Barbara Czarniawska Research Articles

Barbara Czarniawska (1948–2024): reflections in memory of her work and life

PurposeThis paper presents a reflection in memory and tribute to the work and life of Professor Barbara Czarniawska (1948–2024).Design/methodology/approachWe invited those colleagues whom we knew to be close to Barbara to submit reflections about her contributions to academia alongside their memories of her as a person. We present these reflections in the order we received them, and they have only been edited for minor grammatical and punctuation issues to preserve the voice of the contributing authors.FindingsThe reflections in this paper represent different translations of Barbara’s academic and theoretical contributions. However, she also contributed to people. While we can count the number of papers, books and book chapters she published, we must also count the number of co-authors, Ph.D. supervisions, visiting professorships and conference plenaries she touched. This (ac)counting tells the story of Barbara reaching out to work and interact with people, especially students and early career researchers. She touched their lives, and the publications are an artefact of a human being, not an academic stuck in an ivory tower.Originality/valueA paper in Barbara Czarniawska’s honour where some of her closest colleagues can leave translations of her work through a narrative reflection, seems to be a fitting tribute.

Barbara Czarniawska (1948–2024)

Barbara Czarniawska (1948–2024)

„Sternicy mediów”. Opis projektu, kwestie metodologiczne

This article describes the “Media Helmsmen” research project, which primary goal was the analysis of the influence of leaders of media organizations on shaping the media market in Poland after 1989. The project began in 2013 during the “Humanistic Management” conference at Jagiellonian University, and was inspired by the idea presented by the late professor Barbara Czarniawska. Even though professor Czarniawska did not conduct her study in Sweden as it was planned, in Poland extensive research material was collected. It allowed the identification of key dilemmas in organizational management media organizations. The article presents the basic research assumptions of the project, including the main research questions: how is the leadership viewed in relation to media organizations? Who exactly is the media helmsman? What are its features? The authors point to the multi-paradigmatic nature of management sciences and emphasize the importance of both theoretical and practical aspects of research. The article includes a brief description of the research process, which is presented in detail in the monograph titled “Media Helmsmen”.

O Cotidiano de Michel de Certeau nas Práticas de Gestão Ordinária de uma Organização da Sociedade Civil de Caruaru, Pernambuco

Abstract Based on the notion of everyday life proposed by Michel de Certeau, the research aimed to understand how the ordinary management practices of a civil society organization in Caruaru, Pernambuco are constituted. We use the concept of "ordinary management" as we seek to understand how the entity's management occurs, indeed, beyond formalized processes. We also discuss Michel de Certeau's concept of "ordinary everyday life", composed of heterogeneous operations in which subjects use strategies and tactics for their production and reproduction. We used participant observations, documentary research, and semi-structured interviews to operationalize the research. The findings were treated through the hermeneutic triad of narrative analysis highlighted by Barbara Czarniawska. We accessed seven everyday practices that allowed us to realize that strategies and tactics are continually mobilized when building the CSO's ordinary management. We highlight that participatory and decentralized management and popular education are the central premises of CSO management and that the study of ordinary management allows us to understand how these premises build the organization's daily life. We also noted conflicts, power relations, and hierarchies relating to the places and spaces occupied by the entity.

Grand plots of management bestsellers: Learning from narrative and thematic coherence

Barbara Czarniawska and Carl Rhodes have argued that managers and entrepreneurs often learn from popular culture. The dominant plots offer the accepted interpretations and guide for actions, whereas alternative plots, available but not most prominent, provide schemes for possible departures from the common wisdom. In this article, we propose that not only works of fiction serve this purpose; powerful ideas derive also from popular management books, not only in terms of explicit content but also as what we term, in homage to Lyotard, the grand plots: structures of meaning not usually seen as the overt message of this article. We present the results of our classificatory reading of popular management books, interpreting them in terms of the tacit notions of narrative development and cohesion, emplotted in the background. The contribution of this article is to show the ways in which the grand plots of popular management books are used to achieve coherence in presenting the books’ total solutions for a variety of organizational problems and contexts. What their readers learn is not so much (or not just) how to manage but how to make narrative sense of management regarded as part of wider cultural context.

Fashion in Mobile Phone Design—The Emergence of Beautification, Desirability and Variation through Institutional Collaboration

This article studies if and how fashion values, such as beautification, desirability through symbolic interaction, and high variation, are increasingly visible in mobile phone design. Such possible inter-linkages are unpacked through interviews with eight representatives of both industries. Their comments enable a discussion on whether a process of fashionalization is underway and, if so, how it is taking place. The findings indicate that fashion values are visible in the design of mobile phones and are accounted for in design. Fashionalization can thus be seen as emanating from institutions related to clothing that extend to and become shared with the mobile industry, such as a shared dependency on trend agencies for color selection and joint events. This interaction, ad hoc and heterogeneous, resists being modeled as a “system,” which has been suggested as a way to explain institutional work within clothing fashion. Drawing on Barbara Czarniawska’s institutional theory, the article proposes conceptualizing the emerging institutional work in terms of “action nets.” This concept makes visible flexible, situated, and ad hoc activities rather than stable and fixed organizational entities.

