Organisational routines for school improvement: exploring the link between ostensive and performative aspects

Abstract

This article explores organisational routines introduced in schools and preschools in a Swedish municipality and analyses the relationship between ostensive and performative aspects of improvement work. We take our theoretical point of departure in organisational psychology and an organisation development (OD) perspective by integrating the coupling mechanisms of decoupling, assimilation and accommodation to former research. The analysis shows that the ostensive and performative aspects of organisational routines must be closely connected if improvement initiatives are to impact daily practice. For this to happen, leaders of improvement work must design and operate development programmes that go beyond decoupling by also enabling assimilation and at least partial accommodation. The findings from this study provide a theoretical contribution to understanding the relationship between ostensive and performative aspects of organisational routines; in other words, the ways in which organisational routines play out in practice.