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This conceptual paper seeks to critically evaluate and illuminate the diverse autoethnographic methodologies that are pivotal for understanding the dynamics of contemporary workspaces. The objective is to contribute to the ongoing scholarly debate on the value of autoethnography in workplace research and explore how it can shed light on complex organizational phenomena.

The paper adopts a narrative literature review approach, focusing on four main forms of autoethnography: realist, impressionistic, expressionistic and conceptualistic autoethnographies. Each form is discussed and dissected, emphasizing their specific sub-forms and illustrating their application through representative examples. The paper engages in a critical debate on utilizing autoethnography in workplace research.

The findings illuminate how autoethnographic methods can be used to gain nuanced and complex understandings of personal experiences situated in workplace culture, as well as how broader social and cultural contexts shape these experiences. The study also highlights the potential of these methods to explore marginalized and silenced stories within workplaces and contribute to the knowledge on power dynamics, inequalities and injustices embedded in the organizational culture.

The following contribution discusses approaches for conducting autoethnographic explorations of selected work environments, offering researchers valuable insights into these methods' application. Through better comprehension and application of these methodologies, researchers can enhance their contribution toward cultivating more inclusive and equitable workplace environments.

The paper stands out in its extensive review and critical discussion of the autoethnographic methods as applied in workplace research. It expands upon individual autoethnographic studies by providing a comprehensive, multifaceted perspective, delving into the merits and limitations of these approaches in particular context of researching contemporary places of work.

In the mainstream international business literature on multinational corporations (MNCs), an authoritative central headquarter (HQ) that transfers standardised practices to its subsidiaries remains the norm. This study aims to explore how MNCs coordinate their management practices through principles.

The paper draws on empirical findings from a qualitative in-depth single case study based on evidence-rich qualitative data including observations from how a high-tech MNC headquartered in Sweden coordinates its development practices.

An alternative informal coordination approach (i.e. coordination by principles) is identified. Additionally, antecedents and implications of the approach are presented.

Coordination by Principles may facilitate the internalisation of practices and be a feasible compromise between context adaptation and traditional standardisation, particularly for MNCs with highly heterogeneous research and development operations.

This paper highlights the importance of acknowledging that firm practices often are based on management ideas that HQs adopt to prevent loss of legitimacy. As such, this study contributes to the scarce literature that critically questions the assumption that HQs solely transfer practices to subsidiaries to improve subsidiary efficiency and performance.

Mixed methods research is useful to enhance theoretical and practical research contributions. However, single methods have predominated much logistics and supply chain management (LSCM) research. This paper presents a review of mixed methods research across ten years in LSCM to determine their usage, identify benefits and inhibitors, and provide suggestions for LSCM researchers to realise the benefits from using mixed methods.

This paper adopts a mixed methods approach through a quantitative analysis of methods used in six leading LSCM journals, an e-mail survey of mixed methods article authors during the review period, and four published case studies that used mixed methods.

Only 144 (ten percent) of all empirical articles were published using mixed methods during the review period. A range of benefits and inhibitors regarding mixed methods adoption were found. Suggestions for LSCM authors include research training in mixed methods use and developing a project-specific research design due to the specificity and complexity associated with mixed methods research.

LSCM is at a critical juncture, shaped by new contexts, themes and challenges, and would benefit from different research approaches and methods. This paper contributes to the LSCM domain through analysing the current state, benefits and inhibitors of mixed methods research in LSCM journals to provide a renewed call to action and guidelines for mixed methods LSCM research, and suggesting research design adaptation to enable agile and resilient research when investigating rapidly changing and complex phenomena.

The purpose of this paper is to provide an inside-out perspective on the practices and effects of talent management (TM) in a multinational organization.

The study adopts an autoethnographic approach focusing on the experiences of the first author during her employment in a multinational organization. This approach contributes to the literature by providing an insider talent perspective that thus far has not been presented in TM research.

Applying autoethnography as a means to address the inside-out perspective in TM reveals a tension. The authors label this phenomenon the “talent paradox,” defined as the mix of simultaneously occurring opportunities and risks for individuals identified and celebrated as a talent.

The paper may be of value to TM scholars and practitioners, as well as to employees who have been identified as high potentials or talents in their organizations. In contrast with the TM literature’s optimism, the findings illuminate that being identified as a talent may paradoxically produce both empowerment and powerlessness. Attending to personal aspects of TM processes is relevant for organizations as well as for individuals as it enables reflection and sensemaking.

Many management scholars view templates as rigid rulebooks suffocating qualitative research. This viewpoint article recommends that, instead, templates should be viewed through the lens of organizational routines.

To facilitate this viewpoint, this article first clarifies the confusions surrounding templates. It points out that how using templates, like following routines in an organization, constitutes three parts - the artifact, the ostensive and the performative; the latter two being often neglected by template critics. The use of templates is encouraged by discussing the learning advantages for novice researchers, through an autoethnographic note narrating the author’s own research and teaching experiences.

This article deliberates upon the criticisms against templates. It then discusses templates using a perspective offered by organizational routines. Thereafter, the use of templates in qualitative management research is discussed, with the help of examples from published reports. Finally, the article explains a way of reflexively using templates through an autoethnographic note detailing the author’s own research and teaching experiences.

In its entirety, the article submits that the artifacts offered by the templates and the ostensive and performative engagements of the template-users must co-exist for co-creating excellent qualitative research.

This paper argues for the need to use multiple sources and methods that respond to research challenges presented by new forms of war. There are methodological constraints and contention on the superiority given to positivist and interpretivist research designs when doing fieldwork in war situations, hence there is a need to use integrated data generation techniques. The combined effect of severe limitations of movement for both the researcher and researched fragmented data because of polarized views about the causes of the war and unpredictable events that make information hard to come by militate against systematic, organised and robust data generation. The purpose of this paper, therefore, is to make fieldwork researchers understand significant research problems unique to war zones.

