organizational change

This week SJSU launched its advising hub on the university website. It’s certainly a welcomed addition; advising has been a weak point at SJSU since long before I arrived on campus. As the university’s requirements have become more complex, advising becomes more essential. Yet with more students and fewer faculty, having the time for effective advising is challenging. So the advising hub should help guide students toward graduation and reduce some of the need for faculty advising.

At the beginning of Chapter 11 the authors of the text provide a summary of what makes organizational change efforts successful. A key component is acceptance by organization stakeholders in fidelity (a match between the intended use and how its used) and uniformity (all targeted users adopt it). I wonder the degree to which the advising hub will work. I hope it works well, but in my first glance through it, all the text and links are overwhelming. And then there’s this at the bottom of the first page: "WEBSITE DISCLAIMER: This SJSU advising site is new this fall. We have not verfied [sic] that all the information on every link is accurate, and our lists, links and materials are not exhaustive." Scary!

My eyes start to glaze over when faced with a lot of text; I figure that’s true for my students as well. And the advising hub website has a lot of text with pages that go for several screens. In contrast, for a project I’m doing in the spring, I’m working with students to develop podcasts (that will include transcripts) on things students know now about SJSU that they wished they had known when they started. The podcasts will work as an advising tool, but in formats students will find more accessible: they can read the transcript, watch the video, or just listen to the audio.

For organizational change to work, it must be planned and must involve those who will be implementing and living with the change. The advising hub planners may have done that; it's not clear from the site. But the format doesn't seem very user-friendly, so students may not use it as much as the planners might have hoped.

~ Professor Cyborg

management gurus

Box 11.5 in your text asks the question, What role do management gurus play in promoting organizational change? The author, Brad Jackson, “viewed the gurus as part of a whole management fashion industry” (p. 325).

Change in organizations necessarily involves both organization managers and leaders. While this "Voices from the Field" could have been included in Chapter 7, the focus here is more specifically on organizational change. This example provides a nice bridge between the two chapters.

In my experience at SJSU, major organizational changes have stemmed from those in the upper levels seeking to fill out their résumés, rather than following a reasoned, planned approach to change. SJSU is near the end of another overhaul based on a new vision. By my count this is the fourth "new" vision for SJSU since I arrived in 1990. This latest reinventing of SJSU, called Vision 2010, is based on an education guru book, Student Success in College: Creating Conditions That Matter, that identifies 20 highly successful universities and colleges. At least one review suggests universities and colleges can apply different aspects of the authors' findings to each institution's unique situation. However, another review suggests that the authors ignored the featured institutions' shortcomings--which may be instructive as well. As one step toward applying the suggestions in the book, SJSU has formed an Achieving Greater Expectations Institute designed to "bring faculty, staff, students, and administrators together to focus on enhancing student learning and developing a sense of belonging to SJSU to foster student success." I wonder how many students know about it.

Gurus can bring in new ideas and fresh ways of thinking. However, they can also apply a one-size-fits-nobody approach to organizational change that hurts more than helps the organization. Ultimately, if the management guru does a poor job assessing the organization's current state, needs, culture, climate, etc., then change likely will not go well. So the guru has to work closely with organization members at all levels to implement planned change effectively.

~ Professor Cyborg

image restoration discourse

Because I’m interested in the images organizations attempt to create, maintain, change, and manage, I found the examples of image restoration discourse on p. 306 in Chapter 10 intriguing. Although I’m sure SJSU has had to apply some of these strategies in the past, today I decided to examine a university that had been put on probation by the NCAA.

Nicholls State University recently completed its probation for ethics violations. The University president blogged about the incident last February. (Interestingly, the comments function on the blog is not available.) The president used several strategies to restore the university’s image. First, he used defeasibility, indicating that had he known about the actions of others, he would have done something immediately. He also used the corrective action strategy, stating the new compliance officer “was directed to be more active in preventing violations on the front end rather than policing the Athletics Department for violations after the fact.” Near the end of the statement the university president says, “while the violations and the resulting penalties were painful and embarrassing, Nicholls State University has handled them with maturity and determination,” using the bolstering strategy by emphasizing the university’s positive traits.

