Ismael Al-Amoudi University of Reading and Wolfson College (University of Cambridge)
[email protected] Word count: 7855 (excluding footnotes and references)
Critical management education for career conscious students: a case study
INTRODUCTION - SHOULD STUDENTS’ CAREERS?
CME
BE
CONCERNED
WITH
The expression ‘critical management’ - as in critical management studies (CMS) and critical management education (CME) - is quite paradoxical, if anything because it juxtaposes two seemingly incompatible terms. In the first half of the expression, the adjective ‘critical’ denotes subversion, liberation and reflexivity. It also inscribes ‘critical management’ in an intellectual tradition that extends from Marx to Mc Intyre and from Habermas to Foucault and that denounces the manipulative and instrumental social relations fostered by capitalist forms of organization. In the second half of the expression, however, the notion of management generally refers to a practice of deciding and organizing that is characterized by its unquestioned pursuance of efficiency, itself understood and measured in terms of financial benefits (Alvesson et al., 1992 ; Grey, 2002 ; Shayne et al., 1997 ; Zald, 2002). As Shayne et al. (1997) convincingly suggest, ‘critical management’ is an empty oxymoron1 if on the one hand ‘critique’ is taken in the sense of the ‘analysis of instrumental rationalization as fundamentally disenchanting to the human spirit, and on the exploitative and alienating nature of capitalism’ (Shayne, et al., 1997: 416) and if, on the other hand, management is seen as ‘an objective, technically neutral mechanism dedicated only to greater efficiency’ (Ball 1990: 157, cited in Shayne, et al., 1997). However, the oxymoron ‘critical management’ becomes meaningful if we accept to confer slightly broader meanings to the words ‘critique’ and ‘management’. Such re-conceptualization demands that we think ‘critique’ not only as a matter of struggle against exploitation and domination but also, and perhaps primarily, as ‘…a matter of pointing out on what kinds of familiar, unchallenged, unconsidered modes of thought the practices we accept rest …’ (Foucault in Kritzman 1988: 154, cited in Shayne, et al., 1997). In parallel, a distinction must also be drawn between the vision conveyed by textbooks that represent management as a technical and ultimately hegemonic practice (Clegg et al., 2003 ; Mills et al., 1999) and a more sophisticated understanding of management as a practice involving multiple and constant acts of ‘translation’ in the sense of ‘listening carefully to the voices of others, and mediating between different language games rather than assuming that one knows what management means and what it says’ (Clegg et al., 2006). Not so surprisingly, many of the tensions identified in CMS are mirrored, and even amplified, in the classroom. As Hagen et al (2003) remark after an instructive attempt at teaching CME to MBA students: 1
In management studies, the word ‘oxymoron’ has been used to characterise CMS pejoratively (and is employed as a rough synonym for 'meaningless expression'). Yet a further complicating factor is that the poetic use of the oxymoron is precisely to generate the reverse effect of an intensification of meaning. Hence in Shakespear’s play, Juliette’s description of Romeo as ‘A damned saint, an honourable villain’ intensifies each of these adjectives. Whether, a similar effect is reached in the expression ‘critical management studies’ is not granted though.
Work in progress, please do not cite or quote without author’s permission
1
‘Drawing attention to neglected areas of management such as gender (Wilson, 1996) may in fact create dissonance for students who find it discomforting to question takenfor-granted assumptions (Reynolds, 1999). There is also the possibility that any ‘opening of vision’ (Chia, 1996) will be stifled once participants return to the workplace, particularly if their goals now conflict with those of the organization (Alvesson et al., 1992). Critical perspectives may offer frustration as well as emancipation.’ (Hagen, et al., 2003: 254) The question is therefore not only about whether but also about how we can teach potentially subversive material to students who are otherwise learning to identify with management and who desire ardently to occupy professional and then managerial positions (Grey, 1994 ; Grey, 2002). More specifically, this raises the question of equipping students both with skills that will help them doing well and with skills that will help them doing good (or at least not so awfully) in business environments2. The thesis of this paper is that, although the classroom is arguably a place where the contradiction between CMS and the aspirations of (would-be) managers is particularly salient and potentially conflictive, it can also be a place where some of these conflicts and contradictions can be resolved. At this point, it might be useful to distinguish between a pedagogical strategy of circumvention and a pedagogical strategy of engagement. A minimalist attempt at coping with the contradictions of CMS will aim at reaching a situation of compromise in which both lecturer and students attempt to water-down the most visible tensions and conceal the least visible ones to ensure their relatively pacific co-existence during the series of lectures. In such ‘circumventing’ approach, the implicit assumption is that CME is rather ‘against’ management (Parker, 1995) but that lecturers ought to have enough sense of diplomacy to present the material in such a way as to avoid threatening students’ sense of identity as would-be managers. In this situation, students probably still feel that CME does not bring much that solves their academic and career-related concerns, however they would be ready to tolerate them on the understanding that CME is part of what they need to learn to get a business school degree and that they should be able to ignore much of it as soon as they leave university and start working as professionals or managers. For lecturers, this situation presents the advantage of avoiding such ‘disruption’ as reported by Hagen et al (2003, Cf. supra). The influential case study reported by Grey, Knights and Willmott (Grey et al., 1996) can perhaps be interpreted as a ‘non-managerialist’ (rather than an anti-managerialist’) example of circumvention. In their reported experience, the teachers seem to place ‘learning how to live’ at the centre of the pedagogy. Although their contribution constitutes arguably a welcome step away from conventional B-school teaching, by ignoring students’ career prospects and desires, their account also mystifies relations of power both within the classroom and outside of it. Indeed, Grey et al allude to student assessment (in the form of examinations!) but do not describe or reflect on this assessment as a fundamental tool of power inequality between assessing lecturers and assessed students3. Moreover, Grey et al assume that students need to ‘learn to live’ but do not seem to take much into account the conditions of life awaiting business school students - most of whom aspire to become professionals and middle managers in large for-profit companies. How do Grey et al. help their students making their ways in the organizational settings that await them? Is it enough to attract their attention on the difference between ‘being’ and ‘having’ and on the limits of positivism or is there more that can be taught in a CME class? More worryingly, perhaps, by disconnecting CME from the prospects and aspirations of students, Grey et al avoid the question of what use students will do of the material they have learned and of the reflectivity they have developed. 2
In this paper, I leave aside the question of whether ‘good’ and ‘bad’ should be viewed as social constructs and whether they derive from the nature of the world or from our conceptions of it. The paper’s argument supposes minimalist epistemological and ethical assumptions, namely that there exist situations in which it is possible to distinguish between better and worse potential states of affairs and that economic efficiency alone does not always provide grounds for such distinction. 3 Indeed, the assessment of students in university settings carries heavy implications for the future lives of students.
