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Outdoor Management Development as Organizational Transformation

A Study of Anglo-French Paradoxical Experience in the Application of Alternative Human Resource Development Approaches

University of Central Lancashire, UK, pstokes{at}uclan.ac.uk

Outdoor management development (OMD) is a controversial management development technique generating revealing perspectives on potential transformations in embedded practices in cultural contexts. OMD takes place in outdoor (mountainous) locations and embraces outdoor pursuits (hiking, climbing and canoeing) and `alternative'styled activities, for example, using theatre or story-telling. `Alternative' here makes a contrast with notional mainstream British and French management development approaches. Using field research carried out in the UK and France, the article explores why OMD and its `alternative' human resource development approaches, so readily engaged in British corporate settings, have been less applied in French organizational contexts. The article argues that, relative to the UK, the use of the outdoors in France for the development of managers or cadres is significantly less extensive and develops and explores reasons why this may be the case.

Key Words: French management development • outdoor management development (OMD)

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