John M Bryson
Biographic Data
| ID | 3427015 |
|---|---|
| NAME | John M Bryson |
| GIVEN NAMES | John M |
| FAMILY NAME | Bryson |
| SIGNATURE | BRYSON J M |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Minnesota |
| ORCID | 0000-0001-8439-6054 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 43 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 1100 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 43 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1984 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 10 |
Nonprofit sector ambidexterity: A framework for understanding innovation and strategy change in nonprofit organizations
Organizational ambidexterity is recognized in public organizations for achieving innovation, but the concept remains undertheorized in non-profit organizations despite their crucial role in public service delivery. This study examines the applicability of ambidexterity to non-profits and proposes a framework for understanding it in the non-profit sector. By analysing two cycles of strategic planning in a non-profit organization over 10 years, we …
Ongoing strategizing in practice: Examining CEO activities and a social enterprise’s pathways to growth and greater effectiveness
There is a dearth of high-quality process studies on ongoing strategizing efforts by organizations. Our research addresses this gap by exploring strategizing as a set of interrelated activities manifested over time: diagnosis, prognosis, orienting, mobilizing, and structuring. Using a multi-year, mixed-method case study of a non-profit organization supporting minority-owned businesses, we analyse 86 monthly interviews with CEOs between 2015 and 2…
Interrogating “scale” in strategic management-at-scale: Lessons from collaborative governance
While the field of strategic planning and management has mostly focused on single organizations, a new strand of literature on “strategy management at scale” (SMAS) is exploring the way strategic management can address large-scale, cross-organizational, cross-level, often cross-boundary challenges. The appearance of this new strand has coincided with renewed emphasis on concepts such as public value governance, whole-of-government approaches, and…
Understanding goal formation in strategic public management: A proposed theoretical framework
Organizational goals lie at the heart of strategic public management. While research has centred on the performance impact of organizational goals and goal clarity, the field remains unclear on where organizational goals come from and how they form over time. We argue that research has suffered from the lack of a multi-level, process-focused theoretical framework through which goal formation can be understood and studied. Drawing on a problematiz…
Strategizing on behalf of social enterprises: The case of the Metropolitan Economic Development Association and Catalyst
This article adds to the literature on social enterprise by drawing on the strategy-as-practice tradition of strategy research. There, strategy is seen as something an organization does, not as something that it has. Little in the public and non-profit literature at present focuses on exactly what strategizing is, let alone how it relates to social enterprise. A framework for understanding strategizing is illustrated with case examples. Conclusio…
Multi-stakeholder Engagement for the Sustainable Development Goals: Introduction to the Special Issue
The world is not on track to achieve Agenda 2030—the approach chosen in 2015 by all UN member states to engage multiple stakeholders for the common goal of sustainable development. The creation of the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) arguably offered a new take on sustainable development by adopting hybrid and principle-based governance approaches, where public, private, not for profit and knowledge-institutions were invited to engage arou…
Toward a More Strategic View of Strategic Planning Research
How public leaders can promote public value through co-creation
Governance researchers are increasingly interested in how co-creation can contribute to promoting public value in contemporary liberal democracies. While many have already argued for the potential benefits of employing co-creation in government strategies aiming to enhance public value, few have considered the implications of such a strategy for public leadership. Drawing on recent strands of theory on leadership and management, we specify how pu…
The Future of Strategizing by Public and Nonprofit Organizations
An abstract is not available for this content so a preview has been provided. Please use the Get access link above for information on how to access this content
Using a design approach to create collaborative governance
In complex, shared-power settings, policymakers, administrators and other kinds of decision makers increasingly must engage in collaborative inter-organisational efforts to effectively address challenging public issues. These collaborations must be governed effectively if they are to achieve their public purposes. A design approach to the governance of collaborations can help, especially if it explicitly focuses on the design and use of formal an…
Why leadership of public leadership research matters: And what to do about it
The tough-talking, take-charge, individualistic view of public leadership is alive and well throughout the world, despite the enthusiasm of leadership scholars for more shared, relational, and collectivist views. The times therefore seem especially appropriate for assessing the state of public leadership theory and research and charting a path forward to enhance understanding of the continued appeal of Great Person leadership and the promise of c…
