Considering recent calls for change towards a more liveable tourism academia, critical participatory action research is combined with duoethnography to develop The Academic Line—a humorous comic project about academic life. Traditional theories of humour are used to leverage the effectiveness of comics as communicative devices and explored how and to what extent the project promoted solidarity, reflexivity, well-being, and change. This study reveals the concrete commitment to fostering change within and potentially improving academia, and to experiment with a form of communication, which is still underexplored in the scholarly sphere but fruitfully applied in other contexts to raise awareness of and prompt discussion about crucially important issues.
This study investigated perceptions of organizational change management among executive coaches working with British higher-education leaders and factors that make leaders effective when managing change. This basic qualitative research used semi-structured interviews with eight executive coaches selected through purposeful sampling. As main challenges to efficient, inclusive change management, participants mentioned leaders’ lack of a strategic vision or plan, lack of leadership and future leader development programs, and lack of clarity in decision-making. They recognized that leaders’ academic and professional profiles are positively viewed and said that, with coaching and support in leadership and strategic planning, these people can inspire the academic community and promote positive change. Additional emphasis was given to the role of coaching in the development of key soft skills (honesty, responsibility, resiliency, creativity, proactivity, and empathy, among others), which are necessary for effective change management and leadership in higher education. The paper’s implications have two aspects. First, the lessons of the actual explicit content of the coaches’ observations (challenges to efficient change management and views of leaders); second, the implications of these observations (how coaching can help and what leaders need).
While digitalisation requires facilities management (FM) organisations to change at an increasing rate, little is known about the mechanisms that create ownership and enable individuals to implement changes in everyday FM practice. In this study, these mechanisms are explored from a stewardship perspective. The purpose of this paper is to provide insights in the dynamics of organisational change in FM by analysing how stewardship behaviour leads to change.A process model for implementing organisational change is constructed, based on existing theoretical insights from stewardship and intrapreneurship literature. The model is evaluated in a case study through analysis of critical events. Interviewing was the key data collection method.The process model gives an event-driven explanation of change through psychological ownership. Analysis of multiple critical events suggests that the model explains intra-organisational as well as inter-organisational change. The case data further suggests that, compared to intra-organisational change, tailored relational and motivational support is more important for inter-organisational change because of the higher risks involved. Job crafting emerged as an unanticipated finding that offers interesting prospects for future FM research.The process model offers guidance for leaders in FM organisations on providing tailored support to internal and external employees during periods of organisational change.Stewardship and intrapreneurship are combined to provide insights on organisational change in FM. The study demonstrates how intrapreneurial behaviour and stewardship behaviour can be linked to create innovation within and between organisations.
Many companies struggle with their workplace strategy and corporate real-estate strategy, especially when they have a high percentage of knowledge workers. How to balance employee satisfaction and productivity with the cost of offices.This project focused on developing methods and tools to design customer journeys and predict the impact of investments and changes on user satisfaction with the work environment. The tools, including a game and simulation tool, allowed to focus on the needs of particular subgroups of employees while at the same time keeping an overview on the satisfaction and perceived productivity of all employees and guests. We applied Quality Function Deployment techniques to understand how needs of different types of users of (activity-based) office environments can catered for in smart customer-centric office design.
