Below are possible themes that we consider important in the field of organization sciences, and that you can choose from in developing your Master’s thesis project.
Crisis, Vulnerability & Resilience in Organizations
How can organizations ground us in times of adversity? And what can we learn from periods of crisis? Our students focus on complex societal issues and develop innovative approaches to think about solutions. Research projects analysing natural disasters, wars and other (global) threats reveal how we can approach such wicked problems and how we can make societies, organizations, and individuals more resilient. Students ask questions such as how to effectively communicate risks in organizations, or how NGOs can coordinate and organize themselves in response to the climate change crisis.
Employment Relations & Organizational Control
Organizations use control mechanisms to ensure that their goals and aims are met. Employee relations and control-resistance dynamics play a significant role in every organization. Managing workplace conflicts, negotiating contracts, and maintaining a positive workplace culture are the tip of the iceberg. Our students are encouraged to look at what happens when organizations exercise control or introduce changes that employees perceive as threatening to their work environment, job security or well-being. For example, what is the effect of employee monitoring in the age of hybrid working, or what role do HR professionals or Chief Happiness Officers play in organizational control?
New Ways of Working & Organizing Technology
For over a century, business was associated with shareholder firms, hierarchical management, and employment relations. Today’s economy is more about innovation, experiences, and information than products. Recent technologies have made work more mobile, collaborative, and networked. At COM, we look at new forms of organizing such as in coworking spaces, or among freelancers and creators. For example, how can we organize digital technology while avoiding an ‘always-on’ attitude, or how can we foster social security and equality in an economy fuelled by freelancing? The world of work is rapidly changing and requiring healthy human and planetary boundaries.
Professional & Organizational Identities
‘What do you do?’, a standard question we all ask without a second thought. In other words, ‘the work we do’ and ‘the organization we work for’ become part of our personal and professional identities. Not only employees but organizations can have a particular ‘identity’ that relates to the organization’s image and culture, making one organization supposedly distinct from others. At COM, we look at how professional and organizational identities are socially created, and how they are influenced by what others think and do. We look at organizational paradoxes, such as how job applicants must communicate their ‘uniqueness’ and willingness to ‘blend in’ as good team players at the same time. We ask questions such as: how do organizations establish what an ‘ideal’ professional or organizational identity looks like? And how do organizations use these ‘ideals’ for their own (commercial) goals?
Managing Organizational & Cultural Change
Many organizational change studies are based on traditional ‘top-down’ perspectives or ‘planned’ approaches to managing change, often overlooking social and cultural issues and the (un)intended consequences of change, such as power struggles or resistance. Our students are urged to approach change from a critical perspective, viewing change as a dynamic and cultural process happening at multiple levels within the organization. Students focus on real life cases and connect theories to concrete practices of change work, asking questions such as: how do construction workers make sense of their new role as part of the transition to circular construction? Or how do start-ups use culture to deal with scale-up related organizational change?
Entrepreneurship & Innovation in Organizations
Entrepreneurship is about coming up with new and innovative ideas to respond to the needs of consumers and society, and about putting these ideas into practice. At COM, we are interested in what motivates entrepreneurs, how they identify and create opportunities, and how they view their role in communities and societies. Our students research everyday entrepreneurship in various environments, going beyond stereotypical images of entrepreneurship as high-tech, venture capital-backed, profit-oriented, and Silicon Valley-like. We ask, for example: how do social entrepreneurs combine commercial and impact-oriented activities to address social or environmental problems? Or how do migrant entrepreneurs use their cross-border network to establish businesses?
Organizing Sustainability & Multispecies Relations
Sustainability is often approached from a human perspective, ignoring the connections between human and other than human species. However, our current climate crisis is detrimental to all interconnected life on Earth. We encourage our students to think about sustainability from multiple perspectives and investigate the role organizations play in this sustainability transformation. We question the status quo, examining the webs between human and other than human relations in our education, work, consumption, and healthcare, asking questions such as: why are pets not allowed to enter university premises, while other animals are used in medical research labs? Or how are animals treated in our food chains and how does this relate to how we privately think of them?
Diversity & Gender in Organizations
In an age of talking about diversity, whether that be in terms of culture, class, gender, LGBTQ+, bodyism or otherwise, we confront contradictory, often paradoxical processes of inclusion and exclusion in organizations. Students explore the increasing demand for equality measures and cultural recognition while critiquing a growing trend of exclusionary practices in organizations. By looking at these issues from an intersectional perspective, which recognizes that people have multiple overlapping identities that may simultaneously play a role, students explore areas such as: how can organizations manage diversity? Or how can higher education institutions adapt to meet the demands of a diverse student population?
Organizing Mobility & Migration
Migration remains an urgent topic in our society, triggering hot debates from border control and access to the labour market, to the legal recognition of refugees. Our students address the organization of mobility and migration control, and the processes leading to the inclusion or exclusion of migrants from host societies. We tackle topics such as access to the labour market, deportation measures, and inclusion/exclusion of vulnerable and/or racialised migrants. Students ask questions such as: who is welcomed or rejected from Europe and why? How do pressures to ‘integrate’ into a host society affect migrants, and how can private and public organizations respond, adapt and change their own (organizational) culture to become more inclusive in an era of mass mobility and globalization?
