Gender Equity in the Marketing Academy: From Performative to Institutional Allyship

The fair treatment of women in the workplace, where they experience both opportunities and constraints, has been on and off higher education agendas for decades. Yet, institutionalised gendered constraints still shape the careers of female academics, including those in the marketing academy, resulting in disrupted or obstacle-heavy career journeys and the underrepresentation of women in senior positions. Furthermore, progress towards gender equity is hampered by institutional resistance to change, favouring performative rather than genuine and transformational institutional allyship. We draw upon personal experiences, recollections and anecdotes garnered over the years – synthesised with literature – to examine systemic gendered constraints within our collective career span. We propose institutional allyship as the intentional efforts needed by the marketing academy to address systemic and structural gender inequities and achieve second-order change by integrating gender equity outcomes throughout organisational decision-making. Specifically, we suggest nominated actions within a Gender Equity and Inclusion Charter for the Australian and New Zealand Marketing Academy (ANZMAC) and its member universities as a first step.

Expanding God’s Redemptive Fractal: Spirit-Centered Counseling and the Transformative Wisdom of Jesus

Using the image of a fractal, a Spirit-centered approach to counseling is proposed that conceptualizes the Spirit’s activity as seeking to replicate the patterns of God’s redemptive story throughout creation by facilitating deep second-order change. Involving an epistemological shift from ways of knowing shaped by the conventional wisdom of culture to a renewed mind grounded in the transformative wisdom of Jesus, this deep change is explored from the perspectives of science and Scripture. Integrating findings from systems theory with the ministry and message of Jesus, this approach to counseling emphasizes relational premises and values believed to be characteristic of the mind of the Spirit. Defined as the capacity to know and see in ways that are consistent with the passion and purposes of God, cultivating the mind of the Spirit is viewed as the essence of Spirit-centered counseling. Presumed to be seen most clearly in the life of Jesus, this model focuses on his distinctive way of knowing and seeing by examining what can be learned about the epistemological facets of perception and meaning-making when comparing his Way with the patterns of this world. It is proposed that Spirit-centered counseling is guided by the premises and patterns contained in Jesus’ transformative wisdom.

Insights From Systems Thinking

Chapter 7 presents three high-level insights that can be drawn from this book’s look at a health system from a systems thinking perspective. First, all health systems suffer from one of systems theory’s classic descriptive models called The Tragedy of the Commons, in which a scarce resource is consumed when a collective benefit (e.g., health insurance) is subsidized and its price to the user is less than the cost to produce it. Second, when viewed from a systems perspective of value-for-money, most health systems face competing objectives—satisfying individual’s demands for maximizing their own medical care and providing healthcare as a fundamental right of all citizens regardless of ability to pay. Third, to integrate these goals requires re-framing the way societies think about each. The authors describe double-loop learning, which is required when confronting second-order change. The latter term describes problems where it is necessary to redesign human perceptions for change to lead to improvement. Complex changes require double-loop learning, in which underlying interpretive conflicts and differing values and beliefs are surfaced and managed.

Competencies, Culture, and Change: A Model for Digital Transformation in K-12 Educational Contexts

On the surface, adopting technology presents itself as a technical issue. Yet, the real challenge of digital transformation in educational contexts necessitates a second-order change to disrupt and realign interconnected systems. A significant component of digital transformation in K-12 schools is an understanding of the unique affordances of digital tools and technologies and how these can be leveraged to align with learning goals and targets to impact teaching and learning in new ways. While there are several models for innovation diffusion and technology adoption in K-12 contexts, they fall short, particularly in describing the nature and interactions of these interconnected systems. These aspects of technology implementation remain a mystery. As a result, efforts to enact change in K-12 organizations often fall short due to a lack of understanding of context, inadequate goal-setting, insufficient professional development and personalized supports to build capacity, and a failure to evaluate progress. In K-12 educational settings, the people, the competencies, and the culture, alongside the strong leadership, resources, and organizational context, are all essential to effect sustainable change. We propose a model for digital transformation that considers all of these factors and interconnected systems.

Influence tactics and “second-order” change in schools: case study research of principals' political behaviors and strategies

PurposePrincipals are considered central in initiating and mobilizing changes in schools; however, their political behaviors in the course of school changes are underexplored. The present research investigated the influence tactics used by school principals to induce teachers to join a process of second-order (deep and wide) change in the school teaching and culture. In specific, the authors were interested to know which influence tactics, principals and staff members considered to be efficient during such a second-order change process.Design/methodology/approachThe study was based on a case study method focusing on four Israeli Jewish state public religious schools participating in the “Routes” program aimed at strengthening religious values in schools. Data collection included semi-structured interviews with principals, teachers with program coordinators responsibilities and teachers in four schools.FindingsThe results indicate that school principals who are considered successful in leading changes display two key influence prototypes: a hybrid type that combines soft and hard influence tactics and a unitype that relies on soft influence tactics.Originality/valueThe research study contributed to the limited knowledge in educational administration on micropolitics and political behaviors in the course of school changes.

