In praise of holistic scholarship : A collective essay in memory of Mark Easterby-Smith

Robinson, Sarah and Contu, Alessia and Elliott, Carole and Gagnon, Suzanne and Antonacopoulou, Elena and Bogolyubov, Pavel and Mary, Crossan and Cunliffe, Ann and Elkjaer, Bente and Graca, Manuel and Kars, Selen and Li, Shenxue and Lyles, Marjorie and Snell, Robin and St Amour, Wayne and Stead, Valerie and Thorpe, Richard and Vera, Dusya (2022) In praise of holistic scholarship : A collective essay in memory of Mark Easterby-Smith. Management Learning, 53 (2). pp. 363-385. ISSN 1350-5076

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Abstract

This collective essay was born out of a desire to honor and remember Professor Mark Easterby-Smith, a founder of the Management Learning community. To do this, we invited community members to share their experiences of working with Mark. The resulting narratives remember Mark as a co-author, co-researcher, project manager, conference organizer, research leader, PhD supervisor, and much more. The memories cover many different aspects of Mark’s academic spectrum: from evaluation to research methods to cross-cultural management, to dynamic capabilities, naming but a few. This space for remembrance however developed into a space of reflection and conceptualization. Inspired by the range and extent of Mark’s interests, skills, experiences, and personal qualities, this essay became conceptual as well as personal as we turned the spotlight on academic careers and consider alternative paths for Management Learning scholarship today. Using the collective representations of Mark’s career as a starting point, we develop, the concept of holistic scholarship, which embraces certain attitudes and orientations in navigating the dialectical spaces and transcending tensions in academic life. We reflect on how such holistic scholarship can be practised in our contemporary and challenging times and what inspiration and lessons we can draw from Mark’s legacy.