Cities of Noise: Sensemaking, Sensemakers, and Organized WorldsThe Curtain: An Essay in Seven Parts, by Kundera Milan. (Translated from the French by Linda Asher.) New York: HarperCollins, 2007.The Man Without Qualities, by Musil Robert. (Translated from the German by Burton Pike and Sophie Wilkins.) New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1995.Invisible Cities, by Calvino Italo. (Translated from the Italian by William

In his novel The Unbearable Lightness of Being, Czech author Milan Kundera suggests that a novel is “an investigation of human life in the trap the world has become”. Novels are, indeed, arguably the most subtle tool of ontological inquiry, insightful meditations on how individuals, faced with questions and enigmas related to human existence, make sense of their ‘being in the world.’ (Heidegger, 1962). I have always admired the mastery with which great novelists are able to dissect and convey the most intricate aspects of human situations through their characters and plots. Novelists’ investigations are typically triggered by twists and turns that generate disturbance in the status quo and call for interpretations on the part of the characters involved. I refer to this disturbance as ‘noise’. In this essay, I shall comment on a tale of three cities that share the attribute of noise and are depicted in literary works by Milan Kundera, Robert Musil and Italo Calvino. I shall use this tale to develop considerations that are relevant to the world of organizations, and I shall also highlight some ways in which organizational scholars can learn from novelists.

Why I think shadowing is the best field technique in management and organization studies

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to explore the value of shadowing as a field technique. Design/methodology/approach – This piece takes the form of a viewpoint. Findings – Barbara Czarniawska describes the methodological journey that led her to the adoption of shadowing approaches in her organizational research. Originality/value – This invited commentary is informed by extensive experience of using shadowing to gather data in organizational settings.

Nomadic Work: Romance and Reality. A Response to Barbara Czarniawska’s ‘Nomadic Work as Life-Story Plot’

This article takes departure in Barbara Czarniawska’s discussion of ‘Nomadic Work as Life-Story Plot’. It contextualises her analysis of actors’ interpretations of nomadic work with a bi-focal review of the ambiguous realities of these phenomena. Firstly, an examination of key aspects of the socio-economic and political context of nomadic work in global neoliberal economies reveals precarious conditions that cloud romantic interpretations of nomadicity. Secondly, a review of studies of everyday practices of nomadic work shows how neoliberal, but also alternative futures are enacted through creative appropriation of collaborative technologies. One example is the work of digital ‘disaster deck’ volunteers and its potential for the mobilization of ‘rapid, highly localized assistance’ through closer collaboration between a distributed crowd, local communities, and official emergency responders (Starbird and Palen 2013). This and other examples suggest emergent new practices and politics of dwelling in mobility that are focused on sociality and collaboration, straddling virtual and physical commons. The twin critique developed in this response can augment narrative analysis to inform more integrated CSCW innovation that challenges the ‘brave new world of work’.

Book Review: Martin Parker reviews Alternative Business. Outlaws, Crimes, and Culture, edited by Barbara Czarniawska

Book Review: Martin Parker reviews <i>Alternative Business. Outlaws, Crimes, and Culture</i>, edited by Barbara Czarniawska

Sensemaking and sojourner adjustment among Korean entrepreneurs in London (UK)

This paper takes a new look at the role of narrative construction in sojourner adjustment through a case study of two female Korean entrepreneurs (selected from interviews with 10 Korean sojourners) to best differentiate their cultural adjustment from ‘culture shock’ in the UK. We review the literature on culture shock, beginning with Oberg’s classic modernist/foundational ‘transformational’ model. The limitations of this model are shown in terms of the restricted focus upon individualistic, universal cognitive stages of change experienced by the sojourner. Then the benefits afforded by applying Goffman’s dramaturgy and Weick’s sensemaking approach are discussed. These approaches, informed by relationalist metatheory and metamethods, focus upon persons and interaction. They provide more collective, particularistic, social constructivist lenses that incorporate emotional, symbolic, communicative and linguistic viewpoints to complement cognitive explanations. The narrative methodology employed is that of Barbara Czarniawska whose work is heavily influenced by Goffman and Weick.