Work in progress, please do not cite or quote without author’s permission
2
It is reasonable to suppose that, outside the class, the impact of a ‘circumventing’ approach to CME will be rather positive, though very limited. Although the actions and attitudes of the majority of students engaging in for-profit organizations are unlikely to be affected, a situation of peaceful compromise between critical and managerialist aspirations may create a space in which a few students may manifest special interest in CMS, which can lead them in turn either to engage in not-for-profit organizations or in subsequent research in CMS, for example through a PhD in CMS. Arguably, the value of a CME that only influences those students who abandon prospects of a career in a for-profit organization will seem very modest to its defenders and almost laughable to other observers. These limitations mirror indeed the limitations of anti-managerialist assumptions in critical research that are discussed by Clegg et al (2006). The latter suggest that many if not most CMS authors picture management as essentially manipulative and hegemonic, leading in turn these researchers to disengage from the people and practices of organizations (Fournier et al., 2000) and to miss fundamental aspects of management practice, such as the polyphony of discourses in which managerial action takes place (Cf. supra). Clegg et al.’s characterisation of management as ‘translation’ in polyphonic organizations opens the door to an approach to CME that ambitions to move beyond the situation of circumvention described above. Indeed, if the expression CME is a meaningful paradox, then a space may be created where CME does not only become tolerable to career conscious students but also becomes useful and desirable to them. Arguably enough, this space is not a cosy zone of comfort. And indeed it supposes some stretching on both sides of CME and managerial expectations. However, a key contention of this paper is that neither management nor CME have to be transformed beyond recognition in order to nourish one another. Indeed, the assumption is not that management practice and identity must be accepted unquestionably but rather that there may exist ways of practicing management and of being a professional or a manager that do not contradict the values of reflexivity and justice promoted by CMS and CME. In other words, it is assumed in this paper that it is possible to promote and foster a managerial identity that is not only acceptable by graduates and employers but that also avoids some of the defects traditionally associated with the figures of the amoral technocrat and of the selfish entrepreneur (Hendry, 2006). Another important assumption of this paper is that firms do not recruit B-school graduates so much for the theories they have learned as much as for the skills they have developed (Hay et al., 2008). Indeed, in the UK where I teach, it is not uncommon to see well paid jobs in investment banks, management consultancies and even auditing firms being obtained by graduates who studied philosophy, history or chemistry. Even in France, where professional jobs are traditionally dominated by Grandes Ecoles of engineering and management, professional firms would assume that young recruits have ‘une tête bien faite mais pas très pleine’4. It is thus common practice for them to focus recruitment selection on analytical and interpersonal skills instead of the technical knowledge necessary for the job. New recruits would then either learn the necessary technical knowledge ‘on the job’ or through in-house seminars5. Although the strategy of ‘engagement’ with students’ career prospects and concerns sounds attractive, there are no case studies detailing practical attempts at deploying it in the classroom. How can CME enhance both students’ career prospects and their ability to maintain critical or ethical stances? What are the main difficulties that should be expected in such venture? The remainder of the paper relates and discusses the author’s attempt to bring CME into the classroom through an OB module that both respects students’ identifications with management and provides them with skills that are useful for their chosen careers. The first section describes the context and institutional settings of the teaching. The second section focuses on the practical organization of the module and on the methods adopted for teaching and assessing students. The third section examines the reception of the module by students and their academic performance. A short discussion of the potential impact of the module on future managerial practice is proposed in the concluding section. 4
Montaigne (1533-1592) proposed that a finely educated mind was preferable to a mind full of knowledge: ‘une tete bien faite vaut mieux qu’une tete bien pleine’. The sentence has since then become a proverb in French. 5 I base this observation on my own experience as well as that of a dozen of fellow students who graduated from ESCP and went working in management consulting, investment banking, auditing and blue-chip firms.
