Being careful what we wish for? Challenges and opportunities afforded through engagement with business and management research

Abstract

alliance Manchester Business school, university of Manchester, Manchester, uK ABSTRACT Despite the proliferation of work within construction management that draws upon management and organizational theory, two omissions stand out from the body of published work: the absence of any real debate about the values of rigour and relevance in research; and the underuse of dominant perspectives in business and management research (such as institutional theory) to frame construction management and organizational issues. Drawing specifically upon the ideas of institutional logics and institutional work, this paper explores the tensions, ironies and contradictions of the rigour-relevance debate; and the challenges and opportunities facing construction management research (CMR) and its institutions in furthering management and organizational research agendas. In doing so, attention is directed to the complex, contested and changing nature of the knowledge base within the business and management field; as well as key differences between that community of practice and CMR.

The futures of construction management research

“…A formidable hurdle for CMR, and arguably most other domain focused research, is that of achieving a closer integration with the wider base disciplines of the social sciences whilst, at the same time, retaining the field characteristic skills of high contextual knowledge and the ability to interact with industry (cf. Bresnen, 2017). In terms of raising reputational credibility in the academic arena increasing or expanding the domain of inquiry, such as going from project management to management of projects, or changing 'the label on the jar', e.g.…”

“…The aim is to account for the potential effects of a number of emerging trends and contribute to the nascent discussion on the future directions of CMR in this journal (e.g. Bresnen, 2017;Koskela, 2017;Leiringer and Dainty, 2017).…”

Looking out to look in: inspiration from social sciences for construction management research

“…Whereas the previous section addressed the decision-making perspective, the concept of multiplicity addresses the responses of organizations as embedded actors in a system. This relates to institutional theory, as for example Bresnen (2017) points out in relation to CMR, as well as to the duality of choices and paradoxical situations that occur in daily life, as addressed by for instance Bygballe and Jahre (2009) and Ivory (2017). Research in institutional theory has established that expectations about what is appropriate behaviour are not only judged by their technical and economical rationality, but also often shaped by external forces (Heugens and Lander 2009).…”

Maintaining a relevant construction management and economics research community

“…The paper triggered an interesting debate whereby Ivory (2017) questioned Koskela's suggestion that production is a neglected and diminishing focus in management research, arguing for greater divergence in the type of work that we undertake. From an academic relevance perspective Bresnen (2017) and Styhre (2017) challenged the theoretical contributions that the community is and could be making, noting the relatively low uptake of perspectives such institutionalism and socio-materiality that are influential in the broader management domain. They are not alone in their concerns.…”