Abstract
This article analyzes communication practitioners’ accounts to interpret what power effects the strategy discourse has on their ‘way of seeing’ themselves and their work. Through an analysis of 26 interviews with communication practitioners, the findings show that strategy, understood as a discursive body of knowledge, has empowered practitioners by enabling them to produce an understanding of themselves as worthy ‘strategists’ possessing unique expertise and competencies essential to their organization, and empowered them to claim intra-organizational power and power over others. The article empirically shows how practitioners engage with the strategy discourse to construct accounts of themselves and their work, and makes a theoretical contribution by exemplifying the problematizing potential of the strategy as discourse perspective by discussing the power effects strategy has on the profession and practice. Thus, the article complements classical and emergent perspectives on strategy in public relations and strategic communication by offering an approach more attentive toward the constitutive effects of strategy on the practice of public relations and strategic communication.
Highlights
Within public relations and strategic communication research, working strategically is generally promoted as the desirable way of working
While the ambition to reach a complete understanding of strategy and strategic work is admirable, it overlooks one fundamental question relevant when studying strategy – namely if it is possible to gain ‘true’ knowledge of strategic work, performed by certain strategists? In addition, while contemporary perspectives on strategy, such as the strategy-as-practice perspective, have been suggested as promising avenues for gaining a more complete understanding of strategy within public relations and strategic communication, especially the strategy-as-practice perspective has been criticized for reproducing and confirming the colonization of strategic management in organizations as it takes strategists and strategizing for granted instead of demystifying the concept (Blom and Alvesson, 2015)
By approaching strategy as a discourse, this study aims to follow these approaches and develop our understanding of the influence strategy as a body of knowledge has on the profession of public relations and strategic communication
Summary
Within public relations and strategic communication research, working strategically is generally promoted as the desirable way of working. Public relations and strategic communication researchers have been influenced by contemporary strategy perspectives, such as the strategy-as-practice perspective, and suggested them as fruitful avenues for gaining a more complete understanding of strategy (Aggerholm and Asmuß, 2016; Frandsen and Johansen, 2015). While contemporary perspectives on strategy, such as the strategy-as-practice perspective, have been suggested as promising avenues for gaining a more complete understanding of strategy within public relations and strategic communication, especially the strategy-as-practice perspective has been criticized for reproducing and confirming the colonization of strategic management in organizations as it takes strategists and strategizing for granted instead of demystifying the concept (Blom and Alvesson, 2015) While the ambition to reach a complete understanding of strategy and strategic work is admirable, it overlooks one fundamental question relevant when studying strategy – namely if it is possible to gain ‘true’ knowledge of strategic work, performed by certain strategists? In addition, while contemporary perspectives on strategy, such as the strategy-as-practice perspective, have been suggested as promising avenues for gaining a more complete understanding of strategy within public relations and strategic communication, especially the strategy-as-practice perspective has been criticized for reproducing and confirming the colonization of strategic management in organizations as it takes strategists and strategizing for granted instead of demystifying the concept (Blom and Alvesson, 2015)
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