Book chapter
The Garbage Can Model and Organizational Metrics
Worlds of rankings, pp.175-197
Research in the Sociology of Organizations, v. 74, Emerald Group Publishing
2021
DOI: 10.1108/S0733-558X20210000074033
Abstract
Organizational metrics - including rankings, ratings, and other forms of public assessment - are inextricably tied to uncertainty. Metrics are not only responses to uncertainty in the organizational environment, but they also create new forms of uncertainty within the organizations they evaluate. Given this, it is productive to consider these metrics in relation to the garbage can model of organizational decision making, a framework that was designed to provide insight into uncertain and ambiguous contexts. In this paper, the authors use the case of patient experience surveys to argue for the value of this model for understanding responses to metrics in particular conditions. Specifically, the authors demonstrate how the different features of the garbage can model manifest themselves within organizations managing numbers, and the authors then use these findings to discuss the measurement conditions that promote garbage can responses, the distinctive types of unintended consequences these responses might produce, and the implications of the garbage can model for the understanding of metrics more generally.
Details
- Title: Subtitle
- The Garbage Can Model and Organizational Metrics
- Creators
- Michael Sauder - Univ Iowa, Sociol, Iowa City, IA 52242 USAHyunsik Chun - Univ Iowa, Dept Sociol, Iowa City, IA 52242 USAWendy Espeland - Northwestern Univ, Sociol, Evanston, IL 60208 USA
- Contributors
- L Ringel (Editor)W Espeland (Editor)M Sauder (Editor)T Werron (Editor)
- Resource Type
- Book chapter
- Publication Details
- Worlds of rankings, pp.175-197
- Publisher
- Emerald Group Publishing; Bingley
- Series
- Research in the Sociology of Organizations; v. 74
- DOI
- 10.1108/S0733-558X20210000074033
- ISSN
- 0733-558X
- Number of pages
- 23
- Grant note
- Max-Weber-Kolleg 665958 / European Union's Framework Programme for Research and Innovation Horizon 2020 under the Marie Sklodowska-Curie Grant Robert Wood Johnson Health Policy Fellowship
- Language
- English
- Date published
- 2021
- Academic Unit
- Sociology and Criminology
- Record Identifier
- 9984306247802771
Metrics
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