Call for Papers

Much of organizational studies implicitly assume that the appropriate criteria for judging organizations are efficiency and effectiveness, whether that is in the interest of greater shareholder value or even the interests of employee liberation. However, art and design suggest another criteria for judgment: aesthetics. Designers seek to create things that not only work efficiently and effectively, but also are beautiful. Judging by the success of Apple (and their desire to make things that are beautiful), this may be somewhat important in today’s world. Indeed, as Taylor (2013: 79) says:

Although there is nothing wrong with being efficient and effective, it is a low bar to aim for. Beauty is a good in itself (Hanfling, 1992), whereas efficiency and effectiveness are generally thought of as a means to achieve an end (such as optimizing the use of scarce resources). If we are to advance management practice, we need to question the assumption (Alvesson & Sandberg, 2011) that the goal should be instrumental efficiency and effectiveness and aim higher, to aim for beauty.

Of course, it is not only physical products that can be judged on aesthetic grounds. Although modern organizations may be characterized by "an absence of beauty" (Ottensmeyer, 1996: 189), and even an absence of felt aesthetic experience (Carter & Jackson, 2000; Taylor, 2002) it is possible to find and research beautiful action (e.g. Taylor, 2013). And the beautiful (Ramirez, 1991) and the ugly are only two of many possible aesthetic categories (Strati, 1992), such as the disgusting (Pelzer, 2002) and the sublime (Ladkin, 2006) that we might want to consider.

Possible themes are (but are not restricted to):

• Case studies of the beautiful, the ugly, the sublime, the grotesque, the elegant (and other aesthetic categories) in organizations
• The embodied experience of different aesthetic categories
• The relational experience of different aesthetic categories
• Methodological issues in researching aesthetic experience, e.g. how do we collect and represent it, and how do we assess quality
• Philosophic groundings of aesthetic categories (e.g. how the sublime is different from the beautiful (e.g. Ladkin, 2006, vs. Ladkin, 2008) and why that is important for organizations
• Aesthetic categories and organizational phenomena, e.g. beautiful leadership, grotesque strategy, elegant structure, comic marketing, ugly decision-making

References

• Carter, P., & Jackson, N. (2000): "An-aesthetics." In: S. Linstead & H. Hopfl (eds.): The Aesthetics of Organization. London: SAGE Publications, pp. 180–196.
• Ladkin, D. (2006): "The enchantment of the charismatic leader: Charisma reconsidered as aesthetic encounter." Leadership, 2 (2), 165–179.
• Ladkin, D. (2008): "Leading beautifully: How mastery, congruence and purpose create the aesthetic of embodied leadership practice." Leadership Quarterly, 19, 31–41.
• Ottensmeyer, E.J. (1996): "Too strong to stop, too sweet to lose: Aesthetics as a way to know organizations." Organization, 3 (2), 189–194.
• Pelzer, P. (2002): "Disgust and organization." Human Relations, 55 (7), 841–860.
• Ramirez, R. (1991): The Beauty of Social Organization. Munich: Accedo.
• Strati, A. (1992): "Aesthetic understanding of organizational life." Academy of Management Review, 17 (3), 568–581.
• Taylor, S.S. (2002): "Overcoming aesthetic muteness: Researching organizational members' aesthetic experience." Human Relations, 55 (7), 821–840.
• Taylor, S.S. (2013): "Little beauties: Aesthetics, craft skill, and the experience of beautiful action." Journal of Management Inquiry, 22 (1), 69–81.