Psychological ownership of a team of change agents during second-order change in schools and its implications for school culture

PurposeTaking ownership is considered vital for sustaining change in organizations, particularly when second-order changes are the goal. Yet, few studies explored psychological ownership of change agents in educational organizations. Moreover, no knowledge exists on how agents' individual psychological ownership augments psychological ownership in schools and on how collective psychological ownership of change relates to school culture. The present study aims to address these two lacunae.Design/methodology/approachA case study method was adopted to investigate the psychological ownership of teams of change agents in schools. Six Israeli secondary state religious schools adopting a new liberal curricular program were studied. Thirty one interviews were conducted with principals, program coordinators, mid-level teacher leaders and teachers who were active change agents in the promotion of the program. The interviews were complemented by quantitative data on students' perceptions of school discipline and tolerance of diversity based on the national school culture survey.FindingsThe analyses revealed the prevalence of three types of psychological ownership in the sample of schools. The analyses also showed how key components of psychological ownership, i.e. responsibility and territoriality in relation to change manifest in the schools that were explored. Institution-level analysis shed light on the different effects psychological ownership of the change team had on sharing within the faculty. In addition, analyses showed how the scope of agreement between two key change agents, the program initiator and the principal, on psychological ownership affected various psychological ownership aspects of the team. Last, the analysis shows that two types of collective psychological ownership emerged in the course of a liberal school change, and that types were differently related to school outcomes.Originality/valueThe study offers an innovative typology of collective psychological ownership during second-order change in schools, mapping two ideal types: cooperative and fragmented collective psychological ownership. The new types provide a better understanding of the dynamic of collective psychological ownership and its outcomes in organizations in general and schools in particular.

MRI Ideas as a Compass in the Dark: A Beginning Therapist Applies MRI Ideas to Dangerous Situations

The foundational ideas of the Mental Research Institute (MRI) can offer grounding to a therapist when working with dangerous or emotionally fraught situations. In this article, a beginning therapist discusses how these foundational ideas helped her overcome initial biases to work successfully with potentially dangerous court-mandated clients; helped her to handle an emotionally fraught situation in her own family; and clarified her work with a client in a potential domestic violence situation, which might have required reporting to child welfare authorities. Key MRI concepts including the theory of groups; the theory of logical types; first and second order change, cybernetics and positive and negative feedback; context-maintaining behaviors; attempted solutions which become problematic; and therapist maneuverability are discussed. Basic MRI interventions are defined and discussed, including but not limited to the go-slow directive, the dangers of improvement, making a “U-turn,” and how to worsen the problem. A case study is presented.

The free will illusion and the conscious experience within a fatalistic first-order computation (Tao)

Physical interactions among any number of elementary particles are governed by physical laws. First-order change is the change of the state which is governed by the physical laws. Second-order change is the change of the state which breaks the physical laws, so it is impossible in real world. The first-order change is computed out (first-order computation) based on the physical laws. Conscious experience and the feeling of free will, are the results of the first-order computation; they have no impact to the first-order computation.

Fatalistic first-order computation, free will delusion and conscious experience

The first-order change is the change of the state of a physical object (or pattern) which is governed by the physical laws (or rules). The second-order change is the change of the state of a physical object (or pattern) which breaks the physical laws (or rules), so it is impossible in real world. In Conway’s Game of Life, within a pattern (pattern-A), a deterministic algorithm (algorithm-A) is used to solve a problem of the real world. (Actually, this problem will be automatically solved by the first-order change.) Inside algorithm-A, a model (model-AW) is created to represent the real world, and a second-order change can be applied to model-AW. If algorithm-A realized itself to be a deterministic algorithm inside a pattern, and realized that a second-order change is impossible to the real world, while a second-order change is possible to its model of the real world (model-AW), then algorithm-A can distinguish the real world and its model (model-AW) conceptually through this difference. The physical interactions among any number of elementary particles are governed by physical laws. If the time in our universe is discrete, our universe is a stochastic cellular automaton, and each generation is computed out based on the precedent generation and updating rules; let us call this computation the first-order computation. Conscious experience and the feeling of free will, are the results of the first-order computation; they have no impact to the first-order computation. Due to the completely subjective nature of the conscious experience, it’s impossible to reach any agreement on the nature of the conscious experience between any two individuals.