Work in progress, please do not cite or quote without author’s permission
3
I - TEACHING CONTEXT: CAREER CONSCIOUS STUDENTS OF VARIOUS LEVELS OF SKILL AND ENERGY Before discussing the specifics of how the lectures were organized, it may be useful to picture the context in which they were taught. The experience of bringing CMS into the classroom was attempted through a module of organizational behaviour (OB) at the University of Reading Business School in the United Kingdom. The module was taught as an optional course for 2nd year undergraduate students in Spring 2007 and as a compulsory course for postgraduate MSc students in Autumn of the same year. Although most students had no significant professional experience, most of them had some experience of summer internships and other work placements. Moreover, before the start of the module, most students had learned to view firms from the perspective of a CEO-owner whose interests merge with the interests of the firm, of its workers, its managers and other stake-holders. Moreover, students were inclined to rely on a ready-made discourse that presents the current epoch as an era of globalization in which strategic vision, technological innovation and worker motivation are seen as the ultimate sources of profitability. In the world thus depicted, the good of people is unquestionably equated with the good of firms; consumers are sovereign; markets are deregulated and conflict is absent (Thompson et al., 1995). The lecturer also had the opportunity to engage in informal discussions with some of the students in his quality of personal tutor6. Most students appeared to be involved, though at varying degrees, in a dual process of socialization. On the one hand they learned to dress, party, talk and behave as University students, the main vector of this aspect of their socialisation being life on campus and the creation of bonds with other students. On the other hand, B-school students also learned to dress, behave and talk of their experiences like would-be professionals - though in circumstances less frequent and familiar than the former7. The most salient vectors of this ‘professional socialization’ of students were probably the forums they had with potential recruiters and the various enterprise games organized by corporate partners of the university. The urge for students to start writing a CV before their first year internship also constituted an important, though less visible, change in students’ perceptions of themselves as they thereby start conceiving of their life as a contribution to their CV and professional career (see also Grey, 1994 ; 2004). The students registered on the OB module were drawn from a wide variety of countries. Indeed, around half of the BA students and more than 90% of the MSc students were from outside the U.K. The most represented counties were France, Greece, Italy and Poland in Europe; Nigeria and Cameroon in Africa; China, Hong-Kong and Thailand in South-East Asia; India and Pakistan in South Asia. Students had overall a reasonably good academic level and would probably have obtained average GMAT scores of around 570 for MSc and 600 for BA students8. A complicating factor was that that their academic skills and motivation were very heterogeneous, with the top 10-15% of student displaying very promising potential whereas the last 10% of the BA class and the last 20% of the MSc 6 Personal tutors are academic members of staff who exert a double role of surveillance and advice on matters related to academic results, career prospects and personal issues. On the university website, students are advised that: ‘One of the most important people you will meet while you are a student at Reading is your Student and lecturer talkingPersonal Tutor who will usually be a member of academic staff. Your tutor will often be the first person you will turn to if you have an issue or problem to discuss. S/he will enhance your academic and personal development whilst you are at university and will help you to make the most of your time at Reading.’ http://www.reading.ac.uk/internal/freshers/fr-Whatsupportisavailable/fr-PersonalTutorialSystem.asp 7
A difference between ESCP and Cambridge on one hand and Reading and Lancaster on the other was that students in the former institutions would have two types of social events: socials in which there are only students of their age group (18-25) and socials in which there would be a mix of students from their age group and teachers or potential employers. As a result, students from ESCP and Cambridge would also learn early bourgeois ways of partying. 8 BA and MSc students are not required to pass a GMAT test. The author asked three colleagues with MBA recruitment experience to ‘guestimate’ the average GMAT score of Reading students. Their answers were similar at more or less 10 points.
Work in progress, please do not cite or quote without author’s permission
4
class displayed a limited command of the English language and a very light experience in thinking critically and in presenting complex ideas, orally or in writing. Although a degree of heterogeneity is to be expected in any group of students, the lecturer noticed a significantly greater diversity than in the business schools where he had himself studied. Indeed, although the diversity of levels was comparable to what he could witness in an MA programme at Lancaster Business School (Lancaster, UK), it was nonetheless more important than in the Judge Business School (Cambridge, UK) and at Ecole Supérieure de Commerce de Paris (Paris, France). As the lecturer discovered during the module, the differences in academic skills were in part attributable to the fact that, while some of the students had previous education in systems that were relatively close to the British system of education (e.g. France, Germany, Italy), those students coming from more distant countries had often been educated in institutions that cultivate skills of memorization and replication more than analysis and critical thinking. A practical implication for the lecturer was that these ‘overseas students’ had a potential that exceeded their very limited display of skills but that they needed a lot of clarification as to the work that was expected from them (Cf. section II-1 infra). The motivation, energy and autonomy displayed in Reading usually varies greatly from student to student. Whereas some students would send emails to the lecturer a couple of months before the start of the module to enquire about the essential readings and the methods of assessment, quite a few others would submit their work late despite late-submission penalties or would sometimes skip lectures and tutorials. Overall, most students seemed inclined to produce the work expected from them, though with a rather passive attitude: unless specified otherwise, most of them would restrict their reading to the textbook and a few internet websites and would regurgitate theories instead of using them to guide reflection. On average, the students of Reading displayed a level of energy that was not similar to that displayed by Judge Business School students but not so dissimilar to that of ESCP students (Cf. figure 1).
Motivation
+
ESCP (Programme grande ecole)
Cambridge Judge B. School
-
Reading B. School
-
+ Academic skills
Figure 1: The lecturer’s perception of students’ motivation and skills Although students from ESCP and students from Reading displayed rather similar degrees of motivation, the reasons behind their motivation (or the lack thereof) were arguably different. At ESCP, students know that the marks they receive will not count for their career prospects since, in the peculiar French system of Grandes Ecoles, recruiters look at the institution from which the student graduated without concern for the marks obtained. Hence, although the vast majority of ESCP students worked very seriously during the years of classe préparatoire before entering ESCP, they also understand that any effort they put into academic matters during their time at ESCP will probably
Work in progress, please do not cite or quote without author’s permission
5
not be so much considered by employers. Extra-academic activities such as student societies, sports or experiences abroad are indeed much more differentiating for securing a job interview than the marks obtained over that period. The situation for Reading students is different however. In the U.K., the marks students obtain make a very significant difference to the kind of jobs they can get after they graduate. As a rule, investment banks and strategy consulting would recruit students with ‘first class honours’ (over 70 out of 100, around 10% of students nationwide) whereas accounting firms and blue chip companies would focus recruitment on students with a ‘2:1’ (over 60 out of 100, about 30% of students). Students with averages below 60/100 would generally get jobs less prestigious and/or in smaller firms. For undergraduate students, obtaining an average above 60 out of 100 also secures the possibility to continue towards postgraduate study. The lecturer was therefore faced with a double puzzle: why are Reading students less energetic than Cambridge students despite a similar career environment? And why are Reading students not more energetic than ESCP students despite different career pressures? Discussions with students during small-group tutorials revealed that they were generally anxious about both marks and future jobs. A vast majority of them expressed wishes to work in private firms, although only a minority could specify a function or sector of activity. Those who expressed interest in a function or sector did mention: the banking sector (London and Hong Kong being the two most cited places), accounting firms (especially the ‘Big Four’); marketing (especially in consumer goods firms such as L’Oreal or Procter and Gamble). A significant number - especially among students from South Asia and South East Asia - also mentioned the prospects of taking over their family business. The overall anxiety of students regarding their academic results and career prospects was indeed at odds with their investing little energy into their academic work. An alternative explanation is perhaps that they only draw loose connections between the nature of the individual efforts they were expected to produce, the content of lectures and the content of their assessment. In Cambridge students would have ‘supervisions’ in groups of three with a tutor who would ask them every week to produce a short piece of work and who would give them individual feedback9. Pictured in Foucauldian terms (Foucault, 1977), the institution of the supervision creates a field of visibility in which the student’s efforts are seen by the supervisor and in which the student gets to see what their supervisor expects from him/her. They also get to see at the moment of the supervision what constitutes a good piece of work and what peers in the supervision group are capable of producing10. In contrast, students at Reading are generally assessed on a two hours examination that is usually scheduled a few months after the end of their last lecture. Many of them would thus rely on last minute revisions rather than continuous reflection, discussion, reading and writing on the topics of their lectures. A situation of comfortable opacity results, in which students’ efforts are invisible to lecturers and in which students can put aside any need to worry about the way they are assessed or about their actual level of skill and understanding. To summarize, students at Reading are socialized as would-be professionals and managers and are more comfortable in memorizing information than in articulating ideas critically. They display a heterogeneous range of skills and motivation. The lecturer interpreted the diversity of academic levels in light of the diversity of past educational backgrounds. He also interpreted the low level of motivation displayed by some as a result of the system of opacity created by the system of assessment. How could CME contribute to enhancing both academic skills and motivation at the University of Reading? To this question we now turn.
