Prof. P.H.J. Hendriks (Paul)

My research focuses on the infrastructural and social conditions affecting whether and how organisations do or do not learn. To this end, I combine concepts of organisational learning with concepts developed around the knowledge processes of knowledge development, retention, sharing and application. With respect to learning about organisational goals, my special interest concerns how organisations redefine themselves in light of their societal impact, particularly in light of social and ecological sustainability. With respect to conditions for learning and in line with the tradition of Business Administration in Nijmegen, I pay particular attention to (1) the crucial but often not systematically addressed role of organisational structures as core infrastructural conditions and (2) the productive (or not) interaction between social and infrastructural conditions for learning. Partly because I was dean of the Nijmegen School of Management for the last five years before my retirement, the focus of my research activities has shifted (even more) towards supervising PhD projects. I have supervised PhD students who investigate social conditions for learning using theories about social capital (Sabine Bakker). Also, I was the supervisor of research focusing on knowledge processes in the case of expatriation, where cultural differences play a major role (Rob Scharff). Another project recently finished focused on both social and infrastructural conditions for a specific type of knowledge application (namely evidence-based staffing) in the knowledge-intensive environment of hospitals (Carmen van der Mark). I am formally involved as a supervisor in the doctoral research on shared service centres conducted by Herma van Laar, supervised by Jac Christis and Jan Achterbergh. I was also formally the supervisor of Elias Janssen's PhD project on Sustainable Careers in Education.