Ecological Sensemaking and the Attention-Based View for Farmers: What They Know

Abstract

We extend the ecological sensemaking construct to outline the conceptual linkage between the Karl Weick’s sensemaking concept and William Ocasio’s Attention-Based View. We illustrate this linkage within the empirical domain of farms. Collecting interview data from 38 farmers, we present a thematic analysis to show that actors embedded in their local environment accurately make sense of ecological processes at the local level but may not have the attentional extent to make sense of planetary processes. This study synthesizes concepts in physical materiality, sociomateriality, technology, ecological sensemaking, geographical scale, attentional grain and attentional extent to explain the ontological and epistemological position of ecological sensemaking. We provide a method to unpack the enactment, selection and retention sensemaking micro-processes from which may be deployed in future studies of ecological sensemaking in natural resource-based industries. We discuss implications for actors working in any environment for which ecological material is ubiquitous and a key business input. We call for more research to bring forward ecological sensemaking as a process of organising.