Exploring the Intra-organizational Journey of a Vague Management

Concept through a Translation Theory Lens

Åsa Devine and Michaela Sandell

School of Business and Economics, Linnaeus University, 351 95 Växjö, Sweden

Keywords: Contextualization, De-contextualization, Knowledge Platform, Recipient Context, Source Context,

Translation Theory, Vague Management Concept.

Abstract: In the quest for change, management at times introduces vague management concepts in organizations. The

use of such a concept instigates translation journeys, which may end in affecting an organizations competitive

advantage. While performance outcomes of change are pertinent, it is the journey towards change that is

emphasized here based on translation theory. This study explores the intra-organizational journey of the vague

concept “knowledge platform” within a business school. The empirical data originates from 102 written

documents dating from 2009 to 2018 produced by faculty and departmental levels. The data coding reveals

six distinct subseries which together depicts how the knowledge platform passes through phases of de-

contextualization and contextualization as it travels iteratively between the source and recipient contexts.

1 INTRODUCTION

An organization’s management implements changes

in order to adapt to the demands of the environment.

This includes adaptation not only to external

conditions, but also adaptation within the organiza-

tion to comply with the changes that management

sees as an appropriate response to external pressures.

For example, in the wake of adapting to quality

assurance programs of various kinds, it has become

important to be able to clearly show the connection

between research and education. In an attempt to

improve how research and education is organized and

managed within a business school at a Swedish

university, the concept knowledge platform was

introduced. This constituted a change for the

organization. Change for any reason gives rise to a

phase of adaptation, resistance, and even cynicism

(Grama and Todericiu, 2016), which management

must overcome to implement change. This task is at

times made even more complicated by implementing

ambiguous management terminology in the change

process (Örtenblad, 2005).

In this paper, the ambiguous management concept

of knowledge platform is used as focus. While

choosing to have knowledge platform as an object of

analysis, this study makes no claim of shedding light

on definition and scope of the concept as a

phenomenon. Instead the appeal of the concept as an

object of analysis, rests merely within its

ambiguousness. Evidence of the ambiguousness can

be detected in the comparatively sparse referencing to

the knowledge platform concept in the literature. In

those instances where knowledge platforms are

explicitly mentioned, the level of abstraction appears

high. For example, Cheng (2002) describes key

features of a knowledge platform to include the

accumulation, dissemination and application of

knowledge. Grönroos (2000) further suggests that a

knowledge platform can be understood to develop

through dialogue with parties that trust one another.

Whether the knowledge platform concept is

introduced and developed despite or because of its

vagueness (Örtenblad, 2005) there is a certain level of

risk involved by management doing so. The risk

associated originate when “the actors involved appear

to lack any clear perception of what it actually means”

(Örtenblad, 2005, pp. 46). Because of this lack of

mutually held meaning, the organizational change

situation, which is uncertain in itself, not least as

related to the outcome of the process in terms of

organizational performance (Kuusela et al. 2017),

gains another dimension of uncertainty in

terminology and goals.

In this study the translation theory is used as the

theoretical frame allowing for exploration of the

implementation process of knowledge platform in an

organization. While conceptually intriguing,

Devine, Å. and Sandell, M.

Exploring the Intra-organizational Journey of a Vague Management Concept through a Translation Theory Lens.

DOI: 10.5220/0008053100560061

In Proceedings of the 11th International Joint Conference on Knowledge Discovery, Knowledge Engineering and Knowledge Management (IC3K 2019), pages 56-61

ISBN: 978-989-758-382-7

additional empirical studies of the translation process

are needed. In particular, empirical studies regarding

how of a concept´s journey, e.g. the journey of a

knowledge platform, are highlighted as overlooked

research areas in need of more research attention

(Helin and Babri, 2015; Helin and Sandström, 2007).