Large corporations often come to mind when studying how organizations restore their images, yet all organizations have to address this issue. For colleges and universities, image is especially important in attracting students. A university may have plenty of wonderful programs, but if its image is poor due to inept responses to crisis situations, then students will go elsewhere.

~ Professor Cyborg

issue control tactics

The issue control tactics Cheney et al. list in Box 10.6 (p. 287) ring true for me, although I am curious about the research on which the list is based. I searched for a footnote in that section of the chapter, but I couldn't find one.

Although these are applied to the organizational context, they seem even more relevant to political communication. The debates are over for the current presidential campaign, but the rhetorical jousting for votes will continue up until election day. Directing attention away from an issue is a common tactic. Both nominees used this strategy to respond to questions they didn't want to answer or to press an issue they thought was more important. The clearest example of limiting access to information is McCain's refusal to disclose his medical records (there's concern over his treatment for melanoma). Some have argued that Obama has not been forthright in his disclosure about associations with Bill Ayers.

Defining what type of information is considered relevant was a tactic frequently used in the debates, with each arguing the other's evidence was irrelevant, wrong, or misleading and then presenting his own evidence. The creating fear of raising an issue tactic has been applied to race and age. Creating criteria for decisions or priorities that frame the decision has been used to tote the advantages of each candidate's tax and health plans. Defining the problem, decision, or conflict in definitive terms has been applied to the economic crisis, the Iraq war, and health care (to name a few issues).

Cheney et al. point out that these tactics allow communicators to covertly exercise power and avoid or suppress conflict. What's frustrating for voters when politicians use these tactics is the lack of real discussion and debate over complex issues.

~ Professor Cyborg

labor and communication

Box 10.11, authored by Dana Cloud, associate professor at the U of Texas, Austin, focuses on labor issues in the new economy, arguing that the plight of most workers really hasn't changed. Currently, Professor Cloud is organizing a boycott of the Manchester Hyatt Hotel in San Diego, the site of the National Communication Association convention in November. The owner of the hotel contributed to the Yes on Prop 8 campaign. In addition, Unite Here claims it's been trying to unionize the hotel for some time.

The boycott has involved individuals not staying at the convention hotel and some groups moving their events off site. Several persons with disabilities have noted that they must stay at the hotel to participate in the convention and getting to any events no longer at the hotel isn't possible. There's been quite a bit of discussion about the issue on NCA's listserv.

Rather than boycotting the hotel (NCA reserved the hotel five years ago; the Manchester Hyatt will get its money even if some people choose to host their events elsewhere), my department decided to protest in the hotel. We chose a slogan and one of our graduate students (who was a graphics designer in a former life) developed a design for a t-shirt and button. If members of the department want to support this form of protest, they can order their t-shirt or button and wear it at the convention. The faculty decided the best way to address the issue is to engage people in discussion rather than leave the scene.

~ Professor Cyborg

resistance in organizations

In their discussion of power in Chapter 9, Cheney et al. note that "resistance implies something being resisted--usually a stronger force, resource, person, or institution" (p. 266). As the faculty in residence for the Accessible Technology Initiative in the College of Social Sciences I've observed instructors' resistance to making all their course materials accessible.

The initiative originated from the very top of the organization--the the CSU's Board of Trustees. The mandate is simple in its phrasing but has far-reaching consequences:

It is the policy of the CSU to make information technology resources and services accessible to all CSU students, faculty, staff and the general public regardless of disability.

This means that students will not need to self-identify as having a disability and therefore needing access to specific course material (although students still will need to register with the Disability Resource Center for services such as test accommodations). All new courses must be have course materials accessible by the end of the semester. All courses must be accessible by fall 2012.

My role is to help faculty in the college make all their instructional materials accessible to students. These materials include syllabi, handouts, digital slides (e.g., powerpoint), video (closed-captioned), and webpages. For documents, accessible means it's in a digital and editable format (so, for example, a screen reader can read the document or the student could enlarge the text), text equivalent information is included for images, hierarchical identifiers are included (such as headings), no extra spaces or lines, no text boxes, no relying on color for emphasis, no blinking visuals, and links to websites are described (rather than saying something like click here).

