Suchergebnisse

This paper is concerned with defining organizational processes necessary to operate safely technologically complex organizations that can do great physical harm to themselves and their surrounding environments. The paper first argues that existing organizational research is little help in understanding organizational processes in such organizations. It then identifies nuclear powered aircraft carriers as examples of potentially hazardous organizations with histories of excellent operations. The paper then examines a set of components of "risk" identified by Perrow (1984) and antecedents to catastrophe elucidated by Shrivastava (1986) and discusses how carriers deal with these factors to lessen their potentially negative effects. The paper concludes with suggestions for future research.

Advancing organizational reliability / Karlene H. Roberts -- The multiple meanings and models of reliability in organizational research / Rangaraj Ramanujam -- Three lenses for understanding reliable, safe, and effective organizations : strategic design, political, and cultural approaches / John S. Carroll -- Mindful organizing / Kathleen M. Sutcliffe -- Reliability through resilience in organizational teams / Seth A. Kaplan & Mary J. Waller -- How high reliability mitigates organizational goal conflicts / Peter M. Madsen & Vinit Desai -- Organizational learning as reliability enhancement / Peter M. Madsen -- Metaphors of communication in high reliability organizations / Jody L.S. Jahn, Karen K. Myers, & Linda L. Putnam -- Extending reliability analysis across organizations, time, and scope / Paul R. Schulman & Emery Roe -- Organizing for reliability in health care / Peter F. Martelli -- Organizing for reliability in practice : searching for resilience in communities at risk / Louise K. Comfort -- Applying reliability principles : lessons learned / W. Earl Carnes

In the US, Incident Management Teams (IMTs) like to define their role as 'bringing order to chaos'. Conversely, French firefighters tend to describe their jobs as 'organizing chaos'. For US IMTs, internal order is the means to overcome external chaos, while French IMTs consider some (minimal) disorganization as opportunities for enhanced adaptability. What accounts for this difference in the way the Incident Command System (ICS) is enacted? Most importantly, how does it relate to success? Through a set of experiments on a virtual reality‐based simulation platform, we found that optimal performance was associated with the presence of certain types of triads the interaction network. Future research avenues are suggested and implications for ICS are discussed.

This paper examines the problem of risk mitigation in virtual organizations (VOs). We begin by discussing risk propensity in virtual organizations, and draw on a variety of research to suggest processes important in obtaining high levels of reliable performance in VOs. From this research we identify four processes we think are important: organizational structuring and design, communication, culture, and trust. Based on existing research done in conventional and high reliability organizations (HROs), we suggest how these processes may enhance reliability in VOs. We discuss how thoughtful management of these attributes can mitigate risk, and conclude with a theoretical and research agenda for future work.