Over the past 30 years the translation theory has

evolved into three dispersed theoretical versions

including the actor-network-theory (ANT), the

knowledge-based theory, and the Scandinavian

institutionalism (see Wæraas and Nielsen, 2016). In

this study the Scandinavian institutionalism branch

was chosen for primarily two reasons. The first reason

being that this version allows for researching

translations were the object is either classified as a

management idea or practice (Wæraas and Nielsen,

2016). Secondly, there has been a recent rise of

interest in the Scandinavian institutionalism branch

(Wæraas and Nielsen, 2016) indicating particular

contemporary relevancy. Further and more exactly,

the proposed re-conceptualization of the translation

theory offered by Røvik (2016) encompasses the

particular frame of reference. The appeal of Røvik´s

contemporary model lies in its instrumental nature

and while the theory was developed around intra-

organizational knowledge transferring it appears

particularly intriguing also for studying traveling of

abstract management concepts. Contributions in this

research vein should therefore pave way not only for

fruitful research focused on explaining organizational

heterogeneity and competitive advantage, but also

related to how to manage translations for the sake of

reaching particular goals (Røvik, 2016).

Consequently, by researching the organizational

process of implementing the vague management

concept of knowledge platform within an

organization using the translation theory as a frame,

further knowledge can be gained as far as the how of

such process. This leads to the purpose, which is to

explore the intra-organizational journey of the

ambiguous management concept knowledge platform

using a translation theory lens. The paper continues

with a theoretical explication of the translation

process theory, methodological discussions, case

description and analysis. The paper ends with a

discussion and suggestion for further studies.

2 TRANSLATION PROCESS

THEORY

The Scandinavian institutionalism school stipulates

that each translation is a unique process (Wæraas and

Nielsen, 2016) by which ideas are transformed to

local contexts as they travel in time and space (Røvik,

2011; Wæraas and Nielsen, 2016). Because of the

complexity of the translation process (Helin and

Babri, 2015) a given outcome is difficult to predict

(Wæraas and Nielsen, 2016), but can be assumed to

contain some level of heterogeneity as the object

changes (Andersen and Røvik, 2015; Wæraas and

Nielsen, 2016) during its journey. According to the

re-conceptualized translation model proposed by

Røvik (2016) the translation journey is deconstructed

into the four elements of object, phases, contexts, and

translators. These elements together determine the

translation journey.

The object can be thought of as a tangible idea

(Wahid, 2013), a code (Helin and Sandström, 2008),

model, concept or text (Wahid, 2013) that is

embarking on a journey within or between

organizations. A deconstruction of an object is

suggested to reveal a core (Røvik, 2016) and

additional parts. A complimentary divide,

particularly relevant in the case of vague management

ideas, would reveal a label and content (Örtenblad,

2005). An object can be fully or partially translated

into different versions. The degree of

transformability-freedom of the object, i.e. extent of

transforming the object into different local versions

(Andersen and Røvik, 2015), depends to a large

extent, on the solidity of the core (Røvik, 2016). The

more solid the core, fever degrees of freedom of

transformability.

There are two translation-phases, one of which is

referred to as de-contextualization and the other

contextualization. In the de-contextualization phase a

contextual version of the object is translated into a

rather context-free abstract format. Therefore, de-

contextualization can be understood as transforming

a practical application of the object (i.e. the practice

of how something is managed or organized) to a

generalized description of how it ought to be done.

Contextualization, on the other hand, implies that an

abstract object is translated into a version that makes

sense in a local context (Røvik, 2016). Thus, in the

contextualization phase, local relevancy and fit are

key terms often accompanied by a dose of conflict,

confusion and ultimately compromise. Such

compromise is due, in many cases, to it not being

reasonable to assume full compatibility between an

already existing local version of the object and the

abstract object.

The contexts of a traveling object include the

source and recipient contexts, each with its own set of

preferred practices (Røvik, 2016). The source context

is where the de-contextualization first originates

Exploring the Intra-organizational Journey of a Vague Management Concept through a Translation Theory Lens

resulting in a more or less abstract object. Therefore,

the source context is where the initiation of the

translation process of the object is first encountered

(Røvik, 2016). The recipient context on the other

hand is to be perceived as the target context which

receives the traveling object from the source context.