Most of the faculty I've spoken with do want to make their course materials accessible, although some are concerned about sharing all their class notes and digital slides because they view these materials as intellectual property. Others, however, are quite resistant for two reasons. First, they view ATI as another unfunded mandate from the CSU. I agree that converting all instructional materials into accessible formats is time consuming. But once you know how to design accessible materials, it's pretty basic. Second, they object to the increasing pressure for standardization in course materials, such as formats for syllabi, viewing these pressures as an infringement on their academic freedom. From my perspective, however, designing my syllabus in whatever manner I want isn't academic freedom; what I choose to cover in my class is where academic freedom comes in. If SJSU faculty truly want the campus to be a center of inclusive excellence, we must design our classes for all students.

~ Professor Cyborg

language, disability, and power

How power is evident in talk interests me. As the authors point out in Chapter 9, defining terms is one way to exercise power. My research in communication and disability has focused on disability as a contested term. In a chapter for Communication Yearbook 27, I identified six metaphors of disability, discussing the ways each metaphor empowered/oppressed persons with disabilities.

Disability as a medical problem suggests persons with disabilities must be repaired. This metaphor disempowers persons with disabilities, although more recent conceptualizations may provide useful tools for empowerment. For example, empowerment medicine suggests that individuals can act on and change their physical, political, societal, and economic environments. Disability as cognition focuses on the influence of attitudes toward disability or individual differences in personality traits that influence disabled-nondisabled interaction, moving away from objective notions of disability to subjective ones. This metaphor provides some avenues for empowerment in recognizing attitudes of prejudice and stereotyping that contribute to the oppression of persons with disabilities. However, the metaphor oppresses persons with disabilities in that those without disabilities are defined as the norm; persons with disabilities are Other or abnormal.

Disability in culture examines the influence of culture on what constitutes disability, highlighting the ways that cultural definitions oppress and disempower persons with disabilities. To the extent that persons with disabilities participate in communication concerning disability, disabled persons influence the language (and images) used in empowering ways. To the extent that persons with disabilities remain excluded from those discussions and defined as not fully human, then persons with disabilities will face continued oppression. Disability as culture views persons with disability forming distinct cultures/co-cultures, underscoring the empowering potential of disability as a cultural identity. Further, recognizing disabled-nondisabled interactions as intercultural communication underscores the ways in which persons without disabilities stereotype, discriminate against, and disempower persons with disabilities. However, oppression may manifest itself in the subordination and rejection of disability culture and co-culture.

Disability as politics recognizes the importance of empowering relationships in public and private interactions. The transformation of disability identity from dependent, stigmatized, and abnormal to independent, accepted, and normal constitutes the metaphor's foundation. Recognizing disability as a political and social label provides a critique of the dominant "ableist" perspective on what defines humanness and personhood. Thus, disability as politics strikes at the core of disability oppression and brings with it the power to construct one's identity.

Finally, disability as community incorporates several perspectives to provide a more complex view of disability and communication. This metaphor of disability, particularly with its focus on new communication technologies, most clearly demonstrates empowerment strategies that provide an avenue for persons with disabilities to fully participate in the social construction of their life experiences. For example, the metaphor removes the static notion of a uniform disability culture and proposes multiple co-cultures found among diverse group members who share some things in common and yet in other ways are distinctly different.

If you're interested in reading the article, the full citation is:
Coopman, S. J. (2003). Communicating disability: Metaphors of oppression, metaphors of empowerment. In P. J. Kalbfleisch (Ed.), Communication Yearbook 27 (pp. 337-394). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.

~ Professor Cyborg

paradoxes and democracy

For several years I was involved in a professional organization governed by a board of directors that conducted nearly all its business online. The organization was quite innovative, launching the first online journal in the discipline committed to publishing work across the field, not just research about the internet, digital media, or computer-mediated communication. I was a member of the organization briefly, then elected to the board of directors. Two years later I was elected president, and then the board selected me to edit the journal--the second editor in the journal's existence.