9
In the French system of Classes Préparatoires, the dreaded ‘colles’ fulfil a similar function of transparency. There are interesting cultural differences though since French ‘colleurs’ would not hesitate to be harsh with students who fail to comply with their high standards of expectation. In Oxbridge, this harshness is replaced with a rhetoric that presents the action of supervisors as a form of benevolent power (Grey 1994) aiming primarily at helping the student in her studies. 10 It may indeed be possible to formulate an account of Cantabrian supervisions with the concepts of communities of practices proposed by Lave and Wenger (1991) who also insist on trajectories and transparencies. Cf. Lave, J. and Wenger, E. (1991), Situated learning : legitimate peripheral participation, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge [England] ; New York
Work in progress, please do not cite or quote without author’s permission
6
II - ORGANIZING THE MODULE TO DEAL WITH THE PARADOXES OF CME As Grey et al (1996) suggest, teaching students critically must avoid the pitfalls of both ‘positivist’ and ‘discipline’ approaches that consist in focusing teaching exclusively on the academic knowledge that students are expected to master, at the expense of ‘making connections with the particularities of the “real world”’ (Grey, et al., 1996: 100). Instead, they suggest, the point of departure should rather be students’ experience of ‘being in the world’ and teaching should become ‘an activity that points to continuities and discontinuities between students’ experience and bodies of literature.’ (Ibid.: 101). While the lecturer fully agreed with these points, he also differed with Grey et al’s subsequent proposals that knowledge should not be treated as a ‘possession’, and that the lecturer should attempt to create a situation in which ‘Unlike other courses, there is little evident structure, no textbook and no logical (and apparently rational) accumulated set of lecture notes that can provide them with a sense of security, however illusory. [In the proposed settings] all students have are some readings, discussions in the seminars and a lecturer who is more intent on raising questions than in supplying information or answers.’ (Ibid.: 103) The lecturer felt that while Grey et al’s approach may be appropriate for raising the critical awareness of PhD candidates who would already have some mastery of their discipline, he felt very uncomfortable in organising his module this way considering the context described above (Cf. supra). Since in the end students are assessed and since this assessment makes a difference for their lives, isn’t this approach overly privileging those strongest students who are already capable of undertaking independent reading and who master examination techniques? Is the lecturer sacrificing those weaker students who are still not able to conduct independent research or write a decent paper and who will not learn to do so unless they are explicitly guided? Moreover, if the lectures are to introduce novel and potentially disrupting ideas such as those of Marx, Foucault and Freud, is it better to do so in settings that contribute to generating student anxiety? The experience of classroom disruption reported by Hagen et al (2003) is instructive. The authors attempted to introduce a critical agenda during an MBA elective and both lecturers and students experienced feelings of discomfort. The authors explain the causes of this reported discomfort by referring to i) team teaching, leading to occasional tensions and disagreement among the three lecturers; ii) reluctance from the lecturers to assume a position of authority, perceived to be at odds with critical education; iii) inability to control the module organization, leading it to be compacted over three days and to be delivered to a large group and iv) the gendered identity of the (female) teachers that created tensions when they tackled questions of gender. This understanding is somewhat corroborated by the comments of those students who did not appreciate the elective and who reported feelings that resonate somewhat with points i) and iii). An alternative, though connected, interpretation of these feedback comments is that the MBA elective did not connect with the career concerns of students and that its loose structure did not allow them to see what skills the lecturers were intending to foster, generating thus unnecessary anxiety and disorientation. As a participant put it: ‘[The module was] not what [she] had expected. A little ‘off the wall’ and peddling of agendas. Generally left with a sense of disappointment.’ (participant feeback, quoted in Hagen, et al., 2003: 253) [And from another participant:] ‘Rather disjointed with three lecturers. Didn’t hang together well - wasn’t sure where the course was going’(participant feeback, quoted in Hagen, et al., 2003: 253) The approach chosen by the author of the present article differed radically from the choices of both Grey et al and Hagen et al. It put a high emphasis on constructing a structured and relatively predictable learning environment and it insisted on developing skills that are recognised by both academia and corporation. Moreover, it placed the assessment of students at the centre of the module. Indeed, if knowledge has a dual nature (as ‘possession’ and as ‘relation’), then teaching should arguably not attempt to privilege one of its aspects over the other. Neither should it merely attempt to
Work in progress, please do not cite or quote without author’s permission
7
balance them. Rather, teaching should perhaps ensure that ‘knowing how’ nourishes ‘knowing that’ as much as ‘knowing that’ nourishes ‘knowing how’. Concretely, the lecturer attempted to do this by aligning as closely as possible the nature of the assessment, the content of the lectures and the modus operandi of tutorials in a module that comprised 10 lectures of two hours and 20 ‘small group’ tutorials of one hour. The specifics of these arrangements are examined in the following sections.