Strategic Planning
This chapter discusses the six approaches and compares and contrasts them along several dimensions, including key features, assumptions, strengths, weaknesses, and contingencies governing their use in the public sector. The strategic planning process includes general policy and direction setting, situation assessments, strategic issues identification, strategy development, decision-making, implementation, and evaluation. The chapter presents conc…
Coping with Value Conflicts in Interorganizational Collaborations
Because they reflect clashing beliefs about the desired ends and means of public policy, value conflicts are challenging and sometimes even impossible to resolve. If the increasingly widespread use of collaborative governance is to bear fruit, researchers and practitioners need to understand how collaborations cope with value conflicts. This article identifies constructs and coding guidelines for studying value conflicts and coping mechanisms in …
Towards a multi-actor theory of public value co-creation
This essay suggests changes to the theory of public value and, in particular, the strategic triangle framework, in order to adapt it to an emerging world where policy makers and managers in the public, private, voluntary and informal community sectors have to somehow separately and jointly create public value. One set of possible changes concerns what might be in the centre of the strategic triangle besides the public manager. Additional suggesti…
Discovering Collaborative Advantage: The Contributions of Goal Categories and Visual Strategy Mapping
Collaboration can make sense when there is some sort of “collaborative advantage” to be gained, meaning organizations can achieve something together that they cannot easily achieve by themselves. However, the literature is essentially silent on how to identify collaborative advantage. This article addresses this shortcoming in the theory of collaborative advantage for public purposes by proposing a set of goal categories that may be used to help …
Strategic Planning for Public and Nonprofit Organizations
Designing and Implementing Cross‐Sector Collaborations: Needed and Challenging
Theoretical and empirical work on collaboration has proliferated in the last decade. The authors’ 2006 article on designing and implementing cross‐sector collaborations was a part of, and helped stimulate, this growth. This article reviews the authors’ and others’ important theoretical frameworks from the last decade, along with key empirical results. Research indicates how complicated and challenging collaboration can be, even though it may be n…
Public Value Creation by Cross‐sector Collaborations: A Framework and Challenges of Assessment
This article proposes ways to assess the public value that cross‐sector collaborations produce. It introduces a framework featuring three dimensions of public value – democratic accountability, procedural legitimacy, and substantive outcomes – that reflect distinct priorities and concerns for public administration. Utilizing examples from research on a multi‐year cross‐sector collaboration in the transportation field, we illustrate the framework'…
Public Management Research Association
Public Value Governance: Moving Beyond Traditional Public Administration and the New Public Management
A new public administration movement is emerging to move beyond traditional public administration and New Public Management. The new movement is a response to the challenges of a networked, multisector, no‐one‐wholly‐in‐charge world and to the shortcomings of previous public administration approaches. In the new approach, values beyond efficiency and effectiveness—and especially democratic values—are prominent. Government has a special role to pl…
Designing Public Participation Processes
The purpose of this Theory to Practice article is to present a systematic, cross‐disciplinary, and accessible synthesis of relevant research and to offer explicit evidence‐based design guidelines to help practitioners design better participation processes. From the research literature, the authors glean suggestions for iteratively creating, managing, and evaluating public participation activities. The article takes an evidence‐based and design sc…
Performance Information Use and Accountability
The State of Public Strategic Management Research: A Selective Literature Review and Set of Future Directions
Strategic planning and related strategic management elements have become ubiquitous practices at all levels of U.S. government and many nonprofit organizations over the past 25 years. The authors review strategic planning and management research over that time period using the premises of practice theory to guide the discussion. The review is organized according to 10 research directions proposed by Bryson, Freeman, and Roering (1986). Important …
The Future of Public and Nonprofit Strategic Planning in the United States
Strategic planning is now a ubiquitous practice in U.S. governments and nonprofit organizations. The practice has become widespread for many reasons, but the chief one is the evidence that strategic planning typically “works,” and often works extremely well. Improvements in strategic planning practice are likely to come as it is seen and researched in its full richness as a practice, or set of practices. Several predictions are offered about the …
