• Relational Coordination survey at the unit level for airlines
• Relational Coordination survey at the unit level for hospitals
• Relational Coordination survey at the individual patient level for hospitals

Related Websites

Events

• European Academy of Management Conference 2005
  Call for papers
  Track title: Relational Perspectives in Organization Studies
  
  Rapid changes in the composition and functioning of organizational life witnessed the emergence of new forms of organizations and ways of organizing. The creation of informal and network-like organizations, the shifting configurations of networks among groups of actors, the blurring of the boundaries of formal organizations as well as the changing employment relationship, shift our attention to the conceptualization of organizations as sets of dynamic relationships. Such an approach demands the employment of meso levels of analysis and the emergence of a relational perspective overcoming the problems of reification so that organizing could be seen as it is - an individual and group sense-making process taking place in a social context that is the product of constant and ongoing human production and interaction in organizational settings. The aim of this track therefore is to develop a language and perspective which allows us to speak of individuals and organizations in terms which are commensurate with meso level analysis, in which agency and structure are intertwined.
  
  In this way we hope to prevent the negative consequences of traditional approaches, which misrepresent the qualities of relational processes and distort the relationships between people and organization by theorizing people and organizations as entities independent of each other. Faced with the challenge of understanding organizations as sets of dynamic relationships, professional managers are in need of innovative approaches that will aid them accommodating these pressures. Aiming to address this emergent need, we welcome papers that conceptualize a number of organizational phenomena and current organizational developments with a view to allow academics and practitioners to share their cutting-edge and fresh insights into empirical, conceptual, and professional developments in the fields of organization science and human resource management. Involvement of both academic and practitioner communities in the track will promote better communication between them.
  
  Submissions to the track: Please follow the information on how to format and submit your paper as published on the EURAM 2005 conference web site (www.euram2005.de).
  
  Track Chairs:
  
  • Mustafa Ozbilgin, Centre for Business Management, Queen Mary, University of London, Mile End Road, London E1 4NS, UK Email: m.ozbilgin@qmul.ac.uk
  • Olivia Kyriakidou, Department of Business Administration, University of the Aegean, Chios 82100, Greece Email: o.kyriakidou@aegean.gr
  • Laura Costanzo, School of Management, University of Surrey, GU2 5XH, Guildford, Surrey, UK Email: l.costanzo@surrey.ac.uk
  Contact: Please copy in all three chairs in your communication
  
  General Conference Information: www.euram2005.de.
  
  
• EGOS Colloquium, Session on Relationship Maintenance:
  Call for papers:
  
  RELATIONSHIP MAINTENANCE - BETWEEN EXIT AND EXCELLENCE
  21th EGOS Colloquium, Berlin, Germany, June 30-July 2, 2005
  Deadline for submission of abstracts: January 6, 2005
  Convenors: John Child, Roy J. Lewicki, Guido Möllering, Antoinette Weibel
  
  In the past decade, organizational scholars have (re)discovered the importance of relationships within and between organizations. For example, in the field of organizational behaviour, it has long been recognised that levels of trust, solidarity, reciprocity and identification with co-workers and the organization as a whole impact key elements of organizational life. Organizational strategy nowadays builds on the idea that core competences are dependent on unique relationships within the firm, but the relational view highlights at the same time the strategic opportunities generated between firms through inter-organizational co-operation. In organization theory, new organizational forms are studied in which dyadic or multilateral relationships form the unit of analysis, i.e. alliances, partnerships, networks. And, last but not least, there is renewed methodological interest in the application of structural network analysis in organization studies.
  
  However, organizational research on relationships is underdeveloped in recognizing, first, the processual nature of relationships and, second, the problematic, even sinister, potential in any relationship. In other words, over time relationships develop recursively through practice, changing in quality and content, and going through ups and downs. At times, not least today, relationships can be the source of severe strain and inefficiency rather than satisfaction and success. Nevertheless, it is often neither possible nor immediately desirable to terminate relationships when they enter into a bad cycle. Instead, relationship maintenance needs to be understood as a continuous activity between exit and excellence, including efforts at repairing broken relationships, nurturing new relationships and reinforcing positive relationships. Relationship maintenance also means to deal with the positive or negative network effects of individual relationships, e.g. a lack of innovation due to a surfeit of trust.
  
  Relationships typically develop in a self-reinforcing process with increasing returns, lock-ins and irreversibility. Spirals of mutual distrust and exploitation can be observed in many relationships that, nonetheless, continue. Relationship maintenance enters here as a concept that indicates endogenous and exogenous possibilities for unlocking failing relationships not only on the part of managers but by any actor in an organizational context.
  
  The subtheme invites cutting-edge contributions that help to clarify conceptually, empirically or methodologically the processual nature of relationships, the causes and effects of positive and negative cycles within relationships, the persistence of less-than-excellent relationships, and above all the meaning and role of relationship maintenance within and between organizations. The subtheme encourages disciplinary variety and exploratory approaches, but expects papers with a strong theoretical grounding and clear ambition towards first-rate publication.
  
  Abstracts should be between 600-800 words and submitted via the EGOS web (http://www.egosnet.org).
  
  
• Oct. 2004, Positive relationships at work conference at University of Michigan: This is a book building conference that will produce an edited book in 2006 on Positive Relationships at Work. Here is the book outline. An integrative panel discussion on the book’s content was held on October 1, 2004, and an audio version of the talk is available from the ICOS webpage.

• International Network on Personal Relationships: http://myweb.uiowa.edu/blastd/

Suggested Readings
Jane Dutton’s Ph.D. course syllabus on Relationships and Organizations