II.1 - Organizing the module around two long essays The first and perhaps most important measure was to replace the traditional end of year examination with a couple of long home-based essays (2,500 and 3,500 words). In most managerial disciplines and in most British universities, students are primarily assessed through a written examination that lasts between two and three hours and in which students have to answer 3 to 5 questions. This method of assessment is unquestionably excellent for measuring, training and valuing students’ capacity to memorize large quantities of information and to write under great pressure and time constraint. The lecturer wondered however whether examinations were appropriate for valuing and training students’ ability to reflect critically and to construct an argument that is complex yet sound and clear. This reform of the system of assessment was possible because the lecturer was blessed with a head of school, a head of department and a director of teaching and learning who manifested considerable understanding and encouragement. Right from the first lecture, students discovered the titles of the two essays they would have to write along with the submission deadlines and weights of assessed items (essay1: 30%; essay2: 50%; tutorial presentations: 20%). Reading lists of around 10 books or papers per essay were distributed and the lecturer encouraged students to find more references than those listed. The essay questions purposively lent to more than one interpretation and bore on matters for which there is little consensus among academics11. Students were urged to start thinking, reading and writing on the first essay right from the first week. Moreover, they were advised that, since there were no examinations, the module was not a module in which they were expected to memorize great amounts of information (unlike history or law) or in which they had to learn complex techniques of analysis (unlike mathematics and physics). However, the qualities they would need most would be: their capacity to reflect on personal experience, their ability to synthesize conflicting views, good essay writing skills and critical thinking. The lecturer also insisted that, whatever paths in life students chose, they would be glad to have acquired essay writing skills. Indeed, bankers, managers and consultants have to write (and read) long and sometimes complex reports and have to deal with situations of political tension in which a sense of wording and nuance is welcome. Moreover, even those students who chose a career in a notfor-profit organization or those who decide to pursue their family business would need to write such pieces to communicate with and convince external stakeholders: providers of funding, public authorities, large clients, and so on. Besides, students seemed receptive to the lecturer’s proposition that, if they could write a good essay on the tricky topics that were proposed, then professional reports would seem comparatively easy. In order to escape the situation of comfortable opacity reported in the first section of this paper (Cf. supra), the second lecture was integrally dedicated to sharing tacit knowledge as to what constituted a good essay in the eyes of a (British) university lecturer. This involved giving students as much visibility as possible on the marking process, including some of its most embarrassing aspects. Students would thus discover with some awe that the essay for which they will dedicate dozens of hours will be read in less than 30 minutes (sometimes even 15) and that lecturers have a mark in mind after reading the first page and would only amend it marginally as they read through the piece. The 11
In the Spring 2007 session, the titles of the essays were Essay 1: What are the benefits and dangers of motivation theory for contemporary managerial practice? (2,500 words) Essay 2: Critically assess what makes a leader (3,500 words) In the Autumn 2007 session, the essay titles were: Essay 1: ‘Critically reflect on a situation in which you felt particularly motivated or demotivated’ (2,500 words) Essay 2: ‘Assess the advantages and disadvantages of bureaucracy’ (3,500 words).
Work in progress, please do not cite or quote without author’s permission
8
lecturer also insisted on the boredom generated by reading 400 pages that repeat the same story again and again. Students would then be invited to reflect on the consequences for them of the specific organization of marking - and would thus, unknowingly, engage reflection on key OB themes of politics, objective-interests and power/knowledge. The main implications from students’ point of view were, on one hand, a strong incentive for writing a piece that is quickly identified as a ‘good’ essay and, on the other hand, an incentive for clarity and structure - originality and subtlety being appreciated only when the former qualities are displayed12. At the start of the Autumn 2007 session, the lecturer also uploaded on Blackboard a number of essays written by students during the Spring 2007 session. The essays selected were of all levels of quality (1st class; 2:1; 2:2; 3rd class and fail). Students were encouraged to look not only at the best essays but also at the contrast between the best and the less good ones. In this class the lecturer also shared some hints and tips he himself found useful for writing clearly, for connecting ideas and for using references wisely.
II.2 Bringing a critical perspective on traditional OB themes The question of the subject-position (Foucault, 1972 ; 1974) in which students were placed was of critical importance for understanding their interest in critical management approaches. Their previous management education had taught them to look at management from the (mystified) point of view of a quasi omniscient CEO-owner whose interests are unquestionably equated with the interests of the firm, its employees, shareholders, and other stakeholders. From this perspective, CMS is at best an intellectual curiosity that students must learn to get their degree but that they would be well advised to ignore when they start working. The lecturer therefore attempted early on to get students to reflect on their multiple and conflicting identities: as would-be managers, but also as students, as boys/girls, as (future) parents, as sons and daughters, as non/believers, as practitioners of a faith, and so on and so forth 13. Once students acknowledged that they had to occupy multiple subject positions, CMS became much more in tune with their interests. They would probably not start immediately in (fantasized) CEO positions but as professionals or middle-managers, which meant that they would be both in position of authority and of subordination. They would be managers but they would also be employees and, if they wanted to make their way in complex organizations, then awareness of the informal (and sometimes darker) aspects of organizations would indeed be more helpful than the rosy managerialist picture they had been taught to date. On arrival in the first class, and before being briefed on the modalities of assessment (Cf. supra), students were requested to list all the organizations they had encountered on the previous day14. They would usually come up with large consumer good firms such as Tesco, L’Oreal, Nestle and Dell. Sometimes, not-for-profit organizations such as the BBC or the UN would also be mentioned. The lecturer would then ask who among the students had talked to a member of their family on that day and would add ‘family’ to the list of organizations. He would then complete the list by asking the class who had talked to a friend, to a partner, to a sports-mate, to a flatmate, to a kitchen-mate and so on. The benefits of this exercise are three-folded: first it incites students to participate from the first minutes, second it shows students that they already know more than they think about 12
Since the module assessment was based 100% on coursework and student presentations, students were required to submit their essays via the anti-plagiarism software Turnitin. Out of more than 200 essays, only 3 or 4 cases of blatant malpractice were noticed. Although it is admittedly impossible to know of those situations of plagiarism that were not detected by Turnitin, the act of warning students that anti-plagiarism checks would be used arguably had pre-emptive effects on students’ propensity to plagiarize. 13 The way these identities are presented here falls into what Laclau and Mouffe (1985) call the ‘logic of opposition’: although identities are multiple and although they are deemed to be related to conflicting objective interests, their discursive formation is not questioned. Neither is analysed the instability of these discursively constituted identities. The lecturer avoided treating the ‘logic of antagonism’ preferred by Laclau and Mouffe. He did hint, however, at the emergence of the categories of management in a class discussion Foucault’s contribution to organization studies and to Jacques ‘Manufacturing the Employee’ (Jacques 1995). 14 I am particularly grateful to Marc Ventresca and Hugh Willmott for this brilliant idea.