It is in the recipient context that the contextualization

takes place, translating the object into a version that

fits the local context. The ease of the translation and

extent of transformation as an object travels from the

source to the recipient, is determined by the similarity

and compatibility of the two contexts. The larger the

differences between the source and recipient contexts,

the harder it is to manage the translations, e.g. in large

organizations, across organizations, across national

boundaries, and across cultures.

An object does not automatically travel. It can enter

the local context and remain impassive and reside as an

object detached from practical applicability at a high

hierarchical level (Røvik, 2016). In this phase the

object can fade away or after a period of time be

brought into practice (Røvik, 2011). For any object to

start and continue to travel across contexts, actors in

the source and recipient contexts need to be active

(Wæraas and Nielsen, 2016). Pertinent roles

shouldered by these active actors include that of a

translator and gatekeeper. A translator, also known as

a mediator (Helin and Babri, 2015), is an actor who is

involved in the translation process of the objects. The

translator can reject (Røvik, 2011) the object, due, for

example, to value-based incompatibility between the

source and the recipient contexts, or adapt the object,

and through this process reshape (Røvik, 2016) it to fit

with the local context (Røvik, 2011). This adaptation

can range from a full adoption, with a minimal

adaptation to a high degree of adaptation within a

selective adoption.

3 METHOD AND CASE

DESCRIPTION

The case setting for this study is a mid-sized business

school at a Swedish university, an organizational

entity that has initiated change through introduction

of knowledge platforms. Thus, the knowledge

platform is treated as the object. Empirical data was

collected from secondary sources in terms of written

documents originating from faculty and departmental

levels. Each of these two levels hosted a number of

units, i.e. the faculty level including the Dean, faculty

board, faculty council and educational council.

Correspondingly, the department level included

heads of department, program directors, and members

of the department. The faculty level was treated as the

source context, while the department level was

considered the recipient context. All available written

documents originating from these two contexts were

gathered, with the caveat that the documents should

be accessible to the whole organization or at least a

subsection of the organization. Both authors searched

through archived notes, protocols from meetings and

formal policy decisions as well as going through web

posts and group emails. A total of 102 written

documents with the common denominator they all

mentioned the concept of knowledge platform was

found. The earliest document dated from 2009 and the

cutoff point being September 2018.

The coding of the material found in the gathered

documents, was largely inspired by Thietart (2016) in

terms of detecting events and patterns of activities.

Assessing the selected documents, a knowledge

platform occurrence was coded as an event if the

concept knowledge platform was mentioned

explicitly in a document. All events were listed in a

database in chronological order, which allowed the

researchers to manually group together events into

sets of activities, i.e. patterns, over a particular period

of time. These patterns were detected based on the

importance of the events, i.e. how critical an event

appeared in retrospect, and the context in which the

events originated, i.e. number of events originating in

the source versus recipient context within a particular

time period. Such pattern-matching allowed for the

recognition of six possible subseries, each separated

by a critical occurrence, also referred to as a

“structural break” or “unexpected shift” (Thietart,

2016, pp. 778). The consecutive steps involved

assigning a descriptive name to the subserie and to

add depth to each subseries by explicating

characteristics, i.e. who and what, of each subseries.

The description of each subseries was inspired by,

while not restricted to, the work of Hopson and

Adams (1966).

The coding was done by both authors in several

sessions, coding and recoding, going over and

reevaluating until a pattern which made sense to both

authors emerged.

4 INTRA-ORGANIZATIONAL

TRAVEL OF THE OBJECT

KNOWLEDGE PLATFORM

The beginning of the knowledge platform journey

within the case organization lasted for about seven

KMIS 2019 - 11th International Conference on Knowledge Management and Information Systems

years and can be described as a tentative attempt to

introduce the concept confined primarily to the

faculty level. It is not until the second subseries,

which lasted for eight months, that the object actually

starts its journey. The consecutive four subseries

lasted between two to five months, indicating an

increase in number of events and overall activity. In

the remainder of this case analysis, a more nuanced

picture of each subseries is presented. The case

analysis ends with a visualization depicting the paths

that encompass the intra-organizational translation

journey (Figure 1).

