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Article
Publication date: 15 November 2011

Katrina Pritchard

The purpose of this paper is to expand recent discussions of research practice in organizational ethnography by engaging in a reflexive examination of the ethnographer's situated…

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to expand recent discussions of research practice in organizational ethnography by engaging in a reflexive examination of the ethnographer's situated identity work across different research spaces: academic, personal and the research site itself.

Design/methodology/approach

Examines concerns with the traditional notion of “being there” as it applies to ethnography in contemporary organization studies and, through a confessional account exploring the author's own experiences as a PhD student conducting ethnography, considers “being […] where?” using the analytic framework of situated identity work.

Findings

Identifies both opportunities and challenges for organizational ethnographers facing the question of “being […] where?” through highlighting the situated nature of researchers’ identity work in, across and between different (material and virtual) research spaces.

Practical implications

The paper provides researchers with prompts to examine their own situated identity work, which may prove particularly useful for novice researchers and their supervisors, while also identifying the potential for incorporating these ideas within organizational ethnography more broadly.

Originality/value

The paper offers situated identity work as a means to provide renewed analytic vigour to the confessional genre whilst highlighting new opportunities for reflexive and critical ethnographic research practice.

Details

Qualitative Research in Organizations and Management: An International Journal, vol. 6 no. 3
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1746-5648

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 14 April 2014

Michael Smets, Gary Burke, Paula Jarzabkowski and Paul Spee

Increasing complexity, fragmentation, mobility, pace, and technological intermediation of organizational life make “being there” increasingly difficult. Where do ethnographers…

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Abstract

Purpose

Increasing complexity, fragmentation, mobility, pace, and technological intermediation of organizational life make “being there” increasingly difficult. Where do ethnographers have to be, when, for how long, and with whom to “be there” and grasp the practices, norms, and values that make the situation meaningful to natives? These novel complexities call for new forms of organizational ethnography. The purpose of this paper is to discuss the above issues.

Design/methodology/approach

In this paper, the authors respond to these calls for innovative ethnographic methods in two ways. First, the paper reports on the practices and ethnographic experiences of conducting a year-long team-based video ethnography of reinsurance trading in London.

Findings

Second, drawing on these experiences, the paper proposes a framework for systematizing new approaches to organizational ethnography and visualizing the ways in which they are “expanding” ethnography as it was traditionally practiced.

Originality/value

The paper contributes to the ethnographic literature in three ways: first, the paper develops a framework for charting new approaches to ethnography and highlight its different dimensions – site, instrument, and fieldworker. Second, the paper outlines the opportunities and challenges associated with these expansions, specifically with regard to research design, analytical rigour, and communication of results. Third, drawing on the previous two contributions, the paper highlights configurations of methodological expansions on the aforementioned dimensions that are more promising than others in leveraging new technologies and approaches to claim new territory for organizational ethnography and enhance its relevance for understanding today's multifarious organizational realities.

Details

Journal of Organizational Ethnography, vol. 3 no. 1
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 2046-6749

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 1 July 2006

Eric Bolle

The purpose of this paper is to identify what the philosophy of Martin Heidegger (1889‐1976) can contribute to the training of managers.

633

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to identify what the philosophy of Martin Heidegger (1889‐1976) can contribute to the training of managers.

Design/methodology/approach

After a short introduction focussing on philosophy and management, Heidegger's potential contribution to managers will be addressed via Safranski's book Martin Heidegger: Between Good and Evil.

Findings

It is often said that change in organizations is hard or even impossible to achieve because people are afraid of change. Safranski however shows how Heidegger considers anxiety as a gateway to change. I propose to read Heidegger's Being and Time as a handbook on management skills.

Originality/value

In terms of philosophy and management an unexpected juxtaposition is made and interpreted.

Details

Critical perspectives on international business, vol. 2 no. 3
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1742-2043

Keywords

Book part
Publication date: 1 August 2017

Jakob Braun

Consumers are increasingly present in multiple spaces. For instance, many people choose to browse their smartphones for product reviews, while shopping at the traditional…

Abstract

Purpose

Consumers are increasingly present in multiple spaces. For instance, many people choose to browse their smartphones for product reviews, while shopping at the traditional brick-and-mortar store. How is their presence affected in such scenarios? Can they be fully present in the store? How is their overall consumption experience impacted? This chapter addresses such questions and explores the nature and role of presence, which is defined as the “feeling of ‘being there’ in the present, the here and now of the physical or a virtual world” (Waterworth & Waterworth, 2006, p. 82).

Methodology/approach

Drawing on findings from different literatures (e.g., marketing, communications), a conceptual approach is used to identify the underlying components of presence and to explore how this construct relates to customer experience.

Findings

Preliminary assertions suggest that presence has a spatial structure. It is concerned with two distinctions. First, presence may vary depending on the level of physicality or virtuality. Second, presence may change based on whether someone is perceiving stimuli in the external environment (what is happening around us in the physical or virtual space) or is lost (i.e., absent) in the internal world of dreams, thoughts, and imaginations.

Research implications

From a theoretical perspective, this research introduces the presence construct from communications to the marketing literature. Studying consumption experiences through the lens of presence contributes to our understanding of how they are affected by simultaneous activities of customers in physical and virtual spaces.

Practical implications

From a managerial perspective, marketers are encouraged to develop new strategies that account for customers’ presence in various spaces, in order to gain their attention.

Details

Qualitative Consumer Research
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-78714-491-0

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 20 April 2012

Martin Parker

The purpose of this paper is to question some of the assumptions about warm proximity which animate the idea of ethnography as a largely naturalistic mode of enquiry.

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Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to question some of the assumptions about warm proximity which animate the idea of ethnography as a largely naturalistic mode of enquiry.

