Practical traction after a hard hit—field notes and tools for rebuilding without performative positivity
Sometimes inspiration comes from the strangest places. Today, I was watching an interview with Anson Mount, the actor who plays Christopher Pike in Star Trek: Strange New Worlds. He was talking about how he approached the character and what he understood about Pike as a leader. One of the ideas he expressed stayed with me. … Continue reading Give People What They Need, Then Let Them Do the Work
C. Wright Mills’ The Sociological Imagination through communication, conflict management, and the Standing on the Ledge framework Introduction In The Sociological Imagination, published in 1959, C. Wright Mills argues that people can understand their lives more clearly when they connect personal biography with social structure and historical change. His best-known distinction is between personal troubles … Continue reading From Personal Trouble to Organizational Issue
C. Wright Mills’ The Power Elite through an organizational behaviour and Standing on the Ledge perspective Introduction In The Power Elite, published in 1956, sociologist C. Wright Mills argues that the most consequential decisions in American society had become concentrated among leaders occupying the upper levels of three major institutional systems: large corporations, the military … Continue reading Power, Communication, and Conflict Behind the Organizational Chart
Erving Goffman’s Asylums through an organizational behaviour and Standing on the Ledge perspective Introduction Erving Goffman’s Asylums: Essays on the Social Situation of Mental Patients and Other Inmates examines how people experience life inside what he calls total institutions. These are organizations in which a large portion of a person’s daily life occurs under a … Continue reading Communication, Conflict, and the Institutional Control of Identity
Date: Calendar week: August 4-August 10, 2026 Category: Field Lab Learning Journals > MGT2382 Learning Journal Course link: MGT2382 Organizational Behaviour – Week 13: Organizational Change; McShane Chapter 15. Lens: Critical lens: change is not automatically progress; it becomes progress only when it is honest, supported, and connected to real repair. Opening reflection This week’s … Continue reading MGT2382 Week 13 Learning Journal: Organizational Change and the Difference Between Movement and Repair
Date: Calendar week: July 28-August 4, 2026 Category: Field Lab Learning Journals > MGT2382 Learning Journal Course link: MGT2382 Organizational Behaviour – Week 12: Organizational Structure; McShane Chapter 13. Lens: Critical lens: structure is not just a chart; it decides how authority, information, responsibility, and pain move through the organization. Opening reflection This week’s material … Continue reading MGT2382 Week 12 Learning Journal: Organizational Structure and the Shape of Responsibility
Date: Calendar week: July 21-July 27, 2026 Category: Field Lab Learning Journals > MGT2382 Learning Journal Course link: MGT2382 Organizational Behaviour – Week 11: Organizational Culture; McShane Chapter 14. Lens: Critical lens: culture is not what an organization claims to value; culture is what people learn will be rewarded, punished, tolerated, and protected. Opening reflection … Continue reading MGT2382 Week 11 Learning Journal: Organizational Culture and the Stories a Workplace Actually Lives By
Date: Calendar week: July 14-July 20, 2026 Category: Field Lab Learning Journals > MGT2382 Learning Journal Course link: MGT2382 Organizational Behaviour – Week 10: Leadership; McShane Chapter 12. Lens: Critical lens: leadership is not proven by title, confidence, or image; it is proven by behaviour under pressure. Opening reflection This week’s material on leadership is … Continue reading MGT2382 Week 10 Learning Journal: Leadership, Accountability, and the Weight of Example
Module focus Resistance to change, Lewin's force field analysis, unfreezing, movement and refreezing, urgency, communication, learning, involvement, stress management, negotiation, coercion, action research, appreciative inquiry, large group interventions, parallel learning structures, coalitions, and pilot projects Lens Resistance is not always refusal to move. It may be information about fear, loss, distrust, poor design, or the … Continue reading Module 13 Learning Journal: Change Is Not a Memo
Module focus Organizational structure, division of labour, coordination, span of control, centralization, formalization, mechanistic and organic structures, departmentalization, and structural contingencies Lens Structure is not merely boxes and reporting lines. It is the system that distributes information, authority, workload, delay, and consequence. Topic Focus This learning journal examines organizational structure as the formal and informal … Continue reading Module 12 Learning Journal: The Org Chart Is Not the Work
Standing on the Ledge 