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RESISTING WHILST COMPLYING? A CASE STUDY OF A POWER STRUGGLE IN A BUSINESS SCHOOL

Rintamäki, Jukka LU and Alvesson, Mats LU (2023) In Academy of Management Learning and Education 22(2). p.257-273
Abstract

Business school faculty are frequently faced with management practices they find objectionable. Reactions vary, but compliance and hidden resistance are common responses. In this paper, we seek to understand compliance and hidden resistance as responses to objectionable management practices in business schools. To explore this problem, we present a case study of a business school where a new dean brought about aggressive and abrupt managerialist changes toward which faculty were broadly hostile. Faculty eventually failed to resist these changes and ended up resorting to exits and workplace disengagement while complying with management expectations regarding work outputs. To make sense of compliance and hidden resistance as responses to... (More)

Business school faculty are frequently faced with management practices they find objectionable. Reactions vary, but compliance and hidden resistance are common responses. In this paper, we seek to understand compliance and hidden resistance as responses to objectionable management practices in business schools. To explore this problem, we present a case study of a business school where a new dean brought about aggressive and abrupt managerialist changes toward which faculty were broadly hostile. Faculty eventually failed to resist these changes and ended up resorting to exits and workplace disengagement while complying with management expectations regarding work outputs. To make sense of compliance and hidden resistance as responses to objectionable management practices in business schools, we propose the following concepts: “mercenary mentality” and “resipliance” (a combination of expressing resistance attitudes to peers-and to self-and complying with management demands for work outputs). The presence of a mercenary mentality and the related tendency to resipliance-which we argue are both common in business schools-undermines the capacity for resistance against objectionable management practices at the workplace, reminding us that resistance is fragile and elusive.

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Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
author
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organization
publishing date
type
Contribution to journal
publication status
published
subject
in
Academy of Management Learning and Education
volume
22
issue
2
pages
17 pages
publisher
Academy of Management
external identifiers
  • scopus:85132672072
ISSN
1537-260X
DOI
10.5465/amle.2020.0070
language
English
LU publication?
yes
additional info
Funding Information: We would like to express our sincerest gratitude to the associate editor Gabrielle Durepos for her invaluable guidance, and to the three anonymous reviewers for their insightful input. Furthermore, we would like to thank the members of the LUMOS group at the Department of Business Administration at Lund University and the Institute for International Management at Loughborough University London for their comments and feedback on earlier drafts of the paper. We also received vital feedback to earlier versions from Amit Nigam and André Spicer—we are very grateful to you both. We would like to thank the Jan Wal-lander and Tom Hedelius Research Foundation for providing financial support for this research. Finally, we would like to thank the interview participants who made this research possible. Publisher Copyright: © Academy of Management Learning & Education 2023.
id
50cd3c26-ad28-4490-8a7f-c5858b02c4fc
date added to LUP
2024-01-11 14:02:17
date last changed
2024-01-11 14:03:50
@article{50cd3c26-ad28-4490-8a7f-c5858b02c4fc,
  abstract     = {{<p>Business school faculty are frequently faced with management practices they find objectionable. Reactions vary, but compliance and hidden resistance are common responses. In this paper, we seek to understand compliance and hidden resistance as responses to objectionable management practices in business schools. To explore this problem, we present a case study of a business school where a new dean brought about aggressive and abrupt managerialist changes toward which faculty were broadly hostile. Faculty eventually failed to resist these changes and ended up resorting to exits and workplace disengagement while complying with management expectations regarding work outputs. To make sense of compliance and hidden resistance as responses to objectionable management practices in business schools, we propose the following concepts: “mercenary mentality” and “resipliance” (a combination of expressing resistance attitudes to peers-and to self-and complying with management demands for work outputs). The presence of a mercenary mentality and the related tendency to resipliance-which we argue are both common in business schools-undermines the capacity for resistance against objectionable management practices at the workplace, reminding us that resistance is fragile and elusive.</p>}},
  author       = {{Rintamäki, Jukka and Alvesson, Mats}},
  issn         = {{1537-260X}},
  language     = {{eng}},
  number       = {{2}},
  pages        = {{257--273}},
  publisher    = {{Academy of Management}},
  series       = {{Academy of Management Learning and Education}},
  title        = {{RESISTING WHILST COMPLYING? A CASE STUDY OF A POWER STRUGGLE IN A BUSINESS SCHOOL}},
  url          = {{http://dx.doi.org/10.5465/amle.2020.0070}},
  doi          = {{10.5465/amle.2020.0070}},
  volume       = {{22}},
  year         = {{2023}},
}