Work in progress, please do not cite or quote without author’s permission
9
organizations, thus legitimising their reliance on tacit, mundane knowledge. Last but not least, it offers a point of departure for discussing our (ambiguous) conceptions of organizations. Indeed the example of the ‘group of friends’ allows taking the discussion on the intractable question of organization boundaries and of the political stakes of how organizations are defined: what are the political consequences of stating that John is a member of the ‘friends’ group but not Jane? Moreover, students would get to reflect on various possible conceptions of what an ‘organization’ is: as an entity, but also as a process and as a concept. Organizational behaviour was then presented as a contested terrain and students were warned that, for each theme we would cover in the rest of the lectures, more than one perspective had been proposed by reputable scholars. After the second lecture dedicated to essay writing (Cf. supra), the lecturer undertook seven lectures on classic OB themes: leadership, authority, motivation, organisational design, politics and decision making, rationality and bureaucracy, ethics and corporate social responsibility. Although the themes were very traditional and despite the lectures being delivered through the medium of a structured slide flow15, the perspective through which they were treated was less so. The lecturer attempted indeed to get students to reflect on the links between three bodies of knowledge: their own knowledge of organizations, mainstream conceptions and critical approaches. Indeed, for each lecture of two hours, the first ten minutes were generally dedicated to getting students to express some thoughts related to the topic of the lecture. For instance, they would describe the traits and contribution of a person they rated as a leader in the course on leadership or the traits and contribution of someone they rated as a ‘bureaucrat’ in the class on bureaucracy. These exercises offered the lecturer a base of examples from which he could draw whenever he would need to illustrate abstract concepts. The rest of the first hour was dedicated to providing a mainstream account of the subject matter, articulated in the terms generally found in Business textbooks (see Mills and Hatfield, 1999 cited by Clegg et al, 2003). The lecturer would nonetheless specify that: ‘these are the kind of accounts that you would get at Harvard (sic). I don’t think they are fundamentally wrong, but I believe they are somewhat incomplete. Let’s see what you think.’ The second hour would break with the ‘single-managerialist worldview’ (Mills and Hatfield 1999) and would tackle the same theme, though from ‘critical perspectives’ inspired by the works of Foucault, Freud, Marx, Weber, etc. The critical O.B. textbook edited by Knights and Willmott (Introducing Organizational Behaviour and Management) was a very valuable resource to this end as it offered a solid base for preparing lectures, especially those addressing topics that were not directly connected with the lecturer’s research interests. Moreover, the lecturer also felt that the presence of a textbook that mentioned both mainstream and critical perspectives reduced the feeling of anxiety felt by students confronted with multiple and conflicting views on organizations and management. Incidentally enough, this textbook is edited by two of the three authors of Grey et al (1996) and all three authors contributed fine chapters to the textbook16.
II.3 - Linking tutorials and lectures Although lectures provided basic conceptual tools to students, tutorials provided a space for encouraging (and forcing) them to use these tools. In terms of organization, the lecturer divided the class into groups of 3 to 5 students. In each hour of tutorials, three groups would present a 10 minutes presentation about a case study and would then engage in a 10 minutes discussion with the lecturer and the rest of the class17. The case studies dealt with themes akin to CMS, such as corporate culture (and its side effects), organizational design (and its political conflicts) or corporate social
15
Available on http://tinyurl.com/2p7oot
16
One may wonder if this is a sign that they have changed their views on critical pedagogy in recent years?
17
The incidence of the financial resources available to the University are striking here. In Cambridge, groups of 3 students have one full hour of supervision per week. In Reading, groups of three to five students have 20 minutes of supervision every fortnight.
