Abstract This paper examines how embodied, situated and relational experiences outside‐the‐classroom can open space for epistemic dislocations in Management Education under conditions of ecological crisis. Drawing on a qualitative pedagogical experience in a sustainability course in Brazil, informed by Design‐Based Research—whose assumptions of control, design and predictability we critically question–we explore conditions under which radical imaginaries may emerge through such experiences. Students engaged in encounters with human and non‐human others that generated discomfort and tension with habitual ways of knowing, opening possibilities for the emergence of (dis)enchanted imaginaries of Nature and (de)colonial imaginaries. These dynamics were intensified through situated and embodiment engagements, which at times gave rise to epistemic dislocations, or moments in which established ways of knowing lose their capacity to organize experience as alternative imaginaries become available. Those dislocations created temporary openings for participants to re‐examine their understandings of Nature, coloniality and socio‐ecological relations, remaining susceptible to reabsorption into dominant managerial frames. We contribute to climate‐oriented pedagogy by introducing Unmanagement Education, a reflexive pedagogical approach grounded in non‐mastery, embodiment and situated relationality, that may unsettle instituted imaginaries, opening space for epistemic dislocations to emerge under conditions of ecological crisis.
Abstract Digitalization has opposing effects on cybersecurity: While new digital technologies can strengthen security capabilities, they simultaneously expand potential attack surfaces. To determine which effect dominates, we analyse 9606 US firm‐years (2006–2023) with 543 documented breaches and find that increased digitalization, measured through 10‐K business descriptions, significantly raises the likelihood of future cyber breaches. A one‐standard‐deviation increase in digitalization corresponds to up to a 10 percentage point higher breach probability, driven primarily by organizational rather than technological dimensions. Expert auditors and cybersecurity disclosure reduce breach likelihood, but their protective effect attenuates as digitalization rises; that of board and C‐suite technology expertise instead strengthens. These findings qualify the protective role of conventional monitoring in highly digitalized firms and point to a repositioning of cybersecurity governance from external monitoring towards digital expertise embedded in strategic decision‐making.
Abstract This paper examines how, and under what conditions, the increasing presence of highly skilled local employees (HSLEs) within subsidiaries of developed‐country multinational enterprises (DCMNEs) influences incumbent local inventors’ external collaborative innovation. Adopting a power dependence perspective, we propose that incumbent local inventors are more likely to engage in external than internal collaborative innovation in response to the increasing presence of HSLEs. Successful external collaborative innovation enhances incumbent local inventors’ bargaining power by enabling them to gain stronger positions within external networks critical to DCMNEs’ innovation and to access alternative employment opportunities. We further contend that the positive relationship between the increasing presence of HSLEs and incumbent local inventors’ external collaborative innovation is strengthened by the boundary‐spanning characteristics of the management hierarchies, such as cross‐cultural CEOs and interlocking directors. Our analysis of DCMNE subsidiaries operating in China provides empirical support for these predictions. This research offers novel and important insights into collaborating‐by‐hiring, highlighting the increasing presence of HSLEs as a competitive mechanism for interorganizational collaborative innovation and emphasizing the strategic importance of externally leveraging the knowledge and expertise of incumbent inventors.
Abstract Business and management studies comprise distinct epistemic communities that frequently do not interact or collaborate. While this has been explained as paradigm incommensurability, construct ambiguity or the variance–process, this CrossRoads article sets out a less commonly invoked source of difference: how our theories conceptualize time. This includes assumptions about whether the future is determined or open (temporal openness), whether and how change takes place (temporal directionality) and the appropriate timescales and detail for analysis (temporal duration). To illustrate the importance of these three temporal dimensions, influential traditions in strategy, entrepreneurship, institutional theory, process studies, population ecology, real‐options and scenario planning are mapped. The mapping demonstrates that many temporal differences between epistemic communities are differences of degree that may offer productive tensions for collaborative approaches, even though some may remain difficult to reconcile. Through a set of diagnostic questions, this CrossRoads piece offers a framework for interdisciplinary temporal brokerage within and beyond business and management.
Abstract This study examines whether and how RME can be performed as an epistemic object to broaden business schools’ education on climate change. The research builds on a qualitative case study involving 10 Finnish business schools. The analysis reveals that RME is performed as both an epistemic object and a boundary object, with different implications for its embeddedness within institutions. Our findings show how accreditations have introduced RME as a boundary object enforcing performativity around sustainability themes yet enabling disciplines to maintain their distinct or limited roles. At the same time, RME is met with both resistance and compliance, depending on how well the object fits with disciplinary boundaries and career trajectories. Lastly, as an epistemic object, RME encourages co‐reflexivity, which is essential for climate‐proofing business schools. We discuss the possibilities of a hybrid orientation of RME as both a boundary object and an epistemic object for enforcing climate‐orientation in management education.
