Obringer, Lisa
From bureaucratic mode to organizational agility: The use of the piloted community of practice in public institutions
- 2020.
78
Public organizations need to demonstrate organizational agility so as to be efficient and respond to new societal challenges. However, this need for agility is hampered by the bureaucratic logic underlying the way in which these organizations operate. Resolving this paradoxical tension between bureaucracy and organizational agility requires implementing a process of the acceptance and management of such paradoxical tensions. To achieve this, the piloted community of practices offers an analytical framework that promotes this acceptance and subsequently the desired organizational change. We therefore show, through action research, how the piloted community of practices promotes organizational change within a Luxembourg public institution by facilitating its transition from a bureaucratic logic to a logic of organizational agility. The implications are twofold. First, we demonstrate how to manage the conflict between bureaucracy and agility in public institutions. Second, we highlight the role of the piloted community of practices as a vehicle for organizational change in public institutions.