The void at the heart of rules: Routines in the context of rule-following

Benedicte Reynaud

Working Papers from HAL

Abstract: This paper is an attempt to understand how rules operate in organisations. I focus on the links between organisational routines and rules that are defined as incomplete since they come to their application. I analyse the role of routines in managing the incompleteness of rules. I present a case study where management introduced a productivity bonus in the middle of 1992. This allows to study in what extent the new rule modifies the prevailing routines of work organisation. Based on team observations, interviews, and statistics that I carried out over a period of nine years (1992-2000), I show that in an initial period, the productivity bonus has partially biased the tasks selection process. In a second period - "the normal period" - our observations indicate that following the rules consists in translating the abstract rules into concrete reference points, and adding in what the rules have not specified. The translation process conducts to a routine since the interpretation is stabilised. Routines provide a pragmatic, local, and temporary solution to the incompleteness of rules. Since routines emerge only in the course of action, they come with no guarantee of success. That constitutes their dynamic.

Keywords: rules; routines; rule-following; incentives; salary bonus (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2005-01
Note: View the original document on HAL open archive server: https://shs.hal.science/halshs-00590855v1
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (19)

Downloads: (external link)
https://shs.hal.science/halshs-00590855v1/document (application/pdf)

Related works:
Working Paper: The Void t the Heart of Rules: Routines in the Context of Rule-Following (2005)
Working Paper: The void at the heart of rules: Routines in the context of rule-following (2005)
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:hal:wpaper:halshs-00590855

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in Working Papers from HAL
Bibliographic data for series maintained by CCSD ().