Most of my research deals with the micro-level dynamics of how innovation emerges in organizations. This puts a lot of it at the theoretical intersection of innovation, technology and organization and explores how they relate to each other, looking for instance at how organizational forms shape innovation processes, how technical change impacts everyday work, how new technology enables innovation, etc. More recently, I’ve also become interested in the ideology and industry that surrounds entrepreneurship and how management might be practiced better.

My main inspirations come from critical social theory (especially as it is used in Critical Management Studies) and to a lesser degree from heterodox economics (especially Austrian Economics).  The kneejerk reaction by most would be to see these two inspirations as mutually exclusive, but for me, they come together in an interest in the limits to knowing, the primacy of emergence over planning, the effects of ideology on action, and the pervasiveness of domination and power in both brute and subtle forms as it plays out in organizations. They also tend to produce a somewhat bleak view of the potency of ‘management’ as an organizational function, as a practice and as a body of knowledge.

Aside from that, I try to cast a wide net in my reading and get into organization studies, innovation economics, science and technology studies, economic history, strategic management research and industrial sociology. Empirically, most of what I do is qualitatively driven with forays into mixed methods. It has typically been based on studying organizations that happen – in my geography, at least – to be in the public sector (healthcare, military, police, recently some on-going projects on higher education). I tend to favor micro-level evidence over aggregates and deep engagement over large samples.

You can find my published research at Google Scholar and some of my working papers at SSRN. I am currently working on two book projects: one on strategic management and an open textbook for my courses on innovation management (it’s contracted with Cambridge University Press, but the drafts are available and feedback much appreciated).