Culture as text: The development of an organizational narrative

Brown, Mary Helen; McMillan, Jill J.

doi:10.1080/10417949109372850

Cited by 28 publications

(18 citation statements)

References 31 publications

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“…Communications reflect the everyday dramas which people in organizations find important, and these can both support and oppose managerial narratives (Brown and McMillan 1991). Narrative theory has been used to argue that communication is not about objective facts that exist independent of the person or groups through which they are transmitted.…”

Section: Communicating With Storiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Narrative, organizations and research

Rhodes

Brown

2005

Int J Management Reviews

414

381

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Given the rapid expansion of narrative approaches in management and organization theory in recent years, this paper investigates the contribution of this literature to the understanding of organizations and processes of organizing. The paper tells the story of the development of narrative approaches in organizational theory. Narrative's contribution to substantive areas of organization theory is evaluated. These developments are then reviewed in relation to an ongoing tension between story and science. We conclude by contemplating some of the criticisms, and the future, of narrative research.

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Section: Communicating With Storiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Narrative, organizations and research

Rhodes

Brown

2005

Int J Management Reviews

414

381

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“…As revealed by Rhodes and Brown (2005) in their detailed review of narrative studies in organizations, interest in narrative as a way of understanding human interactions can be found across a wide spectrum of authors, ranging from business gurus such as Peters and Waterman (1982, p. 282) who saw 'excellent' companies as 'collectors and tellers' of stories, to organization and communication scholars who have investigated how stories contribute to collective sensemaking (Weick, 1995;Boje, 1991;Czarniawska, 1998) and organizational culture (Brown & McMillan, 1991;Martin, Feldman, Hatch, & Sitkin, 1983), how narratives constitute individual and collective identities (Brown, 2006;Brown, Stacey, & Nandhakumar, 2008), how they are implicated in power relations (Mumby, 1987;Boje, 1995;Smith & Keyton, 2001) and how they manifest themselves in situations of organizational change (Dunford & Jones, 2000;Doolin, 2003;Beech, MacPhail, & Coupland, 2009).…”

Section: The Concept Of Narrative and Its Application To Organizationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Strategy as Practice and the Narrative Turn

Fenton

Langley

2011

Organization Studies

303

274

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This paper argues that organizational communication research, and in particular a perspective that focuses on narrative, can contribute in important ways to understanding the practices of strategy. Narrative is believed to be critical to sensemaking in organizations, and multiple levels and forms of narrative are inherent to strategic practices. For example, narrative can be found in the micro-stories told by managers and others as they interact and go about their daily work, in the formalized techniques for strategy-making whether or not the techniques are explicitly story-based, in the accounts people give of their work as strategy practitioners, and in the artefacts produced by strategizing activity. After exploring applications of narrative approaches to strategy praxis, practices, practitioners and text, we review two concepts that might serve to integrate micro and macro levels of analysis. Overall, narrative is seen as a way of giving meaning to the practice that emerges from sensemaking activities, of constituting an overall sense of direction or purpose, of refocusing organizational identity, and of enabling and constraining the ongoing activities of actors.

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“…Research concentrated on narrative accounts of organizational sense-making expressed by the managing ownership and design staff. Attention was paid both to narrative structure and to the rationales offered by organizational members to explain the stories (Brown & McMillan, 1991;Kreps, 1990;Mumby, 1987). Recurring elements were then integrated into themes encompassing the common ways organizational members spoke of how, where, when, and who wielded power at FED.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%