Problem Solving in Organizations (3^rd Ed., Revised edition) A Methodological Handbook for Business and Management Students

An indispensable guide enabling business and management students to develop their professional competences in real organizational settings, this new and fully updated edition of Problem Solving in Organizations equips the reader with the necessary toolkit to apply the theory to practical business problems. By encouraging the reader to use the theory and showing them how to do so in a fuzzy, ambiguous and politically charged, real-life organizational context, this book offers a concise introduction to design-oriented and theory-informed problem solving in organizations. In addition, it gives support for designing the overall approach to a problem-solving project as well as support for each of the steps of the problem-solving cycle: problem definition, problem analysis, solution design, interventions, and evaluation. Problem Solving in Organizations is suitable for readers with a wide range of learning objectives, including undergraduates and graduates studying business and management, M.B.A students and professionals working in organizations.

Part I. Introduction: 1. Scope and nature of this handbook; 2. Types of student projects; 3. Problem-solving projects; Part II. The Problem-Solving Project: 4. Intake and problem definition; 5. Theory-informed diagnosis of business problems; 6. Solution design; 7. Change plan design and the change process; 8. Evaluation, learning and project termination; Part III. Methods: 9. Qualitative research methods; 10. Searching and using scholarly literature; 11. Quality criteria for research; Part IV. Designs, Designing and Design Science Research: 12. Designs and designing; 13. Design science research: developing generic solutions for field problems; Part V. Cases: 14. Cases.

Joan Ernst van Aken worked for many years in practice as a management consultant and as a manager of management consultants before joining Eindhoven University of Technology as a Professor of Organization Science in 1990.
Hans Berend is Professor of Innovation and Organization at the Knowledge, Information and Innovation (KIN) Research Group, Faculty of Economics and Business Administration, Vrije Universiteit, Amsterdam.