Allenna Leonard, “Symbiosis as a Metaphor for Sustainability Practice in Human Affairs”

This concept paper is an exploration of various symbiotic relationships and their potential relevance for the organization and conduct of human affairs. Many types of symbiosis exist: between plants, between plant and animal life and between different animals. They contribute to protection and defense, cleaning, reproduction, nutrition, transportation and illumination. Some symbiots are so tightly coupled that they are not able to exist, or exist in the same form, separately. Others can exist separately but they are less viable alone than together. Still others benefit from but do not depend upon the relationship. All seem to provide complementary features and strengths that either enhance the success and well being of both or impose a bearable burden on the non-advantaged partner.

We are seeking, and none too soon, new ways to make a difference in the achievement of sustainable relationships in human society and organizations and between human activity and the natural environment. A broader and deeper appreciation of symbiosis in the general public and among researchers in different disciplines may make a contribution to both innovation and a more effective application of existing knowledge and tools.

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Jerome Galbrun, Kyoichi Kijima, “Growth Strategy and Hierarchy Theory: Emergence of Super-players in the Healthcare Computed Tomography Oligopoly”

This paper examines how firms discover effective strategic positions in a business technology-driven oligopoly context (limited players, no possible entrant and rapid technological change). In such settings, neither rational deduction nor local search is likely to lead a firm to a successful growth: firms escalate by launching new products faster, developing new services or acquiring new capabilities. Demonstrating the complexity of the business oligopoly, however, allows us to define the emergence of a new type of players, “super-player”, able to write a new set of rules and to substantially influence the industry for a given period of time. With respect to the Hierarchy Theory, we find the attributes of context changing, filtering information and simplifying multilevel business systems for this “super-player”. More surprisingly, we find a succession of “super-players” that we identify as a consequence of co-evolution for a given oligopoly-type industry, in the Healthcare Computed Tomography: the “super-player” evolves in a way that the entire industry ultimately adapts itself and co-evolves in the same way.

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Abraham Briones-Juarez, Ricardo Tejeida-Padilla, Oswaldo Morales-Matamoros, “A Soft Systems Methodology approach to Design a Restaurant Management Model for a Great Tourism Hotel”

This paper is about the design of a systemic model used in restaurants’ management inside the hotels of Great Tourism category in Mexico City, applied to the Restaurant the Gifts of the Hotel Sheraton Historical Center.

With the purpose of establishing a Holistic vision of the work’s development, the use of the Systems’ Paradigm and the Soft Systems Methodology by Peter Checkland was determinate, since the case of study is a social system that is not only able to choose means to reach certain goals, but also capable to select and to change them.

The designed model was conceptually defined with the restructuring of the information flows, the reorganization of the restaurant’s organizational structure and the view of the elements that affect the system in its intern and external environments.

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This session will follow the format of Singerian Inquiry described in the Call for Papers, with each presenter permitted five minutes for presentation, followed by 20 minutes of conversation.