The last part of Chapter 8 discusses paradoxes in democratic organizations that address four aspects of organizing: structure, agency, identity, and power. Reading this section reminded me of my time with the professional organization and the struggles members faced. Although the organization encountered paradoxes in all four areas, paradoxes of power were the most difficult for the organization members to manage productively. In academe, we like to think of ourselves as egalitarian, but in reality, multiple hierarchies exist within the academy. The organization was challenged both with resolving issues of control and leadership within the board as well as the larger hierarchical norms in the discipline and academe. For example, senior scholars who were well-known in the field generally carried more sway in board member discussions. In addition, founding members of the organization had greater influence as well. These control and leadership issues often conflicted with the organization's hierarchy. As you can imagine, some meetings became quite heated.

Although I enjoyed (most of) my time with the organization--especially editing the journal--managing those paradoxes became time consuming, tiring, and distracting. As communication scholars, we should have done a better job addresses the paradoxes of democratic organizing.

~ Professor Cyborg

democracy and organizational communication

The About Us page of the Department of Communication Studies website includes this:

The B.A. and M.A. programs focus on four primary areas or cornerstones: democracy, diversity, technology, and globalization.

• Democracy - affirms the balance of individual freedom and socio-political consensus shaped through dialogue, argument, and persuasion between individuals and groups.
• Diversity - explores the variety and complexity of communication efforts to shape beliefs, values, and perceptions in different communities and cultures.
• Technology - interrogates the implications of human communication in a mediated world.
• Globalization - recognizes the interconnectedness, integration, fragmentation, and conflict within human societies and cultures in global contexts.

All faculty (at least tenure-track) claim they cover these concepts in their classes, but sometimes I wonder if we really do. And in spite of the lofty definitions, I wonder how the terms are put into practice. For example, how democratic is the department? Who is included in departmental decisions and who is not?

In the small group communication text my spouse and I are writing, we discuss five models of democracy: procedural, competitive, participatory, deliberative, and dialogic. So just in that sense, democracy is more complex than the department's definition. In addition, the emphasis on consensus ignores the necessity of conflict and the reality of power in any democratic system, issues Deetz addresses in his work. But as Cheney et al. point out, "Democracy, thus, is a 'god term'--an unquestioned good--for many societies" (p. 215).

Certainly in the U.S., democracy plays a central role in the nation's collective identity. And it certainly plays such a role in the department's identity. Because of democracy's status as a god term, however, we fail to interrogate what we mean by democracy for our students and in practice for department decisions. For example, major departmental policy decisions seldom involve lecturers and never involve students. Who gets to participate in the department's democracy? The U.S., founded on democratic principles, has not always allowed everyone to participate. And restrictions on voting exist today. Because democracy is an unquestioned good, closely examining democratic processes in organizations is all that more important.

~ Professor Cyborg

democracy and health care teams

As I've already mentioned, I've conducted research in hospice interdisciplinary teams. My early work focused on person-centered communication in supportive and persuasive contexts. Later, I examined team processes, including democratic decision making.

Chapter 8 discusses two views of democracy and participation in organizations. One heralds the value of greater employee participation in decision making. The other notes the dark side of so-called democracy, with employees taking on more responsibilities without any compensation. My work in hospice wasn't concerned with the degree to which democracy was "real," but rather with team members' perceptions of democratic processes.

I found that in practice the hospice teams were less democratic than they're typically portrayed in the hospice and health care tea literature. I also found that involvement in decision making was the most important component of the democratic process in terms of how team members evaluated several team and individual outcomes: productiveness and cohesiveness, overall team communication, satisfaction with the team, and desire to stay with the team. In addition, team productiveness was a mediation variable between involvement with the team and job satisfaction.

For me, the most important outcome of this research was that it highlighted the need to train hospice team members in how to work together. Often organization members are thrown into situations and expected to work as a team. But without the training, people simply don't know what to do. While hospice interdisciplinary teams generally serve as exemplars for effective health care teams, members could still benefit from explicit training in teamwork.

If you're interested in reading the article, the citation is:
Coopman, S. (2001). Democracy, performance and outcomes in interdisciplinary health care teams. Journal of Business Communication, 38, 261-284.

