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Summary Every Article Organization Theory
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Summary articlesWhat is Organization Theory?
Whetten, D. A. (1989). What Constitutes a Theoretical Contribution? Academy of Management
Review, 14(4), 490-495
This article is organized around three key questions:
- What are the building blocks of theory development?
- What is a legitimate value-added contribution to theory development? and
- What factors are considered in judging conceptual papers?
According to theory-development authorities (e.g., Dubin, 1978), a complete theory must contain
four essential elements, which are described in the following paragraphs.
What are the building blocks of theory development?
What. Which factors (variables, constructs, concepts) logically should be considered as part of the
explanation of the social or individual phenomena of interest? Two criteria exist for judging the
extent to which we have included the "right" factors: comprehensiveness and parsimony. It is better
to start with more factors and eliminate some of them.
- Comprehensiveness: Are all relevant factors included?
- Parsimony: Should some factors be deleted because they add little additional value to our
understanding?
How. Having identified a set of factors, the researcher's next question is, How are they related?
Operationally this involves using "arrows" to connect the "boxes." Such a step adds order to the
conceptualization by explicitly delineating patterns. In addition, it typically introduces causality. The
more complex the relationships, the better it is to use a model; visual representation often clarifies
the author’s thinking and increases comprehension.
Why. What are the underlying psychological, economic, or social dynamics that justify the selection
of factors and the proposed causal relationships? This rationale constitutes the theory's assumptions-
the theoretical glue that welds the model together.
To summarize thus far: What and How describe; only Why explains. What and How provide a
framework for interpreting patterns, or discrepancies, in our empirical observations. Together, the
three have to make sure a theory includes a plausible, cogent explanation for why we should expect
relationships in our data (description and explanation).
Last, we have who, where and when. These conditions place limitations on the propositions
generated from a theoretical model.
- Theorists Should be encouraged to think about whether their theoretical effects vary over
time, either because other time-dependent variables are theoretically important because the
theoretical effect is unstable for some reason. Sensitivity to context is especially important
for theories based on experience.
Although it is important for theorists to be sensitive to context, the Who, Where, and When
of a theory are typically discovered through sub- sequent tests of the What, How and, Why.
- Contextualist perspective Meaning is derived from context.
,What is a legitimate value-added contribution to theory development?
Most organizational scholars are not going to generate a new theory from scratch. Instead, they
generally work on improving what already exists. In that context, it is often difficult to judge what
constitutes enough of a contribution to warrant publication in a theory journal like AMR.
The conditions we just saw can be applied to determine if a theory can be useful to use for further
work. You take the following steps:
What and How One way to demonstrate the value of proposed change is a list of factors (what).
This is necessary to identify how this change affects the accepted relationships between the variables
(how). Just as a list of variables does not constitute a theory. Relationships, not lists, are the domain
of theory.
Why It involves borrowing a perspective from other fields, which encourages altering our
metaphors and gestalts in ways that challenge the underlying rationales supporting accepted
theories. This often leads to broad conceptualization of affected theories.
Who, When, Where This often applies to limitations of research, that researchers can use to
renew their model. Conversely, applying an old model to a new setting and showing that is works as
expected is not instructive by itself.
Three broad themes underlie this section:
1. Proposed improvements addressing only a single element of an existing theory are seldom
judged to be sufficient.
So, critiques should focus on multiple elements of the theory.
2. Theoretical critiques should marshal compelling evidence.
This evidence can be:
o Logical: The theory is not internally consistent
o Empirical: Its predictions are inconsistent with the data
o Epistemological: Its assumptions are invalid
3. And third, theoretical critiques should propose remedies or alternatives.
What factors are considered in judging conceptual papers?
To judge a paper, we can answer 7 questions:
1. What's new? Does the paper make a significant, value-added contribution to current
thinking?
2. So what? Will the theory likely change the practice of organizational science in this area?
3. Why so? Are the underlying logic and supporting evidence compelling?
4. Well done? Does the paper reflect seasoned thinking, conveying completeness and
thoroughness?
5. Done well? Is the paper well written?
6. Why now? Is this topic of contemporary interest to scholars in this area?
7. Who cares? What percentage of academic readers are interested in this topic?
, Mayer, K. J., & Sparrowe, R. T. (2013). Integrating Theories in AMJ Articles. Academy of Management
Journal, 56(4), 917–922.
Our goal is to examine different approaches for integrating theories and discuss how to do it in a way
that maximizes the chance that integration will provide novel insights that will influence future
research and ultimately management practice. There are 4 types of ways to integrate a theory:
1. Single phenomenon, two theoretical perspectives (two theories have the same dependent variable)
Status explanation perspective = Members look for cues of task-relevant expertise, that shape their
expectations and interactions – leading to one member being the expert in the hierarchy.
Self-categorization theory = Members interact to shape an ideal group member; the more one
impersonates this, the greater the chance to become leader.
Two conditions are helpful for succeeding is this type of theory integration:
1. The effort needs to respect the foundational assumptions of each theory and resolve any
disparities as they apply to the domain of the integration
2. How each theory will be utilized and why each theory alone could not address the research
question must be clearly articulated.
2. One phenomenon, seemingly disparate theoretical perspectives
This also consists of a common fundament of two perspectives, but it begins by highlighting the
differences and then combining these in a synthesis.
There are three conditions that are necessary to be effective:
1. Both theories need to speak to the same, or highly similar, phenomena.
2. It must be possible to frame the relationship between the two perspectives in terms of a
meaningful opposition. To be persuasive, the opposition should not be forced or artificial
but, instead, reflect genuine differences in emphasis.
3. Within the opposition there need to be points of commonality between the two
perspectives, and those points constitute the basis for productive dialogue.
3. Applying one theory to the domain of another theory
A third way to integrate theories might involve two theoretical perspectives that speak to different
phenomena, but the application of one theory to the domain of the other can lend novel insight.
Two conditions here are important:
1. There should be a clearly articulated link between the theory and the new domain that
allows for productive dialogue.
2. The basic assumptions of the theory and the new domain either need to be compatible, or
the integration effort must find a way to overcome any incompatible assumptions.
4. Streams of research sharing a similar explanatory account
Explanatory account = Processes or mechanisms through which antecedents are held to have their
effects on outcomes (Antecedents: A thing that existed before or logically precedes another).
When multiple streams of research share a common explanatory account, there may be a basis for
dialogue.
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