In recent decades an extensive array of changes and innovations have taken place in and across work organizations and networks of organizations and workers, facilitated by new technologies and technological forms. This has initiated an interest in technological change as one of the conditions for organizational action and researchers have begun to draw inspiration from a wider spectrum of conceptual issues, perspectives and theoretical traditions.
This book is interested in the level of praxis and how this might be understood and theorized. It brings together a comprehensive collection of empirically-grounded and theoretically-informed research projects from studies of organizational practice which explore a number of technological changes in a variety of contexts. These are informed by contemporary debates within and across theoretical approaches including the sociology of technology, work and organizations, actor network theory, technology as text and metaphor, processual and political perspectives, social and business network-based approaches to the analysis of technology and innovation, and the social construction and shaping of technology.
This book will be essential reading for researchers and advanced students within the field of technology, work and organizations and also organization studies and management studies.

eBook available with sample pages: 0203380541

Usually firms introduce new technology in an incremental way, wisely seeking to minimise the adverse effects which business and employees might face. However, this is not always the case. Sometimes technological discontinuities occur when radically different technological systems and working practices are implemented, with the possibility of widespread disruption and conflict. This book looks at this topical issue through the experiences of the international giants of the Finnish paper industry - an industry at the cutting edge of fundamental technological innovation.

This volume describes how conflicting managerial factors become mobilized to co-operate in situations of discontinuous technological change. The author develops a conceptual framework to analyze how technological discontinuities are managed within firms. The mobilization of management is shown to emerge, in part, from the resources in the sectoral and national context. These ideas are explored through an in-depth case study of the Finnish paper industry, in which the Finnish firms are major players at the cutting edge of technological innovation. The national perspective is particularly productive here, because it reveals the processes through which even limited resources can lead to industrial prosperity and success.