Work in progress, please do not cite or quote without author’s permission
10
responsibility (CSR) and the fair load of hypocrisy that often accompany it18. Each group of student had to prepare three presentations which were assessed and counted for 20% of the module mark. On the first tutorial, the lecturer clarified the reasons that guided his choice of format. For instance, the choice of assessing students’ presentations was guided by very pragmatic considerations: if tutorials were not marked, a large proportion of students would not have shown up and those who would make the effort to attend would probably not have made the effort to prepare a decent presentation. On the other hand, since the mark did not count for more than 20% of the module, this meant that students were not putting their module mark at risk as long as they had dedicated a reasonable amount of effort to preparing their presentations. The choices of form and content were also made in consideration of the skills the lecturer wanted his students to develop. For instance, pushing students to deliver presentations was inspired by the lecturer’s own work experience in a consultancy: for better and for worst, presentation skills are particularly differentiating for the careers of managers/professionals since it is during formal presentations (of results, of projects, and so on) that a manager has professional contact with his/her boss’s boss (level N+2). The latter has usually little visibility on the manager’s day-to-day activities but has nevertheless a strong say on his/her career prospects within the firm. Moreover, the choice of leaving 10 minutes of discussion after each presentation was guided by the willingness to raise students’ critical abilities by asking them open questions relative to assumptions they had taken for granted or potential consequences they had excluded from the picture. The cases were chosen to relate with the mix of conventional and critical perspectives of lectures (Cf. supra). In one tutorial, for instance, students were required to compare the CSR statement published by a multinational firm (e.g. in annual reports) and to compare it with alternative, more critical, sources such as Corporatewatch. The short discussion after each presentation also allowed discussing the range of action available to management. The interaction between lecturer and students and among students was as interesting, if not more, than the presentations themselves. For instance, although a few groups proposed from the outset a sophisticated account that reflected on the biases of both critical and corporate sources of information, many students assumed that the firm was ‘wrong’ and that it was ‘lying’ whereas corporate watch was ‘right’ and that it ‘uncovered the truth’. In these situations, the discussion addressed the neutrality of sources of information and the difference between erroneous and biased knowledge. Students were also prompted to suggest alternative sources they could use to complete the picture, especially on those points of contention between Corporate Watch and the firm under scrutiny. The lecturer also attracted students’ attention on the importance of the audience they are facing. For instance, they may want to address issues slightly differently if they are to criticize the wrong doings of Nestle in front of an audience of NGO activists; of company executives or of a mix of both.
III - STUDENT FEEDBACK AND ACADEMIC RESULTS Although the amount of work required in the critical OB modules was arguably higher than in most other modules, students expressed very satisfied feedback. Indeed, on a scale from 1 to 5 (5 being the best), they attributed 4.3 to the overall quality of the module; 4.4 for its intellectual stimulation; 4.2 for the clarity on marking criteria and 4.2 for the practical usefulness of the module. In order to put these results in perspective, we compare them with feedback collected the same year on a conventional strategy module taught and convened by the same lecturer (Cf. figure 2 infra). This strategy module was representative of typical B-school modules both in its content and in its organization. Students were lectured on basic concepts of strategy (Porter’s Five Forces, Resource Based Theories, etc.) and they were assessed for 20% of the mark on a 1,500 words essay and for 80% of the mark on a conventional end-of-year examination. In both cases, feedback was collected on the last class, before students knew their individual results.
18
I am grateful to Peter Flemming for sharing some of these cases with me.
Work in progress, please do not cite or quote without author’s permission
11
Student feedback (out of 5)
Critical OB module
Mainstream strategy module
5 4.5 4 3.5 3 2.5 2 1.5 1 0.5 0 Overall satisfaction
Intellectual stimulation
Marking criteria clear in advance
Useful for life and career
Scope: all students who responded to feedback questionnaire N students: 27 in OB and 24 in strategy
Figure 2: Student feedback Although students expressed a significant preference for the OB module on all dimensions, the one aspect where the gap was widest is the clarity of marking criteria. This result does corroborate our hypothesis that, perhaps because of their international diversity, students needed particular clarification on the marking process. The fact that students found the module intellectually stimulating was very pleasing, although it was somewhat expectable from a class that would study people and organizations through the relatively abstract frameworks of Freud, Marx, Weber, etc. More surprising, perhaps, was the fact that students also found the module practically useful for their lives and careers. A close look at students’ comments on the ‘main learning outcomes of the module’ reveals two broad categories of comments. Whereas some students mentioned topics that can lend to an instrumental interpretation such as ‘Presentation skills, critical analysis, great discussions (and OB knowledge…)’ (Student feedback, Autumn 2007), other students, however, expressed appreciation of the critical aspects of the module: ‘* I feel it has helped me to learn to assess organizations critically, & not just accept the way of doing things, as there are hidden motivations. * Have the courage to leave your job if necessary!’ (Student feedback, Autumn 2007) The effects of the module on students’ academic performance were also quite positive. This appears clearly if we compare the marks they obtained for the first OB essay (2,500 words completed in 6 weeks and worth 30% of the total mark) with the marks obtained for the essay of the strategy module (1,500 words, completed in 6 weeks and worth 20% of the total mark). In the OB module 63% of students obtained marks in the “first” or “2:1” categories against only 48% in the strategy module. Moreover, only 8% of students obtained marks in the failing categories as against 17% in the strategy module (Cf. figure 3). In both modules a significant portion of the essays were second marked by a moderator and in both cases the moderator attributed similar though infinitesimally higher averages (+0.5%) than the lecturer.
Work in progress, please do not cite or quote without author’s permission
12
Proportion of students
Critical OB module
Conventional strategy module
60% 50% 40% 30% 20% 10% 0% First class (over 69)
2:1 (59-69)
2:2 (49-59)
3rd (40-49)
Fail (under 40)
Scope: all students marked by author N students: 64 in OB and 46 in strategy
Figure 3: Academic result obtained at first essay These results may be explained in reference to several factors. The most obvious is probably that students did invest a great amount of focused effort. Although in both strategy and OB modules, the students knew the titles and deadlines of the home-based essay from the first lecture, only the OB module did dedicate a full lecture on clarifying the processes and criteria involved in marking (Cf. supra).Moreover, most students expressed a genuine interest in critical theories - several even mentioning ‘alienation’ as one of the key learning of the course! It may be conjectured that this interest probably played a motivating role when they were writing their essays. Finally, a less visible yet arguably equally important factor is the fact that students were confronted during the OB lectures with overtly conflicting perspectives on the firm. This probably pushed them to produce more sophisticated essays that attempt to either synthesize opposing views or acknowledge their respective limitations.
