Narrative as an organizing process: identity and story in a new nonprofit

Abstract

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to explore narratives in a new nonprofit arts center. It includes the macro‐, meso‐, and personal narratives that keep the center organized in the midst of the chaotic everyday activities. It advocates the explanatory force of narrative as an alternative to organizational life cycle theory for understanding organizational startups.Design/methodology/approachThis narrative ethnography involved participant observation, full participation, and narrative interviews over a three‐year period. Using grounded theory, narratives were examined to discover how they engendered and maintained order.FindingsThis paper contributes to the understanding narratives as a constitutional organizing and sensemaking process, including the narratives of “do it yourself,” and economic production, family and home, and personal narratives that constitute community, community boundaries, and identity, adding to our knowledge of organizing.Research limitations/implicationsThe research examined only one local nonprofit arts center, therefore the findings are specific to this site and the same types of narratives may not necessarily be found in other nonprofits.Originality/valueThis paper examines a nonprofit during start‐up. It validates support for the examination of organizations through narrative ethnography and narrative interviewing. It purports that narratives constitute social identity, rather than being the evidence of social identity.