Browsing by Author "Swart, Juani"

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    Hits and (near) misses: Exploring managers’ actions and their effects on localised resilience
    (Elsevier, 2019-11-29) Turner, Neil; Kutsch, Elmar; Maylor, Harvey; Swart, Juani
    Resilience is clearly a desirable attribute, but characterising it is challenging, especially as it can be understood either as the response to an incident, or its successful avoidance. Individual- and organizational-level resilience are established fields of study, whereas mid-range, managerial-level, evidence of how ‘localised’ resilience (e.g. in the department, work unit or project) is achieved is lacking. We ask the question ‘What do managers do to support resilience?’ We report on a study carried out with senior staff from five major UK-based organizations. From our qualitative data investigating critical incidents and ‘near-misses’, we unpack the key (ongoing) actions that managers undertake, and show that these can be understood as a complex interweaving of exploitative and exploratory activities. We also identify five response archetypes utilised when an incident occurs. We show the simultaneity of multiple enabling and responding arrangements and, in so doing, uncover the ‘messy’ characteristics over time which enable the awareness and containment of potential and realised adversities, i.e. resilience.
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    The role of knowledge resources in managing project complexity
    (2017-04-28) Swart, Juani; Turner, Neil; Maylor, Harvey; Prieto Pastor, Isabel; Martín Cruz, Natalia
    In this paper we consider the nature of project complexity and draw on current literature to make the argument that we do not yet understand fully which resources managers draw on and how they then respond to the range of complexities they face. We consider the role of knowledge resources underpinning complexity responses, and ask the research question "What is the role of knowledge resources in managing project complexity?" We then summarise the empirical work we have undertaken to date in investigating this. Looking at the aerospace industry, we find a range of responses to different forms of complexity, drawing on important human, social and organizational capital.
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    The role of social capital in project managers’ responses to complexities
    (European Academy of Management (EURAM), 2024-06-28) Turner, Neil; Maylor, Harvey; Swart, Juani; Prieto Pastor, Isabel; Cruz, Natalia
    Social capital has been demonstrated to be an important commodity for managers in project-based operations. This paper examines the role of social capital in the work of 36 managers from three engineering firms, using qualitative case data. We ask the research question ‘How is Social Capital used by Project Managers in responding to complexities?’ We derive an improved understanding of how social capital is used in responding to their context. To do this, we draw on two established bodies of work. First, we use the lived experience of the complexity faced by the managers to describe the context. Secondly, we use social capital theory to examine what elements of social capital are employed in response. The interchange between these is initially framed with ‘contextual complexities’ as stimulus and the 'social capital employed’ as response. Our findings show the temporal dynamics of complexity, whereby responses are not isolated but dependent upon both recent experience and expectations of future events. We also show the importance of social relationships in developing valuable recursive patterns of interaction in the project context.
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    Towards an understanding of ‘dynamic ambidexterity’ in supporting managerial resilience
    (None, 2018-04-27) Turner, Neil; Kutsch, Elmar; Maylor, Harvey; Swart, Juani
    Resilience is clearly a desirable attribute, but characterising it is challenging. Individual- and organizational-level resilience are established fields of study, whereas mid-range, managerial-level, evidence of how resilience is achieved is lacking. In this paper we develop the argument that the ability both to exploit and explore (i.e. ambidexterity) may support, and be a valuable way to analyse, resilience. We ask: ‘What ambidextrous actions support managerial resilience?’ We report on a study carried out with senior staff from five major UK-based organizations. From our qualitative data investigating critical incidents and ‘near-misses’ we first unpack the key actions that managers undertake, categorising them in terms of ‘preparing’, ‘noticing’, ‘identifying’ and ‘determining potential responses’. These contain complex, interwoven, exploitative and exploratory characteristics which enable the awareness and containment of potential adversities, yet these vary over time. We posit that these actions are supported by the ‘dynamics’ of contextual ambidexterity which we identify and illustrate. These findings contribute to both the ambidexterity and resilience literatures and lead to practical considerations for managers.
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    Who does what in enabling ambidexterity? Individual Actions and HRM practices
    (Taylor and Francis, 2016-11-30) Swart, Juani; Turner, Neil; van Rossenberg, Yvonne; Kinnie, Nicholas
    In this paper, we explain how ambidexterity, the simultaneous pursuit of exploration and exploitation, is enabled at the individual level of analysis. Research on ambidexterity has been dominated by theoretical approaches focusing on the organisational level; however, we know little about how ambidexterity is enacted by employees. There is also limited work on the multilevel aspects of individual employee actions, for example, particular roles and specifically the level of seniority of the role. We address these gaps by asking: Which individual actions are undertaken by employees at particular levels of seniority in the organization to enable ambidexterity? In order to answer this question we draw on previous research to construct reliable measures of the individual actions that enable ambidexterity. The hypothesized mediation effect of these individual actions is confirmed on the basis of survey data from 212 employees from a UK-based Professional Service Firm. The findings indicate that senior employees are more likely to use ‘integration’, ‘role expansion’ and ‘tone setting’, whilst employees with specialist knowledge about their clients use ‘gap filling’ to enable ambidexterity. Finally, we draw together these findings with 35 interviews conducted to present the HRM practices which support ambidexterity.