The field of organization and management studies has a significant and ever increasing published research base, often criticized as fragmented and of limited relevance for practice. A design science approach to management has argued that more room for the development of solution-oriented or prescriptive knowledge would increase its relevance. In this article we discuss prescriptive knowledge cast in the form of design propositions following the so-called 'CIMO-logic', extending previous applications of the design proposition notion. This logic involves a combination of a problematic Context, for which the design proposition suggests a certain Intervention type, to produce, through specified generative Mechanisms, the intended Outcome(s). We discuss how design-oriented research synthesis provides a vehicle for addressing fragmentation and increasing the chances of application. Moreover, we explore how the development of design propositions can result from synthesizing previously published research and illustrate this with the design of high-reliability organizations (HROs).

This article discusses a design science approach to organizational development (OD) resulting in some new perspectives about how OD interventions might support more effective organizational change. These relate to the way in which the formal organization is redesigned, the way this design is translated by the members of the organization into their own roles and routines, and the way in which subsequent organizational learning produces the intended performance improvement. The background, nature, and characteristics of design science and design science research are discussed, and using a design science perspective, a process model of planned change projects is presented. Drawing on a case in planned change, it is argued that a design science perspective can provide a powerful combination of the original strengths of OD in human behavior and planned change based on humanistic values on one hand and design competencies involving both humanistic and business values on the other.

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