~ Professor Cyborg

leadership deficit

The cover of the October 13, 2008, issue of TIME includes the headline, "The Leadership Deficit," as part of a series of story on the current economic crisis. The article focuses on the lack of credibility and trust members of Congress and the White House have with Americans. As the report, Michael Grunwald, put it, "Americans are always skeptical of politicians, but he financial meltdown has made it clear they no longer believe much of anything Washington's current batch of newscycle-obsessed, responsibility-dodging wold criers have to say" (p. 43). Harsh words. But it does seem that the vision those in Washington want the rest of the country to accept (e.g., "trust me, this will work") isn't selling very well.

Cheney et al.'s discussion of vision in Chapter 7 provides some insight into the cynical response Washington's recent bailouts have received. The authors of the text note that much attention is paid to those who formulate vision and missions statements and not enough attention is paid to those who are supposed to buy into those lofty words. Cheney et al. have four suggestions: personalize vision statements to local contexts, refer to those statements when introducing new program, express enthusiasm for the overall vision, and develop a personal theory or organizing mechanism for how the vision can be practically applied. From my perspective, vision is what's lacking in this entire debacle. There doesn't seem to be any overarching principle for the actions taken in Washington. And we do look to our leaders to take the steps necessary to develop and explain the economic vision for the country. In spite of the leadership alternatives discussed at the end of the chapter, we elect politicians because we expect them to lead. Right now, I agree with Grunwald that leadership is lacking.

~ Professor Cyborg

Weick's view of leadership

I've always liked Karl Weick's work. His writing is engaging. He using intriguing metaphors, such as linking organizing with jazz. His 1969 book, The Social Psychology of Organizing, had a tremendous impact on organizational studies. In a recent article with Kathleen M. Sutcliffe and David Obstfeld, Weick elaborates on the notion of sensemaking in organizations. The authors argue, "Sensemaking involves the ongoing retrospective development of plausible images that rationalize what people are doing" (p. 409). They go on to discuss sensemaking as organizing flux, starting with noticing and bracketing, about labeling, retrospective, about presumption, social and systemic, about action, and organizing through communication. Interesting that a social psychologist in a school of business argues organizing is about communicating. If you'd like to read the article, here's the citation:
Weick, K. E., Sutcliffe, K. M., & Obstfeld, D. (2005). Organizing and the process of sensemaking. Organization Science, 16, 409-421.

So it's not surprising that Weick argues against traditional approaches to leadership. In Chapter 7 of the text the authors note that Weick reverses the "walk the talk" buzz phrase. Because Weick takes the stance that organization members engage in retrospective sensemaking--acting and then thinking--talking the walk may be more productive. In this way, leaders match their words to their actions, which may give them greater flexibility. Weick's concern is that if leaders have to match actions to words, then the words will be more cautious, less innovative, and less compelling.

~ Professor Cyborg

dialectics and disability

The notion of relational dialectics, developed as an interpersonal communication theory, resonates with me because it helps explain the tensions individuals encounter in their relationships. I find it much more appealing than cognitive dissonance theory, which suggests we seek to reduce dissonance and that reducing that dissonance is possible. Relational dialectics recognizes the inherent tensions in relationships--we learn to manage them, but they're always there. So although it's an interpersonal theory, it's useful for the authors of the text to include it in Chapter 6.

The authors list six dialectics, connection-autonomy, openness-closedness, novelty-predictability, equality-inequality, instrumentality-affection, and impartiality-favoritism, applying them to relationships in organizations.

A few years ago I presented a paper at the Association of Internet Researchers in which I examined dialectics about disability identity in blogs written about disability by persons with disabilities. I was especially interested in blogs because historically identity is grounded in the body, but the internet severs that relationship, allowing persons with disabilities freedom from being constrained by physicality in online identity construction.

In conducting a close reading of five exemplar blogs, I found four dialectics: individual-societal (disability as a private and public experience), difference-unity (unique identity and commonality with others), permanence-temporary (stability/change in identity and the temporal nature of disabilities), and dependence-independence (control and relying on others). I found that individual-societal was the most prevalent--the one the five bloggers grappled with the most. Dependence-independence was also crucial, although it didn't receive as much attention. The latter two weren't emphasized as much.