Putting the Resource‐Based View of Strategy and Distinctive Competencies to Work in Public Organizations
A key to the success of public organizations is their ability to identify and build capacity, particularly their distinctive competencies, in order to produce the greatest value for key stakeholders. This article grounds this proposition in the resource‐based view of organizations and presents a method for identifying and making use of distinctive competencies in the form of a “livelihood scheme”—a business model appropriate for the public sector…
The Design and Implementation of Cross‐Sector Collaborations: Propositions from the Literature
People who want to tackle tough social problems and achieve beneficial community outcomes are beginning to understand that multiple sectors of a democratic society—business, nonprofits and philanthropies, the media, the community, and government—must collaborate to deal effectively and humanely with the challenges. This article focuses on cross‐sector collaboration that is required to remedy complex public problems. Based on an extensive review o…
Designing and Implementing Cross‐Sector Collaborations: Needed and Challenging
Theoretical and empirical work on collaboration has proliferated in the last decade. The authors’ 2006 article on designing and implementing cross‐sector collaborations was a part of, and helped stimulate, this growth. This article reviews the authors’ and others’ important theoretical frameworks from the last decade, along with key empirical results. Research indicates how complicated and challenging collaboration can be, even though it may be n…
Designing Public Participation Processes
The purpose of this Theory to Practice article is to present a systematic, cross‐disciplinary, and accessible synthesis of relevant research and to offer explicit evidence‐based design guidelines to help practitioners design better participation processes. From the research literature, the authors glean suggestions for iteratively creating, managing, and evaluating public participation activities. The article takes an evidence‐based and design sc…
Public Value Creation by Cross‐sector Collaborations: A Framework and Challenges of Assessment
This article proposes ways to assess the public value that cross‐sector collaborations produce. It introduces a framework featuring three dimensions of public value – democratic accountability, procedural legitimacy, and substantive outcomes – that reflect distinct priorities and concerns for public administration. Utilizing examples from research on a multi‐year cross‐sector collaboration in the transportation field, we illustrate the framework'…
The State of Public Strategic Management Research: A Selective Literature Review and Set of Future Directions
Strategic planning and related strategic management elements have become ubiquitous practices at all levels of U.S. government and many nonprofit organizations over the past 25 years. The authors review strategic planning and management research over that time period using the premises of practice theory to guide the discussion. The review is organized according to 10 research directions proposed by Bryson, Freeman, and Roering (1986). Important …
A leadership framework for cross-sector collaboration
This article presents an approach to collaborative leadership - the Leadership for the Common Good Framework. The framework includes the following elements: attention to the dynamics of a shared-power world; the design and use of forums, arenas, and courts, the main settings in which leaders and constituents foster policy change in a shared-power world; effective navigation of the policy change cycle; and the exercise of a range of leadership cap…
What to Do When Stakeholders Matter: The Case of Problem Formulation for the African American Men Project of Hennepin County, Minnesota
We propose a series of stakeholder analyses designed to help organizations—especially governments—think and act strategically during the process of problem formulation in order to advance the common good. Specifically, we argue that at least five sets of analyses are necessary, including the creation of (1) a power versus interest grid; (2) a stakeholder influence diagram; (3) bases of power–directions of interest diagrams; (4) a map for finding …
Applying Large‐Group Interaction Methods in the Planning and Implementation of Major Change Efforts
Public policy makers, planners, and managers are increasingly relying on what might be called large‐group interaction methods to involve large numbers of people (from as few as eight to more than 2,000) in planning and implementing major change efforts. These methods are structured processes for engaging large numbers of people to: (1) enhance the amount of relevant information brought to bear on a problem; (2) build commitment to problem definit…
How public leaders can promote public value through co-creation
Governance researchers are increasingly interested in how co-creation can contribute to promoting public value in contemporary liberal democracies. While many have already argued for the potential benefits of employing co-creation in government strategies aiming to enhance public value, few have considered the implications of such a strategy for public leadership. Drawing on recent strands of theory on leadership and management, we specify how pu…
Using a design approach to create collaborative governance