4.1 Gestation

December 2009- December 2016 (subseries 1). The

term knowledge platform was mentioned explicitly in

various documents. However, the object was not

defined, which indicates a state of infancy and lack of

a core as there is a label but no content. To exemplify,

the faculty board expressed

that “teachers and

researchers work in knowledge platforms with

responsibility for program and courses”. During this

period the documents originated almost exclusively at

faculty level, thus, the faculty level was the source

context. The compatibility between the source and

recipient context cannot be assessed because the

recipient context was not active. Thus, this subseries

lacked a traveling object, and consequently active

translators, leaving the object to reside in a dormant

state in the source context, detached from practical

applicability.

4.2 Initiation

December 2016- August 2017 (subseries 2). In this

subserie the faculty level can be described as

demonstrating a certain level of excitement with

regards to knowledge platform formation, e.g. the

object was “highlighted as a prioritized area” by the

faculty board. A broad description of a knowledge

platform was also provided by the faculty level

meaning that an early abstraction of the object was

available, “The meaning of the concept knowledge

platform is that it gathers resources and functions as

a production resource which make up a component in

[University X´s] knowledge environment in

Vision and strategy for 2015-2020, School of Business

and Economics

Operational plan 2017-2019, School of Business and

Economics

Notes from the Educational council 2017-10-23, School

of Business and Economics

accordance with the mission regarding co-creation”.

Thus, the label is at this point made available together

with a content description. The object reached the

department level but remained passive.

Consequently, no contextualization occurred, as the

actors in the recipient context were not active.

4.3 Turbulence

September 2017- November 2017 (subseries 3). The

object became embodied through the announcement

of an actual knowledge platform, while the content of

the concept knowledge platform still remained

largely ambiguous. Thus, while the faculty level

entered an exhilarated state, the departmental level

could best be described as entering a state of

uncertainty. The subseries was characterized by

fluctuation between the source and recipient context,

not least due to the invitation from the faculty board

expressed as “input to the knowledge platforms is

welcomed”. Actors in the recipient context, i.e.

departmental level, were active in the translation

process enabling the object to enter its first

contextualization phase.

4.4 The Rise from Below and Back

November 2017- January 2018 (subseries 4). A

contextualized version of the object was developed at

department level and a letter of intent regarding the

formation of knowledge platforms

was sent, hence

the object travelled back to the faculty level. The

translator(s) residing in the source context were active

when receiving the contextualized version of the

object from the recipient context. Shortly thereafter,

a de-contextualized and expounded version of the

object was presented and communicated as a formal

decision taken by the Dean and registered

. There was

a considerable degree of discrepancy between the

new de-contextualized version and existing

contextualized versions. The recipient context

passively received the updated version of the object,

i.e. an object with a label and substantially more

precise content.

Letter of intent was sent from department to the Dean,

2017-11-14

Definition of knowledge platform at the School of

Business and Economics, 2017-11-29

Exploring the Intra-organizational Journey of a Vague Management Concept through a Translation Theory Lens

Figure 1: The intra-organizational journey of the knowledge platform concept consisting of six subseries. For each subseries

a descriptive name, phase (de-contextualization versus contextualization), and contexts are indicated. The overall pattern of

development is also shown, alternating between the source and recipient context. The length of each subserie reflects the

number of events (mapped per context).

4.5 Becalmed

January 2018- April 2018 (subseries 5). Confusion

reigned as the recipient context realized that the de-

contextualized description received from the faculty

level was in conflict with the contextualized objects

developed on the faculty level. The conflict caused

havoc with the translation process due to the mixed

messages sent from the faculty level. That is, attempts

to add details to the de-contextualized version of the

object appeared conflicting when compared to

previous translations, resulting in the existence of

incompatible versions. The source context continued

to discuss “issues of importance of problems to be

solved”

with already acknowledged knowledge

platforms, while other faculty members were

encouraged to partake in the knowledge platform

formation process as such involvement was explained

to be “necessary, important and challenging”

4.6 Ongoing Contextualization

April 2018- September 2018 (subseries 6). The

faculty level formally invites recipients at

departmental level to present their versions of the

object. Such hearings proceed with an external

evaluator present, sending a signal of priority and

urgency. Thus, the faculty level is involved in further

exploration and testing of alternative knowledge

platforms since it is “expected that the remaining

platforms have been formed”

before the end of 2018.

