Critical Management Studies (CMS)

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Message From CMS Division Co-Chairs

  • 1.  Message From CMS Division Co-Chairs

    Posted 04-30-2020 07:59

    Dear CMS division members, 

     

    We hope to find you in good health. In the past few weeks, our own lives and the lives of those around us have been disrupted in unprecedented ways. While the emergency is global, its effects have been for each of us different, reflecting our own specific positions and vulnerabilities. Although today we cannot foresee which longer-term impact this pandemic will have on how we organize our communities, societies, and socially reproductive and professional work in the future, awareness is rising that change is unlikely to be temporary. We might not ever go back to 'business as usual'. As with all crises, however, this one might also offer, next to the devastation, opportunities to rethink what we do,  how we do it, and why. It might afford us to engage in novel practices that prefigure more just, equitable and environmentally sustainable practices in global academia and beyond, the ambitions at the core of our CMS community.     

     

    Until today, the CMS executive has consciously chosen to restrain from communicating with you. We apologize for the delay.  In the absence of a clear guiding framework from the AOM, we feared we would risk only adding noise to the conversation. Amidst the every-day adjustments, enhanced anxiety and pervasive communication flow in the wake of the eruption of the COVID-19, the CMS executive has focused on three things.

      

    First, we have entered into dialogue with the other divisions and the AOM itself to envision an adapted 2020 annual conference that, in our estimation, both caters to the needs of our community and is feasible. This dialogue has been quite productive and we see that other divisions share many of our concerns. We were among those which advised the AOM to hold a short survey with the whole membership (although we were not involved in drafting the version that was launched on April 24).  

     

    Second, we have been carrying on all the regular activities to ensure that the conference can be held in some form (and despite the uncertainty about what will take place and in which form). This includes, as usual, selecting papers, symposia and PDWs, organizing the PhD and early career consortium, the review process for awards, and being in touch with the invited keynote speaker, and our sponsors. We would like to thank all authors and reviewers that put their efforts into writing and commenting on manuscripts and convenors that engaged in developing workshops and symposia. We want to honour their efforts as best as we can.

     

    Third, we have been setting up a platform, in collaboration with Organization, for webinars from and for our community. The call for webinars will be launched shortly. We are also drafting (and gathering) new ideas about how participation and engagement within the community could be improved and how we could work to expand the impact of our ideas and to engage more people in our debates. 

     

    As you know, the AOM board will meet on May 7th to make the final decision on the format of the 2020 conference. We ask you to be patient until then. We will follow up shortly and communicate to all contributors to the program. We engage ourselves to do all we can to get the most out of the format that will be proposed. We hope you will join us in making sure that we, as a critical community, grow stronger out of these unsettling circumstances.  

     

    Patrizia Zanoni and Marcos Barros

    On behalf of the CMS executive



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    Marie Hasbi
    Representative-at-Large (Communication - Social Media & Website
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