10.2190/WR.14.4.e 36W9NL0600457776 5 Rationales for Breaking Management Rules—The Case of Health Care Workers 457 479 20110304 20110304 20110304 20110304 36W9NL0600457776.pdf http://baywood.metapress.com/link.asp?target=contribution&id=36W9NL0600457776 4 Jörg W. Kirchhoff Jan Ch. Karlsson Østfold University College, Norway The aim of this article is to describe the mechanisms that legitimise organizational misbehaviour, that is, rules with a rationale for breaking management rules. It builds on case studies of four Norwegian health care enterprises, in which the main method of data collection in each case was through focus groups and in-depth interviews with registered nurses, auxiliary nurses, care workers, and home care assistants. We identify three distinctive rule sets: service rules, collective rules, and professional rules, based on distinct work relations within the context of wage labour. The relations are with clients, colleagues, and professional group, respectively. The identification and analysis of rules contribute, we argue, to a better understanding of organisational behaviour and organisational misbehaviour.

Ackroyd, S., & Thompson, P. 1999. Organisational misbehaviour. London: Sage.

Aronson, J., & Neysmith, S. M. 1996. "You're not just in there to do the work": Depersonalizing policies and the exploitation of home care workers' labour. Gender & Society, 10: 59-77.

Bolton, S. C. 2004. A bit of a laugh: Nurses' use of humour as a mode of resistance. In M. Dent, J. Chandler, & J. Barry (Eds.), Questioning the New Public Management: 3-16. Aldershot, UK: Ashgate.

Bunge, M. 1998. Social science under debate: A philosophical perspective. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.

Edwards, P. K. 1986. Conflict at work. A materialist analysis of workplace relations. Oxford: Basil Blackwell.

Fleetwood, S. 2008. Institutions and social structures. Journal for the Theory of Social Behaviour, 38: 241-265.

Green-Pedersen, C. 2002. New Public Management reforms of the Danish and Swedish welfare states: The role of different social democratic responses. Governance, 15: 271-294.

Hannigan, B. 1998. Assessing the New Public Management: The case of the National Health Service. Journal of Nursing Management, 6: 307-312.

Hansen, I. L. B. 2007. Arbeiderkollektivet—50 år etter? [The worker collective—50 years later?]. Halden, Norway: Avdeling for samfunnsfag og fremmedspråk, Høgskolen i Østfold.

Hutchinson, S. 1990. Responsible subversion: A study of rule bending among nurses. Scholarly Inquiry for Nursing Practice, 4: 3-17.

Karlsson, J. C. 2004. The ontology of work: Social relations and doing in the sphere of necessity. In S. Ackroyd & S. Fleetwood (Eds.), Critical realism in action in organisations and management studies: 90-112. London: Routledge.

Karner, T. X. 1998. Professional caring: Homecare workers as fictive kin. Journal of Aging Studies, 12: 69-82.

Kirchhoff, J. W. 2010. De skjulte tjenestene—Om uønsket atferd i offentlige organisasjoner [Hidden services—On organisational misbehaviour in public organisations]. Karlstad, Sweden: Karlstad University Studies 2010: 1 [Dissertation].

Lawson, T. 2003. Reorienting economics. London: Routledge.

Lysgaard, S. 1972. Arbeiderkollektivet [The worker collective]. Oslo, Norway: Universitetsforlaget.

Morrison, E. W. 2006. Doing the job well: An investigation of pro-social rule breaking. Journal of Management, 32: 5-28.

Næss, S. 2003. I tøffeste laget—Dokumentasjonsrapport om arbeidssituasjonen til ansatte i pleie- og omsorgstjenesten [Hard times—A report on the working conditions among employees in health care enterprises]. Bergen, Norway: Rokkansenteret, Rapport 9/2003.

Napier, B. 1972. Working to rule—A breach of the contract of employment? Industrial Law Journal, 1: 125-134.

Ramsdal, H., & Hansen, G. V. 2005. "Om sirkelens kvadratur—Psykisk helsearbeid møter bestiller-utførerorganisasjonen" [Squaring a circle—Psychiatric health care and the purchaser-provider model]. Tidsskrift for psykisk helsearbeid, 2: 134-148.

Rasmussen, B. 2004. Between endless needs and limited resources: The gendered construction of a greedy organization. Gender, Work & Organization, 11: 506-525.

Roethlisberger, F. J., & Dickson, W. J. 1965. Management and the worker. New York: John Wiley & Sons.

Simonet, D. 2008. The New Public Management theory and European health-care reform. Canadian Public Administration, 51: 617-635.

Taylor, F. W. 1998. The principles of scientific management. Norcross, GA: Engineering & Management Press.

Thompson, P., & Ackroyd, S. 1995. All quiet on the workplace front? A critique of recent trends in British industrial sociology. Sociology, 29: 615-633.

Timmons, S. 2003. Nurses resisting information technology. Nursing Inquiry, 10: 257-269.

Vabø, M. 2005. "New Public Management i nordisk eldreomsorg—Hva forskes det på?" [New Public Management and care of the elderly in Scandinavia—What does research show?]. In M. Szebehely (Ed.), Äldreomsorgsforskning i Norden: 73-111. Copenhagen, Denmark: Nordiska Ministerrådet.

Vabø, M. 2007. Organisering for velferd—Hjemmetjenesten i en styringsideolgisk brytningstid [Organising welfare—Health care enterprises in a transition of management ideologies]. Oslo, Norway: Universitetet i Oslo, Det samfunnsvitenskapelige fakultet.

Wilkinson, M. J. 1995. Love is not a marketable commodity: New Public Management in the British National Health Service. Journal of Advanced Nursing, 21: 980-987.