The recipient context appeared partially recovered

and once again active in the translation process, but

the renewed involvement contained a measure of

confusion. Hence, while the contextualization phase

remained on-going the confusion materialized in a

number of questions regarding the object. These

questions were generated at departmental level and

brought to the faculty level for clarity.

The Dean on March, 2018-03-29

Ibid

5 DISCUSSION

The journey of knowledge platforms within the

studied business school has not come to an end and can

consequently not be evaluated as to its completed

translation. Regardless, there are contributions as far as

how a vague management concept travels within an

organization. The case description with its six

subseries allows for an overall view of how an intra-

organizational change, distilled with a high degree of

uncertainty, is unfolding. The case analysis reveals that

the change process of forming knowledge platforms

consists of several iterative sub-processes causing the

translation process to be of a non-linear nature.

The reiterative process of knowledge platform

formation can be understood to stem from a certain

level of conflict and confusion detected while the

knowledge platform travelled between source and

recipient. Interestingly, while Røvik (2016) suggest

that it is in the contextualization phase where conflict

and confusion occur, the material in this study reveals

that conflict and confusion indeed also can appear in

the de-contextualization phase. In the subseries Rise

from below and back as well Becalmed it can be seen

that confusion and conflict also occur in the de-

contextualization. A possible reason for this is that the

object itself, i.e. the management concept, is so vague

and ambiguous that not even the source can de-

contextualize it without experiencing conflict and

confusion.

The vagueness of the concept implies an initial

low solidity of the core. Thus, it can be assumed that

as long as the core of the object, here the vague

management concept of knowledge platform, is not

firmly set, the freedom to transform the object into

local versions exists. When such an opportunity

appears, local actors become heavily involved in the

translation of the object, as can be seen in the material

in this study.

School of Business and Economics Operational report

2017, 2018-04-09

Gestation Initiation

Turbulence Rise from below and back Becalmed Ongoing

contextualization

Phase: Lack of translation De-contextualization Contextualization Contextulization & Lack of translation Contextualization

Context:

initiation de-contextualization

Source

Recipient

KMIS 2019 - 11th International Conference on Knowledge Management and Information Systems

The mapping of the translation process reveals the

broadest roles of actors present on faculty and

departmental levels. While a more nuanced picture of

the individual actors involved in the process is not

offered here, their general patterns of behavior in

terms of being passive, rejecting, adapting and

reshaping what a knowledge platform is, can be

discerned. The translation process explored in this

case is affected by the fact that the contextualization

phase depicted in this study restrictively originates

from documents. A more intricate picture could have

been painted if other types of source material, e.g.

interviews, were included. Also, the inclusion of

other actors from other organizational layers, e.g. top

management-team level, or other stakeholder groups

such as media and NGOs.

While this case is based on a mid-sized

organization where the employees are used to having

their voices heard and opinions listened to, one could

assuredly conduct a similar study in organizations of

other organizational behaviors and well as other sizes.

A reason to embark on such a study could purely be

to see if all parties in an organization speaks the same

language. Especially if there is an object of interest

that has a low core solidity, one could assume that

there would be a difference between how the source

and recipient context interpret the object, at least

initially. An interpretation of the object with the help

of translation theory could be of interest for ease of

communication, but also the translation process itself

can show values and interests in the organization,

which might not be formalized or even voiced.

This study suggests that the vagueness of the

concept affects the translation journey, thus it would

be interesting to learn how other vague management

concepts endeavor on their intra-organizational

journeys.

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Exploring the Intra-organizational Journey of a Vague Management Concept through a Translation Theory Lens