework for understanding artful creation as a unique organizational discourse: an aesthetic discourse. These five propositions reveal the common characteristics of artful creation: (1) presentational knowledge/language; (2) mediated dialogue; (3) symbolic constructions that act as metaphorical representation; (4) collaborative inquiry/co-creation; and (5) window to the unconscious. The chapter concludes by addressing the implications, seeking to answer the question “What is the value of an organization engaging with the process of artful creation?” Finally, the chapter suggests that the five propositions may guide future research in two areas: (a) the practice of the artful creation of positive anticipatory imagery in appreciative inquiry; and (b) the further development of a theoretical framework for understanding the “art of” appreciative inquiry as aesthetic discourse.

Submitted in the form of a manifesto, this article seeks to make a call to scholars in international management and business studies to embrace post‐colonial theory and to allow it to provide an interrogation of the ontological, epistemological, methodological and institutional resources currently dominating the field.

A manifesto approach is adopted in providing a series of deliberately provocative principles which it seeks to have the field adopt.

The paper finds the field to be currently imprisoned within a limited and limiting paradigmatic and institutional location and offers the resources of post‐colonial theory as a way to interrogate and reconfigure it.

The paper points to the limitations of the field and provides the grounds for a radical reconfiguration across all aspects of its knowledge production, dissemination and research practice.

The paper offers practical steps which the field can take to reconfigure itself more appropriately in terms of its various research commitments and its institutional frame.

This article offers an original assessment of the orthodoxy currently controlling and disciplining the field, presented in the relatively novel and challenging form of a manifesto.

The history of Organizational Development (OD) reveals a much older tradition of organizational science than the conventional wisdom would suggest. By the 1960s and 1970s OD became self‐confident and dynamic. This period was not only highly experimental but established the principles of OD for much of the twentieth century. By the end of the twentieth century new images of OD had occurred and much of the earlier thinking had been transformed. This review illustrates some examples under a series of themes that have had a major impact on the discipline of OD and on the wider thinking of organizational theorists and researchers.

The purpose of this paper is to conduct a general review of the ethnographic method. It uses metaphors to read several pieces of ethnographic research and discuss the different issues encountered during the research process. The review consisted of new articles but also important books that helped to construct and maintain the field of organizational ethnography.

The paper aims to discuss the ethnography research process through the metaphor of the Christian Seven Sins. It proposes a reflection on planning and conducting ethnographic research. The seven sins are used as a metaphor that can lead to more reflexive research for educational and explanatory purposes. Ultimately, the authors encourage organizational scholars to conduct ethnographic research.

The metaphors of the Christian seven sins represent issues that may arise during an ethnographic research. Gluttony is the dive in all topics that may appear; Greed is to lose yourself in the amount of data; Lust is to get too much involved in the field; Wrath is to take the struggles of the subjects as your own; Envy is to judge other's research according to your paradigm; Sloth is to not collect enough ethnographic data and Pride is forgetting to have a critical perspective toward your data. The redemption of these “sins” brings reflexivity to ethnographic research.

The paper opts to treat ethnography as a methodology that can be utilized with different epistemological and ontological approaches which could diminish the degree of reflection. No metaphor would be able to explain all the details of an ethnographic research project, still the seven sins provided a wide range of ideas to be reflected upon when using the methodology.

As a paper on ethnography, researchers and especially PhD students and early careers can get to know the issues that can arise during ethnographic research and put them in contact with good examples of ethnography in Organization and Management Studies.

This paper groups different complexities and discussions around ethnographic research that may entail research reflexivity. These ideas were scattered through various ethnographic publications. With the review their highlights can be read in a single piece. With these discussions, the paper aims to encourage researchers to conduct good quality ethnography.

The purpose of this paper is to elaborate on John B. Thompson's “tripartite approach” for the analysis of mass media communication, highlighting how this methodological framework can help address some of the shortcomings apparent in extant studies on accounting which purport to analyse accounting “texts”.

By way of example, the paper develops a critique of an existing study in accounting that adopts a “textually‐oriented” approach to discourse analysis by Gallhofer, Haslam and Roper. This study, which is informed by Fairclough's version of critical discourse analysis (CDA), undertakes an analysis of the letters of submission of two business lobby groups regarding proposed takeovers legislation in New Zealand. A two‐stage strategy is developed: first, to review the extant literature which is critical of CDA, and second, to consider whether these criticisms apply to Gallhofer et al. Whilst acknowledging that Gallhofer et al.'s (2001) study is perhaps one of the more comprehensive in the accounting literature, the critique developed in the present paper nevertheless highlights a number of limitations. Based upon this critique, an alternative framework is proposed which allows for a more comprehensive analysis of accounting texts.

The critique of Gallhofer et al.'s study highlights what is arguably an overemphasis on the internal characteristics of text: this is referred to by Thompson as the “fallacy of internalism”. In other words, Gallhofer et al. draw inferences regarding the production of the letters of submission from the texts themselves, and make implicit assumptions about the likely effects of these texts without undertaking any formal analysis of their production or reception, or without paying sufficient attention to the social and historical context of their production or reception.

Drawing on Thompson's theory of mass communication and his explication of the hermeneutical conditions of social‐historical enquiry, the paper outlines a range of theoretical considerations which are pertinent to researchers interested in studying accounting texts. Moreover, building on these theoretical considerations, the paper delineates a coherent and flexible methodological framework, which, it is hoped, may guide accounting researchers in this area.

The purpose of this paper is to critically scrutinize the use of training interventions as a means of implementing corporate culture change and to assess the implications of such programs for employee identity.

The paper uses empirical materials, observations and reflections from a two‐year ethnographic study in a manufacturing firm to discuss the organization's “core values” with specific attention directed to a particular organizational event – the running of a training program designed to educate the firms employees in the company's newly designed culture.

The contested interaction between formally articulated corporate culture and the workplace experience of the employees is shown to demonstrate how cultural change programs can work to suppress employee's dissent and dialogue whilst being articulated in a language of inclusiveness and involvement.

The paper provides a review of the complex and paradoxical implications of cultural change programs that would be of use to managers, management consultants and human resource development professionals involved in implementing cultural change.

The paper examines organizational culture through detailed ethnographic study with a particular focus on the problematics of how training is used as a technology for cultural change.