In complex, shared-power settings, policymakers, administrators and other kinds of decision makers increasingly must engage in collaborative inter-organisational efforts to effectively address challenging public issues. These collaborations must be governed effectively if they are to achieve their public purposes. A design approach to the governance of collaborations can help, especially if it explicitly focuses on the design and use of formal an…
Influences of Context and Process on Project Planning Success
This study reports results of a quan titative analysis of fifty-eight cases of deliberate efforts to produce ma jor change, or "projects." The results demonstrate that (1) the greater the potential impact on resource alloca tion patterns, (2) the greater the ex tent of problem identification efforts, and (3) the more extensive the use of problem solving as a conflict reso lution strategy, the more likely it is that project goals will be achieved …
A transaction-based approach to policy intervention
The Policy Process and Organizational Form
In this paper the transactions cost approach (TCA) is used to define organizations and to predict their forms under certain conditions. Next, Aaron Wildavsky's approach is used to define the policy process and to predict its form in particular organizations. Two assertions follow: namely, that the most efficient organizational form may be predicted from knowledge of underlying transactions costs, and that the form of the policy process in an orga…
There is No Substitute for an Empirical Defense of Planning and Planners
The Future of Strategizing by Public and Nonprofit Organizations
An abstract is not available for this content so a preview has been provided. Please use the Get access link above for information on how to access this content
Finding a Home for Minnesota's Hazardous Wastes: Case Materials
Toward a More Strategic View of Strategic Planning Research
Fighting the Not-In-My-Backyard Syndrome in Minneapolis
This case examines citizens', planners', and elected officials' responses to the proliferation of community-based residential facilities for disabled people in a large U.S. city. It traces an effort to rationalize a highly political siting process for these group homes. In the course of this effort, city planners surveying neighbors of group homes found that the neighbors cited benefits more often than problems associated with group homes. Planne…
The Policy Process and Organizational Form
In this paper the transactions cost approach (TCA) is used to define organizations and to predict their forms under certain conditions. Next, Aaron Wildavsky's approach is used to define the policy process and to predict its form in particular organizations. Two assertions follow: namely, that the most efficient organizational form may be predicted from knowledge of underlying transactions costs, and that the form of the policy process in an orga…
Initiation of Strategic Planning by Governments
Government leaders have become increasingly interested in strategic planning since the early 1970s as a result of the wrenching changes that have beset the public sector (Eadie, 1983). The changes have stemmed from oil crises, demographic shifts, changing values, tax levy limits, tax indexing, tax cuts, reductions in federal grants and mandates, the devolution of responsibilities, and a volatile economy. The changes have brought into sharp relief…
Case Materials
Finding a Home for Minnesota's Hazardous Wastes: Case Materials
The Nonprofit Economy
Influences of Context and Process on Project Planning Success
This study reports results of a quan titative analysis of fifty-eight cases of deliberate efforts to produce ma jor change, or "projects." The results demonstrate that (1) the greater the potential impact on resource alloca tion patterns, (2) the greater the ex tent of problem identification efforts, and (3) the more extensive the use of problem solving as a conflict reso lution strategy, the more likely it is that project goals will be achieved …
A transaction-based approach to policy intervention
Fighting the Not-In-My-Backyard Syndrome in Minneapolis
This case examines citizens', planners', and elected officials' responses to the proliferation of community-based residential facilities for disabled people in a large U.S. city. It traces an effort to rationalize a highly political siting process for these group homes. In the course of this effort, city planners surveying neighbors of group homes found that the neighbors cited benefits more often than problems associated with group homes. Planne…
There is No Substitute for an Empirical Defense of Planning and Planners
The Competition Prescription
Journal Article The Competition Prescription Get access Donald F. Kettl. Sharing Power: Public Governance and Private Markets. Washington, D.C.: Brookings, 1993. $22.95. ISBN 0-8157-4906-6. John M. Bryson John M. Bryson Hubert H. Humphrey Institute of Public Affairs, University of Minnesota Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory, Volume 4, Issue 2, April 1994, …
And All for One
Applying Large‐Group Interaction Methods in the Planning and Implementation of Major Change Efforts
Public policy makers, planners, and managers are increasingly relying on what might be called large‐group interaction methods to involve large numbers of people (from as few as eight to more than 2,000) in planning and implementing major change efforts. These methods are structured processes for engaging large numbers of people to: (1) enhance the amount of relevant information brought to bear on a problem; (2) build commitment to problem definit…
What to Do When Stakeholders Matter: The Case of Problem Formulation for the African American Men Project of Hennepin County, Minnesota
