Faculty
Professor Andrew Van de Ven, University of Minnesota , USA and Professor Majken Schultz, CBS

Course Coordinator
Professor Majken Schultz, Department of Organization, CBS

This course focuses on the relationship between theory and practice, research and action. Organizational theory and practice are often seen as separate endeavours following different institutional logics and producing different types of knowledge. Nevertheless, scholars of organization studies have for some time been concerned about the application to practice of the knowledge produced in our scientific field and visa versa. The course explores how research findings and knowledge can be useful for science, practice, and policy.

Understanding how research can advance scientific and practical knowledge is an ongoing challenge and is particularly relevant in the applied areas of management and organization studies, where there is a distinct responsibility for researchers to engage with the 'real world'.

During the past decade academic research has been increasingly criticized for not advancing science or practice in intended ways. Special issues in several top journals have highlighted growing concerns that academic research has become less useful for solving practical problems, that academics should translate their abstract knowledge into practice, but that the gulf between science and practice is widening. In short, a large proportion of current academic research is not contributing in intended ways to either science or practice. Academic researchers sometimes respond to these criticisms by claiming that the purpose of their research is not to make immediate contributions to practice; instead it is to make fundamental advances to scientific knowledge that may eventually enlighten practice.

Recently, developments have shifted from insisting on the distinction between rigorous research and relevant practical knowledge, to a much more explorative and engaging mindset. This shift is fuelled by academics who experience the excitement of creating rigorous and relevant research along with an appreciation of having an impact on managerial and organizational practice. These explorations expand the ways, in which academics conduct research and open a range of new opportunities for academic researchers with respect to, how research ideas are generated and how research findings are disseminated.

This course will set the stage for appreciating the different kinds of research that emerge from the increasing interaction that academics have with practitioners.The course will introduce a broad set of experiences of engaged scholarship through readings, case stories and debates of students' experiences. It is based on Andrew Van de Ven’s call for more engaged scholarship, and presents the distinction between four kinds of engaged scholarship: 1) Basic science with stakeholder advice; 2) Co-produce knowledge with collaborators, 3) Evaluation research for professional practice, and 4) Action/intervention research for a client showing that there are many ways to become involved as a researcher.

Lectures with workshop, dialogs and student discussions.

Participants role
The PhD scholar must be working on an organizational research project and be willing to explore the relevance and implications of engaged scholarship on the project. The idea is not to push students into becoming engaged scholars, but to make them reflect upon their role and project from this perspective.
The PhD scholar must be willing to present his/her research. The PhD scholar is required to present a short (two - maximum three pages), written presentation (in English), in which she/he relates the curriculum literature in the course to his/her project. The presentation must include specific references to the literature applied. Deadline for submission of presentations is 14 October, 2008.

The presentations will also be used as material for discussion in minor groups during the course. The scholar must be willing to participate in discussions of other presentations. All course material and the course itself will be in English.

Andrew Van de Ven: Engaged scholarship : A guide for organizational and social research, Oxford University Press, 2007.

Two-three articles to be announced later.