Basic Social Math
16
Basic Social Math The Epistemological Basis for Resolving the Rigor-Relevance Debate © 2012 by Jared Lee Hanson DBA Stage 1 Assessment
-
Upload
jared-lee-hanson -
Category
Business
-
view
304 -
download
1
description
The Epistemological Basis for Resolving the Rigor-Relevance Debate in Management Research. Since the time of Plato and Aristotle, there has been a debate over how humans can create valid knowledge about the world in which we operate. Plato argued that abstract models within human cognition can be considered valid even if there is no corresponding instance of the phenomena observable in the external environment. Aristotle argued that abstract models must have a corresponding instance of the phenomena they represent that is observable within the external environment. Subsequently, Euclid was one of the first to use the linguistic frame of math to establish a rigorous correspondence between abstract models and real world evidence in his geometric proofs. Since then, scientific breakthroughs and knowledge have emerged from the precise and accurate representations of the external environment made possible within the rigorous linguistics of basic math and Aristotle's scientific method. Today, management research as practiced in accredited business schools has taken sides with Plato, not Aristotle. They operate within their own closed loop of investigation and knowledge generation that is based on abstract models of a theoretic world that is disconnected from the realities of practicing managers. Academics argue that the knowledge they generate is valid because it is "rigorous". Practitioners argue that this "knowledge" is not relevant to the real world in which they operate. Until now, no one has followed the example of Euclid and expanded the frame of math to establish a more rigorous correspondence between the abstract models and the evidence from the external environment. Basic Social Math is a new framework that seeks to change that by reconnecting management research to the real world!
Transcript of Basic Social Math
Basic Social MathThe Epistemological Basis for Resolving the Rigor-Relevance Debate
© 2012 by Jared Lee Hanson DBA Stage 1 Assessment
Divided, But ‘Equal’
Immanuel Kant’s (1781) Epistemology: “reality is constructed in the mind”
Ontological Pluralism: no absolute truth (multiple realities exist)
Both Positivism and Constructivism are “Valid” Epistemologies (Phillips & Oswick,
2012, p37): (sets of rules for making sense of the
phenomena we observe in management)So Why the Debate?
#1 Challenge “preventing us from engaging in the serious management problems in organizations:
The Research-Practice Gap: That our research is not relevant to society.”
- Anne S. Tsui, (2012) Academy of Management President
Conflicting ‘Realities’
Academic Reality uses “Rigor” as basis for judging legitimacy.
Practitioner Reality uses “Relevance” as basis for judging legitimacy.
Irreconcilable Differences?
Survey/ Statistical Methods
Therefore, Not Like Physical Science!
Interview/ Observation Methods
“No observational study can definitively establish causality” (O’Brien et al, 2010, 639)
“Both are valid.” (Phillips & Oswick, 2012)
20+ years of debating and no resolution…
Why?
Where’s the Problem?
Is Ontological Pluralism Scientific?
Is there a difference between:
} The internal, ‘constructed’ realities
} & the external, ‘material’ reality?
Can Sophisticated Math, Statistics, or Advanced Analytics Determine Which ‘Reality’ is Legitimate Science, not Art?
Does “Rigor” = Legitimacy or
Does “Relevance” = Legitimacy?
“The objectivity attributed to their numerical precision inescapably rests on subjective decisions made by the researchers designing the questionnaires and the participants who are asked to choose the verbal anchor that best represents their experience of the target phenomenon” (Sandelowski 2009).
NO! They can’t. Hence, no truth in ontological pluralism.
ябълка apple
Truth = “Ideal Speech Situation” Habermas (1971):
Which one is the ‘ideal speech situation’?
What’s the source of conflict & miscommunication?
Where is alignment needed to create ‘ideal speech’?
What happens to ‘truth’ and ‘meaning’ when the rules don’t align?
}Sense-making rules are here.
Bridging the Philosophical Divide
Frankfurt School: Theory must inform practice, but [the ‘reality’ of] practice must also inform theory.
