Human Agency as a Factor in Corporate Success

Authors

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.14515/monitoring.2025.4.2927

Keywords:

agency, corporate sector, economic development, entrepreneurship, platform employment, non-standard employment

Abstract

The article is devoted to the study of manifestations and methods of supporting agentic behavior, transforming the environment in a direction not determined by it, as a factor of success of contemporary corporations in the condition of neo-structuration. The latter is seen a new phase of societal evolution, which assumes a change in the relationship between individual action and social structure. Individual action becomes not just a mechanism for changing corporate structures in the logic they set, but a framework that ensures their preservation as dynamic entities in a poorly predictable environment. In the context of crisis trends in the economy, identifying productive forms of agency support in the corporate sector, as well as their classification, is an important theoretical and practical task, for which the authors conduct a review of Russian and international academic and practical literature covering more than 350 sources published since 2015.

The study shows that agency, the potential of which mobilizes the corporate sector, is highly diverse in forms and sources, it can be implemented both in individual-autonomous and in team forms, and can be oriented not only to the internal, but also to the external environment, including consumers or users. In addition, agency varies in strength and scale of effects. Thus, it can have a more or less strong strategic transformative influence on the organizational environment. Self-organized work teams are considered as an example of agency fields — a new type of structure in the corporate context built around individual agency and enhancing its effects. Special attention is paid to the forms of manifestation and effects of individual agency in the context of platform employment and corporate crowdsourcing, the importance of which increases in the context of reducing the rigidity of boundaries not only within the company, but also between the internal and external environment of the organization.

Acknowledgements. The research was supported by the Russian Science Foundation, grant No. 23-78-10182.

Author Biographies

Pavel S. Sorokin, HSE University

  • HSE University, Moscow, Russia
    • Cand. Sci. (Soc.),  Leading Research Fellow
    • Head of the Laboratory for Human Capital and Education Research
    • Associate Professor, Department of Educational Programmes, Institute of Education

Irina Afanaseva, HSE University

  • HSE University, Moscow, Russia
    • PhD in Art and Design, Research fellow of the Laboratory for Human Capital and Education Research
    • Associate Professor, Department of Educational Programmes, Institute of Education

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Published

2025-09-11

How to Cite

Sorokin, P. S., & Afanaseva, I. A. (2025). Human Agency as a Factor in Corporate Success. Monitoring of Public Opinion: Economic and Social Changes, (4), 202–224. https://doi.org/10.14515/monitoring.2025.4.2927

Issue

Section

SOCIOLOGY OF LABOR, ORGANIZATIONS AND PROFESSIONS