We propose a series of stakeholder analyses designed to help organizations—especially governments—think and act strategically during the process of problem formulation in order to advance the common good. Specifically, we argue that at least five sets of analyses are necessary, including the creation of (1) a power versus interest grid; (2) a stakeholder influence diagram; (3) bases of power–directions of interest diagrams; (4) a map for finding …
Strategic Planning and Management
What to do when Stakeholders matter: Stakeholder Identification and Analysis Techniques
This article focuses specifically on how and why managers might go about using stakeholder identification and analysis techniques in order to help their organizations meet their mandates, fulfill their missions and create public value. A range of stakeholder identification and analysis techniques is reviewed. The techniques cover: organizing participation; creating ideas for strategic interventions, including problem formulation and solution sear…
Contributions of Planning Under Pressure
Planning under Pressure offers managers, planners, consultants and students a comprehensive and authoritative guide to the Strategic Choice Approach, which has gradually been attracting worldwide recognition as a fresh, versatile and practical approach to collaborative decision-making under uncertainty
A leadership framework for cross-sector collaboration
This article presents an approach to collaborative leadership - the Leadership for the Common Good Framework. The framework includes the following elements: attention to the dynamics of a shared-power world; the design and use of forums, arenas, and courts, the main settings in which leaders and constituents foster policy change in a shared-power world; effective navigation of the policy change cycle; and the exercise of a range of leadership cap…
The Design and Implementation of Cross‐Sector Collaborations: Propositions from the Literature
People who want to tackle tough social problems and achieve beneficial community outcomes are beginning to understand that multiple sectors of a democratic society—business, nonprofits and philanthropies, the media, the community, and government—must collaborate to deal effectively and humanely with the challenges. This article focuses on cross‐sector collaboration that is required to remedy complex public problems. Based on an extensive review o…
Putting the Resource‐Based View of Strategy and Distinctive Competencies to Work in Public Organizations
A key to the success of public organizations is their ability to identify and build capacity, particularly their distinctive competencies, in order to produce the greatest value for key stakeholders. This article grounds this proposition in the resource‐based view of organizations and presents a method for identifying and making use of distinctive competencies in the form of a “livelihood scheme”—a business model appropriate for the public sector…
The State of Public Strategic Management Research: A Selective Literature Review and Set of Future Directions
Strategic planning and related strategic management elements have become ubiquitous practices at all levels of U.S. government and many nonprofit organizations over the past 25 years. The authors review strategic planning and management research over that time period using the premises of practice theory to guide the discussion. The review is organized according to 10 research directions proposed by Bryson, Freeman, and Roering (1986). Important …
The Future of Public and Nonprofit Strategic Planning in the United States
Strategic planning is now a ubiquitous practice in U.S. governments and nonprofit organizations. The practice has become widespread for many reasons, but the chief one is the evidence that strategic planning typically “works,” and often works extremely well. Improvements in strategic planning practice are likely to come as it is seen and researched in its full richness as a practice, or set of practices. Several predictions are offered about the …
Designing Public Participation Processes
The purpose of this Theory to Practice article is to present a systematic, cross‐disciplinary, and accessible synthesis of relevant research and to offer explicit evidence‐based design guidelines to help practitioners design better participation processes. From the research literature, the authors glean suggestions for iteratively creating, managing, and evaluating public participation activities. The article takes an evidence‐based and design sc…
Performance Information Use and Accountability
Public Management Research Association
Public Value Governance: Moving Beyond Traditional Public Administration and the New Public Management
A new public administration movement is emerging to move beyond traditional public administration and New Public Management. The new movement is a response to the challenges of a networked, multisector, no‐one‐wholly‐in‐charge world and to the shortcomings of previous public administration approaches. In the new approach, values beyond efficiency and effectiveness—and especially democratic values—are prominent. Government has a special role to pl…
Business (34 works) · Political science (30 works) · Computer Science (24 works) · Public Policy and Administration Research (23 works) · Public relations (21 works) · Process management (15 works) · Knowledge management (13 works) · Economics (12 works) · Nonprofit Sector and Volunteering (10 works) · Sociology (10 works)