Authors in practice, practical authorship
The relationship between people and organizations, in the present time, is constantly upset by current crisis and post-crisis sceneries. People are expected to balance a high need for reliability with adaptability, instability, and uncertainty. New balances have to be found between material and immaterial dimensions of the work, between stability and mobility, between standardization and differentiation.
Passivity is the risk, whilst the challenge is to stay and to be active, by not stopping the search for meanings and for sustainable courses of action. Becoming authors is therefore a key possibility to face and drive the changes and the unexpected, by rebuilding our own positioning and sense of identity inside our workplaces and communities (Gherardi and Strati, 2012; Cunliffe, 2001; Shotter and Cunliffe, 2002; Shotter, 1993). Practical authorship is a way of being, relating and dwelling in professional and organizational communities. It means grasping and creating a shared sense of self and of the organizational landscapes as both constructions and products of discourses and practices. Authorship in practice implies agency, change and practical impact. It means rediscovering a sense of passion, pleasure, ethical and aesthetical relationships with work and professional objects. It is a way of exploring but also leading new ways of thinking and learning, new alternative possibilities of knowledge sharing and their consequences for practice. By embracing this theme, we believe OLKC 2015 debate will help reshape how we are conceptualizing knowing, learning and organizing in nowadays turbulent times. Original and critical reflections around the concept of authorship, together with contributions offering insights on new research possibilities and new forms of organizational intervention and learning will be therefore welcomed and encouraged.
KEYNOTE SPEAKERS
Ann L. Cunliffe
Ann L. Cunliffe
Ann L. Cunliffe is Professor of Organization Studies at Bradford University School of Management. She moved to Bradford from the University of Leeds, UK after spending 25 years working in the USA, latterly at the University of New Mexico and California State University. She is also Visiting Professor at the University of Strathclyde, UK, and at the Escola de Administracâo da Fundaçao Getulio Vargas, Brazil. Her recent publications include the books A Very Short, Fairly Interesting and Reasonably Cheap Book about Management (2014) and the co-authored Key Concepts in Organization Theory with John Luhman (2012). She has published articles in Organizational Research Methods, Human Relations, Management Learning, Journal of Management Studies, and Organization Studies. In 2002 she was awarded the Breaking the Frame Award from the Journal of Management Inquiry for the article that best exemplifies a challenge to existing thought. Ann was Program Chair and Division Chair of the Critical Management Studies Division of the Academy of Management (2007 -10). She organizes the biennial Qualitative Research in Management and Organization Conference. She is Editor-in-Chief of Management Learning and Consulting Editor of the International Journal of Qualitative Research in Organizations and Management.
John Shotter
John Shotter
John Shotter is Emeritus Professor at The University of New Hampshire, USA. He is internationally known for his work in the fields of psychology, philosophy and communications, having been at the cutting edge of social constructionism for many years. Recently, he has begun to look beyond current versions of social constructionism, which he sees as still embedded in the Cartesianism they aim to overcome. He is interested in participatory forms of life and inquiry in a world of living, embodied beings who are spontaneously responsive to each other. In particular he focuses on dialogically-structured or ‘chiasmically organized’ (Merleau-Ponty, 1968) activities. He is the author of well over 100 book chapters and articles in psychology, communication and organization studies journals, including Organization Studies, Organizational Research Methods, and Management Learning.
Silvia Gherardi
Silvia Gherardi
She has been Professor of Sociology of Organization at the University of Trento until 2014, when she retired. She has been one of the founders of the research unit RUCOLA (Research Unit on Communication, Organizational Learning, and Aesthetics, www.unitn.it/rucola) with which she continues to collaborate. At the moment she is professor II at the Faculty of Education, University of Oslo and Visiting Distinguished Professor of Organization and Management at Aalto University, School of Business. Her main research interests are in the development of a sociological approach to practice- based studies, and in gender studies. Her recent publications include the books ‘How to conduct a practice-based study: problems and methods’ and in collaboration with Antonio Strati ‘Learning and knowing in practice-based studies’, both published by Edward Elgar in 2012. She has published articles in Organization, Organization Studies, Management Learning, The Learning Organization, Human Relations, Journal of Management Studies, Gender, Work and Organization, International Journal of Qualitative Research in Organization and Management, both as single author and in collaboration with other Rucola’s members. She has been president of the European Group for Organizational Studies (1997-2000) and received the Honorary Membership of the European Group of Organizational Studies in 2007. She received the award of “Doctor Honoris Causa” from the Danish Roskilde University (2005), from the University of Eastern Finland (2010), and from St Andrews University in 2014 .
Prof. Silvia Gherardi www.unitn.it/rucola