EVENT SYSTEM THEORY: AN EVENT-ORIENTED APPROACH TO THE ORGANIZATIONAL SCIENCES

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Morgeson, Frederick P.; Mitchell, Terence R.; Liu, Dong
• 署名单位: Michigan State University; University of Washington; University of Washington Seattle; University System of Georgia; Georgia Institute of Technology
• 刊物名称: ACADEMY OF MANAGEMENT REVIEW
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0363-7425
• DOI: 10.5465/amr.2012.0099
• 发表日期: 2015
• 页码: 515-537
• 关键词: MULTILEVEL RESEARCH; STRATEGIC CHANGE; self-regulation; SENSEMAKING; work; teams; MODEL; time; duration; BEHAVIOR

摘要

Organizations are dynamic, hierarchically structured entities. Such dynamism is reflected in the emergence of significant events at every organizational level. Despite this fact, there has been relatively little discussion about how events become meaningful and come to impact organizations across space and time. We address this gap by developing event system theory, which suggests that events become salient when they are novel, disruptive, and critical (reflecting an event's strength). Importantly, events can originate at any hierarchical level and their effects can remain within that level or travel up or down throughout the organization, changing or creating new behaviors, features, and events. This impact can extend over time as events vary in duration and timing or as event strength evolves. Event system theory provides a needed shift in focus for organizational theory and research by developing specific propositions articulating the interplay among event strength and the spatial and temporal processes through which events come to influence organizations.