Organizational change in a public housing foundation: The crucial importance of discourse analysis
01 Oct 2012-pp 1-15
TL;DR: It is argued that change programs contain both objective and subjective dimensions, of which the linguistic dimensions might give reasons for better understanding the difficulties in implementing change in new ways.
Abstract: The purpose of this paper is to investigate how strategic vision of change is communicated by managers and how this affects the discourse behavior of service engineers. The case study describes the consequence of variations in professional discourse of managers and employees (mostly engineers) working together in a public housing foundation. The data suggest that interaction between different professionals using different discourses can be a source of misunderstanding. As a consequence behavior of the professional seems to impede cooperation. It is recommended that future research regarding change management should incorporate linguistic discourse analysis. Investigating social interaction processes in change programs could be done comprehensively paying attention to differences in professional cultures in cross-functional cooperation. A managerial implication of our study is that understanding differences in professional discourses reflected in communication is a constant point of attention in facilitating processes of organizational change. We argue that change programs contain both objective and subjective dimensions, of which the linguistic dimensions might give reasons for better understanding the difficulties in implementing change in new ways.
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01 Jan 2000
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14 Mar 2014
TL;DR: In this article, the authors describe three case studies of service engineers participating in organizational change, interacting with managers and consultants, and investigate the role of differences in professional discourse and culture when these three professional groups interact, and how this affects the change result.
Abstract: This doctoral thesis describes three case studies of service engineers participating in organizational change, interacting with managers and consultants. The study investigates the role of differences in professional discourse and culture when these three professional groups interact in organizational change, and how this affects the change result. We bring together two scientific fields, first change management and second, linguistics. The intersection represents the overlapping field of professional discourse and culture. The research design was an explorative multiple case study using qualitative linguistic analyses. The study found that successful organizational change is the result of interaction between professional culture, the organizational culture and the organization/change context. The differences between the professional cultures and discourses can hamper the change process. The practical contribution of this study might be the increased awareness among professionals about their own professional, and often implicit, assumptions. Managers, consultants and service engineers have to be aware of the group dynamics and the specific role of their own typical professional discourse and culture in a change project setting.
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01 Jan 1997TL;DR: Organization theory as mentioned in this paper describes the environment of organization strategy and goals technology organizational social structure organizational culture the physical structure of organizations, and the issues and themes in organization theory: organizational decision-making, power and politics conflict and contradiction in organizations control and ideology in organizations organizational change and learning.
Abstract: Part 1 What is organization theory?: why study organization theory? histories, metaphors and perspectives in organization theory. Part 2 Core concepts of organization theory: the environment of organization strategy and goals technology organizational social structure organizational culture the physical structure of organizations. Part 3 Key issues and themes in organization theory: organizational decision-making, power and politics conflict and contradiction in organizations control and ideology in organizations organizational change and learning.
2,172Â citations
TL;DR: A participant-observation study in a large office-supply firm of how people perform stories to make sense of events, introduce change, and gain political advantage during their conversations is reported in this article.
Abstract: This paper reports on a participant-observation study in a large office-supply firm of how people perform stories to make sense of events, introduce change, and gain political advantage during their conversations. The story was not found to be a highly agreed-upon text, told from beginning to end, as it has been studied in most prior story research. Rather, the stories were dynamic, varied by context, and were sometimes terse, requiring the hearer to fill in silently major chunks of story line, context, and implication. Stories were frequently challenged, reinterpreted, and revised by the hearers as they unfolded in conversation. The paper supports a theory of organization as a collective storytelling system in which the performance of stories is a key part of members’ sense making and a means to allow them to supplement individual memories with institutional memory.*
1,620Â citations