This research was guided by the postmodernist mode of thought which challenges standardised research traditions. Fieldwork experiences in Cabo suggest the need to use the composite strategies that rely on the theoretical foundation of integrative and creative collection of data when doing research in violent settings.

The fieldwork experiences showed that the standardised, conventional and valorised positivist and ethnographic research strategies may not sufficiently facilitate understanding of the dynamics of war. There should not be firm rules, guidelines or regulations governing the actions of the researcher in conflict. As such, doing research in violent settings require reflexivity, flexibility and creativity in research strategies that respond to rapid changes. Research experiences in Mozambique show the need to use blended methods that include even less structured methodologies.

Fieldwork experiences in Cabo challenges researchers who cling to standardised research traditions which often hamper awareness of new postmodernist mode of thought applicable to war settings. It is essential to study the nature of African armed conflicts by combining creativity and flexibility in the selection of research strategies.

The implementation of mobile health (mHealth) in developing countries seems to be stuck in a pattern of successive pilot studies that struggle for mainstream implementation. This study addresses the research question: what existing health-related structures, properties and practices are presented by rural areas of developing countries that might inhibit the implementation of mHealth initiatives?

This study was conducted using a socio-material approach, based on an exploratory case study in West Africa. Interviews and participant observation were used to gather data. A thematic analysis identified important social and material agencies, practices and imbrications which may limit the effectiveness of mHealth apps in the region.

Findings show that, while urban healthcare is highly structured, best practice-led, rural healthcare relies on peer-based knowledge sharing, and community support. This has implications for the enacted materiality of mobile technologies. While urban actors see mHealth as a tool for automation and the enforcement of responsible healthcare best practice, rural actors see mHealth as a tool for greater interconnectivity and independent, decentralised care.

This study has two significant limitations. First, the study focussed on a region where technology-enabled guideline-driven treatment is the main mHealth concern. Second, consistent with the exploratory nature of this study, the qualitative methodology and the single-case design, the study makes no claim to statistical generalisability.

To the authors' knowledge, this is the first study to adopt a socio-material view that considers existing structures and practices that may influence the widespread adoption and assimilation of a new mHealth app. This helps identify contextual challenges that are limiting the potential of mHealth to improve outcomes in rural areas of developing countries.

To understand how narratives used by entrepreneurial support organizations (ESOs) in Detroit's growing entrepreneurial ecosystem shape transitional entrepreneurs' social reality. We offer theoretical and practical insights to elicit critical support, formulate policies and programs and guide ongoing empirical examination of transitional entrepreneurship.

We adopt a multi-case study approach, looking at two ESOs in Detroit: one focused on promoting high-growth entrepreneurship and securing financial capital for technology entrepreneurs, the other focused on promoting everyday entrepreneurship (especially among underserved communities) and amassing a more diverse array of resources. We conduct a thematic analysis of organizational texts and interview data with ESO leaders.

ESO narratives shape Detroit's transitional entrepreneurs by constructing entrepreneurs' social identity, orienting them to the ecosystem and envisioning a collective future in which transitional entrepreneurs are key.

This study offers insight into the definition of transitional entrepreneurs by extending existing conceptions by highlighting the role of institutional actors, like ESOs, and the narratives they adopt in shaping opportunities and challenges for transitional entrepreneurs. Moreover, we push the boundaries of transitional entrepreneurship, including technology start-up entrepreneurs in the definition and call attention to the role of transitional entrepreneurs in post-industrial cities by showcasing their role in community and urban development.

Democratic therapeutic communities (TCs), use a “flattened hierarchy” model whereby staff and clients are considered to have an equal voice, sharing administrative and some therapeutic responsibility. Using the sociological framework of interaction ritual chain theory, the purpose of this paper is to explain how TC client members negotiated and enforced community expectations through an analysis of power within everyday interactions outside of structured therapy.

The study used narrative ethnography, consisting of participant observation with two democratic communities, narrative interviews with 21 client members, and semi-structured interviews with seven staff members.

The findings indicate social interactions could empower clients to recognise their personal agency and to support one another. However, these dynamics could be destructive when members were excluded or marginalised. Some clients used their interactions at times to consolidate power amongst dominant members.

It is argued that the flattened hierarchy approach theoretically guiding TC principles does not operate as a flattened model in practice. Rather, a fluid hierarchy, whereby clients shift and change social positions, seems more suited to explaining how the power structure worked within the communities, including amongst the client group. Recognising the hierarchy as “fluid” may open dialogues within TCs as to whether, and how, members experience exclusion.

Explorations of power have not specifically focused on power dynamics between clients. Moreover, this is one of the first papers to look at power dynamics outside of structured therapy.

This paper aims to investigate the role of relational governance in innovation platform development, specifically investigating the context of living labs.

Two longitudinal case studies are presented, derived from auto-ethnographic narratives, qualitative interviews and secondary documents, which cover the critical stages in the development of each living lab.

Empirical insights demonstrate the relevance of coordination activities based on joint planning and activities to support innovation platform development across different stages. The governance role of research actors as platform activators is also identified.

The paper offers a useful perspective for identifying collective goals between living lab actors and aligning joint activities across different stages of living lab development.

The case provides insights into the challenges and opportunities for collaboration between academia, industry and users to support sustainable construction innovation.

A relational governance mode is identified, going beyond top down or bottom up approaches, which contributes a new understanding of how collective goals align within a relational space.