Introduction

Click to increase image sizeClick to decrease image size ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS My thanks first and foremost to the volunteer contributors to this special issue: Barbara Czarniawska, Ewan Ferlie, Mauro Guillén, Dvora Yanow, and Charles Perrow, who produced essays of truly exceptional quality and were a delight to edit. Thanks also to Steve Kelman and Marc Ventresca for proposing this special issue and my editorship, to Martha Feldman for help in organizing the issue, and to Lisa Cohen, who was an excellent editor to the editor. Additional informationNotes on contributorsRodney LaceyRodney Lacey (rlacey@uci.edu) is at the Graduate School of Management at the University of California, Davis. He received his PhD in organization behavior and sociology from Northwestern University. His research focuses on industry-level institutional structures, particularly in entrepreneurial or technologically intensive industries. His specific research projects include the social construction of explanations for industrial accidents, emergence of process standards for software development, and the effect of celebrity CEOs.

Global Ideas: How Ideas, Objects, and Practices Travel in the Global Economy. Barbara Czarniawska and Guje Sevón, eds.

Global Ideas: How Ideas, Objects, and Practices Travel in the Global Economy. Barbara Czarniawska and Guje Sevón, eds.

Nanette Monin 2004Management Theory. A Critical and Reflexive Reading In the Management, Organisations and Society Series Edited by Barbara Czarniawska &amp; Martha Feldman RoutledgeLondon &amp; New York

NANETTE MONIN 2004 Management Theory. A Critical and Reflexive Reading In the Management, Organisations and Society Series Edited by Barbara Czarniawska & Martha Feldman Routledge London & New York One way to read Monin's text is as a 'methods' book, but one that is refreshingly out of the ordinary for the management discipline. In it the author describes the eclectic 'scriptive' method of text analysis that she developed for her PhD research project and is able to use in her current work in the Department of Management and Business at Massey University in New Zealand. Based on literary criticism, deconstruction, reader-response and rhetoric theories, the scriptive method involves a tripartite process of reading a text. Firstly, a 'dominant' reading focuses on the author, to provide a summary of (what the reader understands is) their argument(s). Monin chose this Derridean label in an effort to escape a realist mode of analysis-also calling it 'paraphrasis', defined as 'a rewording of the original text' (p.77). secondly, an in-depth 'critical' reading focuses on the text. The backbone of her method, this phase examines three more 'P's that are borrowed from rhetoric theory and practice-'performance', 'perspective' and 'persuasion'. Thirdly, a 'reflexive' reading focuses on the reader, exploring how they have constructed their individual interpretation. This final phase Monin calls 'perpension'-the fifth 1P'-which she defines as 'a process of apprehending, considering and evaluating and weighing the outcomes of my reading to this point' (p. 80). Monin then applies her scriptive method to analyse selected parts of five classic management texts: Frederick Taylor's The Principles of Scientific Management, Mary Follett's Dynamic Administration: The Collected Papers of Mary Parker Follett, Peter Drucker's The Practice of Management, Henry Mintzberg's The Nature of Managerial Work, and Rosabeth Moss Kanter's The Change Masters: Corporate Entrepreneurs at Work. Monin concludes that four of the texts contain a long-held and institutionalized Utopian metanarrative and root metaphor that provides ten 'precepts', or rules of moral conduct for guiding the practice of management and its theories over much of the 20th century. This is a heroic story of progress in the form of a journey that instructs managers to discard old incorrect theories and practices in favour of the map that is offered, which will ensure that the hero discovers the right question and its answer. When he (the hero is strongly gendered as male) reaches this Utopian future place, the manager will enjoy many powerful roles that will enable him to control his employees, with whom to fight others different from them, but who are, nevertheless, resources for meeting the primary financial needs of both himself and his organisation (pp. 189-191). Follett's is the exception-and noticeably so, as her text contradicts nine of the ten precepts (her only similarity is in her criticisms of the past and suggestions for management in the future) (p. 193). Monin proposes that her evidence of Follett's different perspective can explain the discipline's long neglect of her ideas, and that a recent disciplinary interest in Follett's texts promises new narratives and worldviews to guide future theory and practice of management (pp. 196-197). Taking up Monin's invitation to use her scriptive method, I follow up my 'dominant' reading outlined above with a 'critical' reading of her text that identifies a number of ways the author performs her text. Firstly, Monin adopts a role of poet and literary scholar, which she signals from the beginning, when she introduces a poem by Robert Graves and a Shakespearian quotation in blank verse before even exercising her own voice. In her arresting opening paragraph she then constructs herself as a hybrid poet/management theorist: I read poetry and I read management theory. Sometimes I read poetry in search of a good theory and sometimes I read management theory as if it were a poem (p. …

Nanette Monin 2004Management Theory. A Critical and Reflexive Reading In the Management, Organisations and Society Series Edited by Barbara Czarniawska &amp; Martha Feldman RoutledgeLondon &amp; New York

Nanette Monin 2004Management Theory. A Critical and Reflexive Reading In the Management, Organisations and Society Series Edited by Barbara Czarniawska &amp; Martha Feldman RoutledgeLondon &amp; New York