Moving beyond disciplinary boundaries : some guiding principles for a reflexive approach to teaching employment relations and organisation studies

Employment relations and organisation studies are two closely related interdisciplinary fields in management studies that share in common the study of work and organisational practices and relations between employers and employees. Teaching programs in both fields tackle themes such as organisation of work, quality of work life, job design and motivation, job satisfaction, training and development, employee performance, workplace pathologies, organisational structures and processes, teamwork, and the impact of change on the workplace. These fields also share in common conceptual frameworks, epistemologies and methodologies such as theories of employee motivation, psychological and structural analytic approaches, and case studies. Unlike physics, engineering or economics, employment relations and organisation studies have no clearly demarcated boundaries, and draw from fields such as psychology, sociology, anthropology and management theory.