CONCLUDING REMARKS The critical OB module attempted to introduce critical management studies in such a way as to develop on one hand students’ capacity to distance themselves from ready-made managerial discourse and on the other hand skills that will help them in their careers as managers: the ability to write complex pieces, the capacity to present on tricky themes and an aptitude to defend their ideas in front of a challenging audience. Although students showed a positive appreciation and a rather skilful understanding, the most important expected result remains unknown to date: what managerial professional identity has the module contributed to foster? How is this identity to make a difference to business, society and the ecosystem? And, equally worryingly, how is this professional identity to stand the long-term influence of corporate settings? Despite the near impossibility to observe the future professional behaviour of his students, the author has reasons to expect that the influence of the critical OB module is less limited than the alternative ‘circumventing’ approaches typically presented in CME case studies. The orientation of the OB module is practical in the sense that it does not content to raise awareness that society is traversed by processes of subjection and domination (economic, social, gendered, ethnic, and so on). Rather, it prompts students to reflect on the processes through which they will participate to these discriminations and on the (limited) actions and attitudes they can adopt, should they wish to relieve these inequalities or distance themselves from alluring yet misleading subject-positions. The module was organized so as to take into account the specific subject positions that students are likely to
Work in progress, please do not cite or quote without author’s permission
13
occupy: as (middle) managers, as employees, as parents, as citizens, and so on. Critical analysis started thus from the situated point of departure of the contemporary organizations where students are the most likely to work and which they are the most likely to be in a position to influence, even marginally. Indeed, by equipping students with categories of analysis at the cross-road of critical theory and management discourse and, equally importantly, by training students to use these categories when writing a 15 pages piece or addressing an audience, the module aimed at arming them with a few means for defending their freedom and that of others. The module had thus a more narrow aspiration than Grey et al’s project of teaching ‘how to live’ as it attempted to teach rather ‘how to make one’s way in and try to ameliorate organizational settings that are not of one’s making’. And yet it may be observed that the skills fostered by the OB module can be employed as powerfully (and more comfortably) in actions that contribute to reinforce and lock mechanisms of inequality than in actions that contribute to alleviate domination and subjection. And indeed, a number of (ex) students will probably use what they have learned in the critical OB module for their individual interests without much regard for the consequences for others. While this observation is probably founded, its range deserves a word of comment. More specifically, this remark highlights the implicit optimistic assumptions of the module’s convenor, namely that most people are ready to pay an (albeit limited) price to contribute to what they perceive as ‘better’ states of affairs and that increased awareness of processes of domination and subjection are a useful (albeit insufficient) step towards their amelioration.
REFERENCES Alvesson, M. and Willmott, H. (1992), ON THE IDEA OF EMANCIPATION IN MANAGEMENT AND ORGANIZATION STUDIES, Academy of Management Review, 17, 3, pp. 432-464 Alvesson, M. and Willmott, H. (1992), On the Idea of Emancipation in Management and Organization Studies, The Academy of Management Review, 17, pp. 432-464 Chia, R. (1996), Teaching Paradigm Shifting in Management Education: University Business Schools and the Entrepreneurial Imagination, Journal of Management Studies, 33, pp. 409-428 Clegg, S. R., Kornberger, M., Carter, C. and Rhodes, C. (2006), For Management?, Management Learning, 37, 1, pp. 7-27 Clegg, S. R. and Ross-Smith, A. (2003), Revising the Boundaries: Management Education and Learning in a Postpositivist World, Academy of Management Learning & Education, 2, 1, pp. 8598 Foucault, M. (1972), The archaeology of knowledge, Tavistock Publications, London, Foucault, M. (1974), The order of things: An archaeology of the human sciences, s.n., S.l. Foucault, M. (1977), Discipline and punish: The birth of the prison, Pantheon Books, New York Fournier, V. r. and Grey, C. (2000), At the critical moment: Conditions and prospects for critical management studies, Human Relations, 53, 1, pp. 7-32 Grey, C. (1994), Career as a project of the self and labour process discipline, Sociology, 28, 2, pp. 479 Grey, C. (2002), What are business schools for? On silence and voice in management education, Journal of Management Education, 26, pp. 496-511 Grey, C. (2004), Reinventing Business Schools: The Contribution of Critical Management Education, Academy of Management Learning & Education, 3, 2, pp. 178-186 Grey, C., Knights, D. and Willmott, H. (1996), Is a critical pedagogy of management possible?, Rethinking management education, pp. 94-110 Hagen, R., Miller, S. and Johnson, M. (2003), The 'Disruptive Consequences' of Introducing a Critical Management Perspective onto an MBA Programme, Management Learning, 34, 2, pp. 241
Work in progress, please do not cite or quote without author’s permission
14
Hay, A. and Hodgkinson, M. (2008), More Success than Meets the Eye—A Challenge to Critiques of the MBA: Possibilities for Critical Management Education?, Management Learning, 39, 1, pp. 21-40 Hendry, J. (2006), Educating Managers for Post-bureaucracy The Role of the Humanities, Management Learning, 37, 3, pp. 267-281 Jacques, R. (1995), Manufacturing the employee: Management knowledge from the 19th to 21st centuries, Sage, London Lave, J. and Wenger, E. (1991), Situated learning : legitimate peripheral participation, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge [England] ; New York Mills, A. and Hatfield, J. (1999), From imperialism to globalization: Internationalization and the management text, Global management: Universal theories and local realities: 37-67 B2 - Global management: Universal theories and local realities: 37-67, pp. Parker, M. (1995), Critique in the Name of What? Postmodernism and Critical Approaches to Organization, Organization Studies (Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co. KG.), 16, 4, pp. 553 Reynolds, M. (1999), Grasping the Nettle: Possibilities and Pitfalls of a Critical Management Pedagogy, British Journal of Management, 9, pp. 171-184 Shayne, G. and Maria, H. (1997), Critical management studies in postmodernity: oxymorons in outer space?, Journal of Organizational Change Management, 10, 5, pp. 412 Thompson, P. and Ackroyd, S. (1995), ALL QUIET ON THE WORKPLACE FRONT? A CRITIQUE OF RECENT TRENDS IN BRITISH INDUSTRIAL SOCIOLOGY, Sociology, 29, 4, pp. 615-633 Wilson, F. (1996), Organizational theory: Blind and deaf to gender, Organization Studies, 17, pp. 825-842 Zald, M. N. (2002), Spinning Disciplines: Critical Management Studies in the Context of the Transformation of Management Education, Organization, 9, 3, pp. 365
Work in progress, please do not cite or quote without author’s permission
15