Design/methodology/approach

Watching television and having a think.

Findings

That the history of ethnography can be told as a process of bringing “them” closer to “us”, and this account culminates in the idea of watching a TV show as a mode of academic enquiry.

Originality/value

Largely depends on whether anyone is actually convinced by the argument.

Details

Journal of Organizational Ethnography, vol. 1 no. 1
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 2046-6749

Keywords

Book part
Publication date: 7 July 2017

Juan Bornman

Literacy instruction for children with a disability is not highlighted as a priority in South Africa. This can be attributed to numerous reasons, amongst others: the focus on care

Abstract

Literacy instruction for children with a disability is not highlighted as a priority in South Africa. This can be attributed to numerous reasons, amongst others: the focus on care of children with disability to the detriment of learning; the high number of children with disabilities who are currently out of school; the gradual change and movement towards inclusion despite policies being in place, poorly qualified teachers with limited knowledge regarding best teaching practices and limited experience of teachers in teaching functional literacy. However, the National Department of Education is attempting to address these factors by, for example introducing a compulsory year of schooling before Grade 1 commences (Grade R), developing work books for all learners in the foundation phase and making them available across the country as well as introducing a new national curriculum – Curriculum Assessment Policy Statement CAPS – with a stronger emphasis on literacy.

In this chapter I will briefly provide a contextual background to the South African context; then provide a short discussion of the challenges faced in this context and finally focus on the best practices that have some evidence in this context.

Details

Inclusive Principles and Practices in Literacy Education
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-78714-590-0

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 1 March 2000

Stuart Hannabuss

Qualitative research offers a unique insight into the behaviour and beliefs and meanings of the organisations, situations and people studied. Often these meanings express…

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Abstract

Qualitative research offers a unique insight into the behaviour and beliefs and meanings of the organisations, situations and people studied. Often these meanings express themselves in narrative forms. The researcher’s own experience of research itself takes a narrative form, and has similarities with autobiography. The reflexive elements of autobiography can make for more self‐aware research, above all when the researchers are researching organisations, situations and groups of which they themselves are a part.

Details

Library Management, vol. 21 no. 2
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0143-5124

Keywords

Book part
Publication date: 7 December 2016

Arch G. Woodside

At its best, participation observation (PO) includes the researcher living inside a formal or informal organization long enough to actually observe first-hand how the organization…

Abstract

Synopsis

At its best, participation observation (PO) includes the researcher living inside a formal or informal organization long enough to actually observe first-hand how the organization makes sense of its environment, frames problems and opportunities, plans and performs actions, evaluates outcomes, rewards and punishes its members, and celebrates and commiserates sacred, climatic, and/or exceptional events. The core feature of PO is being there — the researcher's presence in the same context as participants as events happen and not relying mostly on participants retrospections about what happened and the causes and consequences of what happened. In some studies PO data collection occurs unobtrusively — the researcher does not inform the organizations’ participants that she is conducting a study of their thinking and behavior — for example, in The Tearoom Trade (Humphreys, 1970) the researcher becomes a “watch queen” (lookout watching for police) in a men's room in park while others engage in homosexual acts; in The Informant (Eichenwald, 2000) an executive in an international manufacturing firm becomes an undercover researcher (with hidden cameras and listening devices) to collect data showing his colleagues planning and doing illegal price-fixing deals with executives in other firms. In most studies PO data collection is obtrusive with the organizations’ members knowing that a researcher is present for the purposes of observing, describing, and explaining what is occurring in the organization — for example, in Coming of Age in Samoa (Mead, 1943) the American researcher lived among the natives in the south Pacific island to describe rituals relating to the transformation of child to adult; in The Used Car Game (Browne, 1976) the researcher directly observed interactions of salesmen, customers, and sales managers for seven-to-ten hours a day for 15 months with all participants knowing that the researcher was “being there” to collect data to describe and understand their thinking and behavior. The intent for this chapter is not to present a full review of the PO literature; the focus here is to illustrate an obtrusive PO study in a formal organizational context in-depth. The main goals include (1) illustrating doing PO and (2) describing the value of PO research. This chapter serves to introduce the reader to relevant organizational PO literature and provides details of applying participant observation to the study of organizational behavior. The study applies an ethnographic approach to develop flow diagrams of the information processes and decision-making stages of corporate and plant executives in developing corporate purchasing agreements with suppliers. Participant observations of the processes to develop corporate purchasing agreements were conducted along with extensive personal interviews of plant buyers at seven plant locations of Epsilon Corporation — a multinational electronics firm with headquarter offices in New York City. The results indicate that valid and useful descriptions are possible of the information processes and decisions actually used to produce corporate purchasing agreements. Several diagnostic comments are provided to each of the four phases in the processes used to develop corporate purchasing agreements. A template for applying participant observation methods in case study research concludes the chapter.

Details

Case Study Research
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-78560-461-4

Book part
Publication date: 26 June 2007

Robert Hooijberg, James G. (Jerry) Hunt, John Antonakis and Kimberly B. Boal

A key distinction, mentioned by Dubin (1979, p. 227), is “leadership at a distance.” When Dubin was writing, there was little research on this topic. More recently, however, there…

Abstract

A key distinction, mentioned by Dubin (1979, p. 227), is “leadership at a distance.” When Dubin was writing, there was little research on this topic. More recently, however, there has been an upsurge in leadership-at-a-distance work. We see a major review by Antonakis and Atwater (2002), following an earlier one by Napier and Ferris (1993), along with work by authors such as Shamir (1995) and Waldman and Yammarino (1999).

Details

Being There Even When You Are Not
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-6-6110-4908-9

Abstract

Details

Leading with Presence: Fundamental Tools and Insights for Impactful, Engaging Leadership
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-78714-599-3

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