Management consultants as improvising agents of stability

Furüsten, Staffan

doi:10.1016/j.scaman.2009.05.009

Cited by 43 publications

(48 citation statements)

References 13 publications

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“…These findings are notable because researchers have previously suggested-despite the lack of systematic evidence-that organizations often buy professional services, particularly MC services, to reduce uncertainties related to their business activities (Clark and Salaman, 1996;Furusten, 2009). For instance, consultants have been argued to reduce clients' uncertainty both by providing access to new knowledge and advice that might benefit organizational performance and innovativeness (Abrahamson and Eisenman, 2001;Amara et al, 2016;Furusten, 2009) but also through providing legitimacy to managers and organizations (Canato and Giangreco, 2011;Clark and Salaman, 1996). From this perspective, conceptual arguments could be made that UA, through a stronger belief in experts and their knowledge in high UA contexts (Hofstede, 2001), would be associated with a higher use of consultants.…”

Section: Theoretical Contributionsmentioning

confidence: 99%

The relationship between national culture and the use of professional services: Evidence from two cross-country studies

Pemer

Sieweke

Werr

2018

Journal of Purchasing and Supply Management

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A B S T R A C TEach year, clients spend large sums on professional services, such as accounting services, legal services and consulting services. While research has found significant cross-country differences in organizations' spending on professional services, we do not know why they occur. Inspired by the organizational buying behavior literature, this paper investigates the influence of national culture on the use of professional services, particularly management consulting services. As the use of professional services involves considerable uncertainties-particularly for the buyer-it can be assumed to be influenced by cultural differences regarding the level of Uncertainty Avoidance, Individualism and Masculinity. By drawing on two independent cross-country studies, we show that organizations in high uncertainty avoidance and individualistic cultures use professional services less than organizations in low uncertainty avoidance and collectivist cultures. We found no relationship between Hofstede's dimension of Masculinity and the use of professional services. The findings contribute to the theorizing on how the cultural context influences organizational buying behavior and the purchasing of professional services.

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Section: Theoretical Contributionsmentioning

confidence: 99%

The relationship between national culture and the use of professional services: Evidence from two cross-country studies

Pemer

Sieweke

Werr

2018

Journal of Purchasing and Supply Management

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“…This study offers empirically based conclusions about what the professionalism of management consultants consists of, but the role such new professionals play for organizations and the evolution of society remains a challenge for other studies to explore (cf. Buono, Sturdy and , Werr, 2009;Furusten, 2009) -empirically as well as theoretically -where the understanding of the rise and construction of new professionalism is a good place to start.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…to deal with innovations in the areas of IT, recruitment procedures, staying up-to-date on the latest management techniques, or may lack experience of handling complexities such as the internal working environment, quality assurance procedures, ethical and environmental certification, or lobbying and PR issues, etc. Although the meaning of the concepts professionalism, professional, experts and expertise can be debated, in practice at least, it would seem that when someone is convincing in his or her role as an expert, this person is likely to be legitimized to play the role of expert in this particular setting (Furusten and Werr, 2005;2009). This suggests that how they are perceived is important in the construction of management consultants as professionals.…”

Section: …Is Not Authorized…mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In the management advisory services industry, however, this is not the case. Services of this kind are often described as intangible and hard to define (Clark, 1995;Kubr;Furusten and Werr, 2005;2009). Defining the need for these services, measuring their output, and post-delivery assessments of whether they had any real impact, are also difficult.…”

Section: The Growth Of An Industry For Marketized Experts Providing Mmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The presence of a management consultant in a client organization may thus be evaluated primarily on the basis of how well the consultant manages to meet expectations and provide comfort and beliefs that give client organization members the confidence to deal with their daily toils. Thus, the problem the consultants are hired to solve may not always be the service they deliver, it may be to deliver confidence and still the uncertainty experienced by the organization (Furusten, 2009 professionalization, where the system itself is supposed to set and control the rules of entry into the occupational group through prerequisites for membership (e.g. Larson, 1977).…”

Section: The "Rites De Passage" For Professionalism and Procedures Fomentioning

confidence: 99%

See 2 more Smart Citations

Commercialized professionalism on the field of management consulting

Furüsten

2013

Journal of OrgChange Mgmt

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Abstract:In the last two decades, we have witnessed in the Western World that, instead of employing people with particular skills that they no longer need on a daily basis, organizations now source these skills when needed from external markets. This has led to a growth of markets for some types of specialized organizational and managerial services. This study argues that a new form of institutionalization of expertise is taking place in these markets. Through analysing the conditions for professionalism in management consulting, which is seen here as the most typical form of this kind of emerging expert work in contemporary society, a model that contrasts theories of traditional professionalism is suggested, in order to explore the mechanisms for "authorization" of actors in contemporary society performing in role of the expert.

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Content Analysis of Critical Business Jokes

Bouwmeester

2022

SpringerBriefs in Ethics

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This chapter introduces a new jokes-based method of content analysis applied to a larger sample of critical business jokes. Analysing jokes puts higher demands on interpretation than usual for content analysis. The analysis of jokes on the topic of uncertainties in the consultant–client relation indicates that both clients and consultants are active players, with their own tactics to create, use and reduce uncertainty. These results are in line with earlier studies on consultants and uncertainty, but add nuance and detail to earlier findings by illustrating new consultant and client tactics. Benefits of content analysis of a sample of jokes are the rich insights they provide together. The jokes tell about what we can call the grey zone of ethical transgression: common problematic and mostly concealed practices that most insiders are somewhat ashamed of. Limitations of jokes-based content analysis relate to the type of data used, which can be considered biased much like metaphors. There is representation bias related to irony, exaggeration, distortion, stereotyping, exclusion, abstraction and fictional elements. There is also bias related to what topics are funny or not (humour bias). These limitations can all be mitigated by careful interpretation and data triangulation.

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Management consultants as improvising agents of stability

Cited by 43 publications

References 13 publications

The relationship between national culture and the use of professional services: Evidence from two cross-country studies

The relationship between national culture and the use of professional services: Evidence from two cross-country studies

Commercialized professionalism on the field of management consulting

Content Analysis of Critical Business Jokes

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