New Perspectives on Work-Life and Organisations

New Perspectives on Work-Life and Organisations - illustrasjonsfoto - iStock

We investigate complex and context-specific phenomena in work-life and organisations.

Our research

The point of departure relates to how leaders, managers, employees and organisations (and their stakeholders and target groups) are actually experiencing and recognising as challenges – what matters to them – where we as researchers endeavour to understand, analyse and locate solutions based on examining the holistic nature of the phenomenon and its particularities.

Thus, we emphasise the need for a critical and reflexive inquisitive gaze on our own research (and that of others) in terms of the limitations with granting a default primacy to theory and scientific concepts as well as the re-jigging of others’ social reality to accommodate for deploying a particular scientific method at the expense of producing knowledge that are informed by the actual and holistic dynamics associated with a practical challenge.

The application of interdisciplinary perspectives and a wide range of, in particular, qualitative (but also quantitative) methods, enrich our research through its ability to elucidate various facets relating to a work challenge and the contestable conditions for what we assume to constitute the ”correct” understanding.

Our research is situated within different socio-technical systems and organisations, with a particular focus on individuals’ own subjective, socially constructed, lived experiences and interpersonal relations in interplay with formal, macro environments and processes.

We link organisational aspects with societal trends traversing national borders and cultural and linguistic boundaries as well as micro, macro and meso levels. In addition to contributing with advancing scientific knowledge, our overarching goal is to offer pertinent knowledge that benefit the development of practices and corporate policy as well as thought-leaders in Norwegian and international work-life.

Topics and themes where we research work phenomena:
  • Behaviour, emotion regulation and conflict
  • Boards
  • Climate change and sustainability 
  • Corporate diversity responsibility 
  • Critical perspectives and reflexivity
  • Cultural issues in international business and management
  • Decision making 
  • Entrepreneurship
  • Ethnopolitics
  • Expatriates, international assignments and global mobility
  • Gender and SHEconomy
  • Global talent management and Human Resource Management
  • Governance
  • Inclusion an exclusion, equality, diversity and marginalised people
  • Intercultural management and cultural intelligence
  • International management
  • Interstate negotiations
  • Investor-state dispute settlement
  • Leadership and strategic management – translation of strategy and implementation
  • Learning and theories of organisation
  • Migration
  • NGO management
  • Organisational transformation, continuity and change
  • Organisation, organising and time
  • Preparedness and crisis management
  • Project management
  • Public sector organisations and administration
  • Risk analysis
  • Stress management
  • Values, roles and identity

Research methods

We deploy a wide range of methods traversing the qualitative and quantitative research paradigms, including multi- and mixed-method designs–in an addition various analytical approaches, theoretical perspectives, interdisciplinary inquiries, critical and reflexive interrogation and research philosophical underpinnings. We conduct studies, frequently in an international and multicultural setting, which methodologically are sensitive and pertinent for the applicable context.

Research disciplines

In our research endeavours, we draw upon a broad range of academic disciplines: Critical Studies, Geography, International Human Resource Management, International Relations, Leadership, Management, Organisation Studies, Political Science, Public Administration, Social Anthropology, Sociology and Strategy.

Research partners and network

Our researchers lead, and are involved in, a wide range of collaborative partnerships with work organisations in different industries and professions in addition to a myriad of small and large research projects with academics around the globe.

Involvement in larger externally financed research project encompasses:

  • Migrant Work Inclusion - co-creating joint opportunities through employment and entrepreneurship (member:  Seierstad) – funded by The Research Council of Norway (NOK 11.9 million)
  • Responsible Research and Innovation in Norway (Afino, Work Package 6) (member: Guttormsen) – funded by The Research Council of Norway (NOK 4.2 million)
  • «Beredskap for drikkevann» (industry cluster; USN, Scandinavian Water Technology AS, Horten Muncipality and Inland Norway University of Applied Sciences) – funded by Regional Business Fund
  • Managing of and within the digital and sustainable transformation (member: Fagerland) – financed by Digital Norway and The Directorate for Higher Education and Skills (HK-dir) (NOK 3,6 million)

 

Examples of collaborative partnerships with work organisations:
  • Avarn Security Aviation AS
  • Bulgarian National Revenue Agency
  • CORPRT Think Tank
  • County Governor of Vestfold and Telemark
  • Digital Norway
  • Horten Muncipality
  • Jotun AS
  • Norwegian Civil Defence
  • Norwegian Society for Sea Rescue
  • The Norwegian Coastal Administration
  • LØRN
  • Panasonic, Pistaljka
  • Scandinavian Water Technology AS
  • Skien Fire Services
  • Southeastern Police District
  • Telemark Hospital Trust
  • The Norwegian Directorate for Civil Protection
  • The Norwegian Police University College
  • The Norwegian Radiation and Nuclear Safety Authority (DSA)
  • Vestfold Inter-City Fire Services
  • Widerøe and 3Greens Consulting AS 
Examples of academic collaboration:
  • Adana Science and Technology University
  • BI Norwegian Business School
  • Cardiff University
  • Centro Universitário de Brasilia
  • Copenhagen Business School
  • Curtin Business School
  • École de Management de la Sorbonne
  • ETH Zurich
  • Florida International University
  • Fudan University
  • Goethe University Frankfurt
  • Griffith University
  • Guelph University
  • Hankuk University of Foreign Studies
  • Harvard Medical School
  • Hokkaido University
  • Høgskolen i Innlandet
  • ISEG - Lisbon School of Economics & Management
  • Lancaster University
  • Lund University
  • Norwegian network for public sector innovation research
  • NTNU
  • Polish Air Force University
  • RADEM forskergruppe (Australia, New ZealandPolen, Sverige, Thailand, USA), Ritsumeikan Asia Pacific University
  • Royal Holloway – University of London
  • Techno-Economic-Societal Sustainable Development Training in Sri Lanka
  • Thammasat Business School
  • The University of Chile – Santiago
  • The University of Oklahoma
  • The University of Warwick
  • University of Bristol
  • University of Exeter Business School
  • University of Tunis El Manar
  • Universiti Sains Malaysia
  • WU Vienna
  • Queen Mary – University of London
  • University of Melbourne, University of Passau
  • University of Porto
  • University of Southampton
  • University of Toronto
  • University of Western Australia
  • Aarhus University​​​​​

Our members are frequently invited to present their scholarly work at leading international, national and specialist conference, such as:

  • Academy of International Business (AIB)
  • Academy of Management (AOM)
  • Asia Academy of Management (AAoM), European Academy of Management (EURAM)
  • European Association of Work and Organizational Psychology Congress
  • European Conference on Migrant and Ethnic Minority Health
  • European Group for Organizational Studies (EGOS)
  • Interdisciplinary Perspectives on Leadership Symposium
  • International Political Science Association (IPSA)
  • NEON–Nettverk for organisasjonsforskning i Norge
  • Nordic Academy of Management og Workshop on Talent Management