Austrian Economics: logical deduction from “irrefutable facts,” not probabilistic modeling…instead isolate logical processes of action.
“researchers and practitioners represent information in different ways and use different language and strategies (Kelemen & Bansal, 2002;
Kieser & Leiner, 2009),
and researchers and practitioners have different epistemological stances (Rousseau, Manning, & Denyer, 2008; Shrivastava & Mitroff, 1984).” (Bansal, Bertels, Ewart, MacConnachie, and O’Brien, 2012)
Management Decision Making
Neuroscience & Experiential Learning
Is there more than one building behind the frames?
Nested Relationships of Emotion, Cognition, Learning, & Social Decision Making (Immordino-Yang & Damasio 2007, Kolb 1975, Lund-Dean & Jolly, 2012)
Conceptual Alignment: “Decision making is a fundamental particle of management” (Noonan 2007)
via Socially-Constructed, Cultural Narratives or The Narrative of Empirical Evidence?
New Theory of the Mind
Did you konw yuor biarn is diong clalcuus to decdoe tihs mssaege?
Physiology studies: 80% of the nerves going into the
visual cortex of the brain come from areas associated with
memory, while only 20% come from the eyes (Gawande 2008).
New Epistemological Frame
Meaning Rigorously Anchored & Corresponded to Empirical Evidence from Material Reality
The Material Reality of Practice Sets the Rules for Legitimacy: Ontological Unity (single set of rules that can represent all the complexity)
Theory & Methods have to ‘fly’ in practice = Rigor + Relevance = End of Debate!
Alignment = Scalable Dynamics
LXXVIII- XLIV vs.
78- 44
What if… we align rules to empirics before we calculate meaning?
}Statistical assumptions are here.
Going for “theoretic generalization” of the set of rules (Meredith 1998) (epistemology)
Not the “assumptive generalization” of statistical modeling (Meredith 1998)
Single set of rules that theoretically applies across all contexts and scales of systemic size. (ontological unity)
}Epistemology rules are here.
Do we keep ontological pluralism &
continue framing mgmt research in socially-constructed narratives: label same phenomena in different ways & translate between ‘multiple realities’ of cultures (GLOBE, Hofstede, etc.)?
= “intellectual progress entails much more of the nudging, pushing, competing, and convincing that mark Kuhnian-style scientific systems (Kuhn, 1970).” (Devinney & Siegel 2012)
Do we seek ontological unity & start
framing mgmt research in the narrative of empirical evidence from the singular, material reality of practice to bring alignment before calculations of meaning?
= harnessing the power of abstraction and linguistic rigor of basic math to calculate meaning consistently across cultures and scales of systemic size.
The Choice is Ours…Status Quo: Innovation:
Innovation BringsNew Tools
That ExtendOur Vision:
Microscope of Neuroscience Telescope of Complexity Science
Research Proposition
Put this new epistemological frame to the test in a cross-cultural, change-management program as a Participant-Observer.
Ethnographic Field Study to test if empirical rules generalize across cultures in practice.
Can managers reconcile conflicting views of stakeholders by anchoring to the empirical dynamics of learning and decision making rather than to socially-constructed, cultural narratives in order to navigate uncertainties and foster change in complex operations?
“Abstraction is the key, recognizing that orders arriving at a warehouse and people calling to purchase airline tickets can be described in fundamentally the same way.
“While the actual business problems are quite different, when abstracted they can be studied together.” (Boyd 2007)
Video Intro to Research Context
Viewable at: https://vimeo.com/47904479 password: “socialmath”
Methodology
Ethnographic Case Study
Researcher as Participant-Observer: Both Documenting & Directing Managerial Activities (Experimental Interventions)
Documenting Examples of Conflict in the Operation and Impact of New Epistemological Framing on Resolution
Extensive Use of Video Recording to Document Initial Conditions, Interventions, & Outcomes. (Signed Consent Obtained from Participants for Audio/Video Usage)
Questions?
Other Feedback?
