Facing Up to Opposition
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/ 16 Iv.sw I 7wuiar - llítnli 2003
Facing Up to Opposition Phil Smith has to be done is to generate proposals, implement, monitor, and take corrective action where necessary.
OR inleiveniions are plated out on a stage populated b_y different inlereit groups, working towards dzÏferenl goals arid prion ties, and erJoying differential power. It is unrealistic lo
The whole process is neat, logical, impartial and
expect all dfferences lo be reso leed and all power to be suspended or pleaged in support of the OR practitioner. Opposiiwn and opportunism wi/i feature. Thi.v paper is concerned wit/s opposition. A Foucauldian view of power is
relatively unproblematic.
utilised lo explore aspects of opposition and inform proposals
vertical dimension of increasing systems complexity,
On Jackson and Keys' grid (Figure 1), problem contexts are seen in terms of two dimensions: the and the horizontal dimension of increasing people
a structured response.
complexity.
Introduction The world of management is a world in which opposing views and forces are encountered on a Nevertheless, practising managers frequently appear to see their environment as ideal: one in which everyone associated with a particular situation subscribes to the same logic, ambitions, and priorities. From this perspective, the work of the OR practitioner is relatively straightforward, because the benefits of the intervention arc clear and welcomed by all. The OR task is technical or unitary in nature (see upper left quadrant of Figure 1), and the status of the OR practitioner is that of technician - defining the research question, agreeing a research process, collecting and analysing data to form a view of the situation. From this point all that daily basis.
Unitary
Pluralist
The basis of Jackson and Keys'
arguments is that early approaches to organisational problem solving focused on the upper left quadrant, seeing problems as simple, and the people dimension as unitary, or subject to no disagreement about aims, objectives or means. Traditional operational
research techniques such as systems analysis and design have been placed in this quadrant. During the last twenty years or so, however, there has been an increasing recognition that 'problem solving' needs to deal with more than just simple/unitary problem contexts, leading to consideration of methods to address situations characterised by greater complexity and increasing divergence of views. In addressing opposition to prevailing views, this paper is essentially concerned with the horizontal axis of the .Jackson grid, and is therefore focused on problem contexts within which there are varying levels of disagreement between participants. in addition to unitary contexts, .Jackson developed two further people-complexity classifications:
Coercive
pluralism, in which it is assumed that, although currently no agreement exists, there is the potential
Simple
for agreement to be reached; and coercion, in which the lack of agreement cannot be resolved because of coercive influences or the exercising
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