Although this research isn't directly about organizational communication, it provides insight into identity construction for persons with disabilities.

~ Professor Cyborg

networking

Yesterday's entry came from my professorial persona. Today's is from my department events coordinator one. Chapter 6 emphasizes the importance of relationships and networking in the workplace. About 2 weeks ago the department hosted COMM Career Day, which I organized. Over 50 students attended. The panel included a representative from the Career Center and five communication studies alumni. Every speaker talked about the importance of networking to get a job and to change jobs within an organization. Speakers mentioned using internships, interviews (informational and employment), professional organizations, and even social contacts for networking.

As the authors of your text observe, "Much of the research on relationships at work has focused on their instrumental role in career success--the networks that people form and the role of those networks in advancing careers" (p. 141). The authors then point out that organization members form relationships for other reasons as well. Still, the workplace context will always influence the nature of those relationships. For example, I've maintained friendships with many of the people with whom I went to graduate school at the U of Kentucky. We have personal connections, such as visiting each other outside the work context and talking about topics other than work. But we keep those professional ties as well, working together on projects, serving on panels, and meeting up at conventions. For example, I found out about the text I use for the class from Ted Zorn, one of the authors, because we both went to UK and we're part of a network of UK grads.

~ Professor Cyborg

message design logics

On page 149 of the text Cheney et al. briefly mention Barbara O'Keefe's work in message design logics. O’Keefe argues that individuals differ in their basic beliefs about the function of communication, or message design logics. These individual differences are reflected in the ways communicators construct and interpret messages. For expressives, the purpose of communication is to express one's thoughts and feelings. Conventionals view communication as a game with participants following shared conversational rules. Finally, rhetoricals see the self and situations as socially constructed and negotiated in talk. For rhetoricals, communication is no longer what one does within a context (conventional), but rather, communication is the means through which interactants create socially shared contexts and negotiate definitions of self and other.

Message design logic follows a general developmental progression (O'Keefe & Lambert, 1995). The three logics are hierarchically ordered, with the expressive design logic the first individuals acquire, conventional the second, and rhetorical the third. Some individuals do not develop a message design logic past expressive; others acquire the conventional system, but do not progress to the rhetorical system; and others progress through the expressive and conventional logics and acquire the rhetorical view. However, when the next system is acquired, the previous one is not discarded but is subsumed within the more advanced level. As message producers move up the hierarchy from expressive to conventional to rhetorical, they have more options in how and to what ends they use language. Therefore, they are better able to identify interpersonal goals (theirs and others') and adapt their messages to achieve those goals.

In a lecture O'Keefe presented at the U of Kentucky when I was a graduate student, she argued that the logics generally were evident only in problematic situations. That is, under most circumstances, we all appear to be conventionals, following the rules of conversation. Particularly when conversational goals are simple, clear, and straight-forward, message design logics are not readily apparent. However, when we are trying to handle multiple, often competing goals, then how we think communication functions influences our ability to achieve those goals. In such situations, expressives will generally say whatever they're thinking, conventionals will be concerned with following the rules, and rhetoricals will try to find a way to negotiate the rules and definitions of self to manage the multiple, competing goals.

~ Professor Cyborg

more on organizational identity

On Tuesday I blogged about the department and how faculty worked together to create the department's tagline and tagline image. I emphasized the importance of that process in giving participants a stake in identity creation. What I hadn't thought about, however, was those who were left out of the process--students, staff, and part-time lecturers. Although the process was more inclusive than that of the university's, all unit members did not participate. I should note, though, that we did ask students for their ideas about the department's tagline, emailing all majors for their suggestions. Two students responded. I posted their ideas to the faculty wiki and we used those ideas as a basis for our discussion.

Similarly, for the COMM Club, only those who attended the two meetings in which the discussion of the logo took place were able to comment on the logo. All COMM majors were invited to the meetings (unlike the faculty meetings where students, staff, and part-time lecturers were not invited), so you could make the argument that the club's members attempted to be inclusive. But in person meetings privilege students who have the time to attend and don't have other commitments during the meeting. To provide greater inclusivity, the Club could have put the draft logos online and invited comments.

In spite of these criticisms, though, the club and department did seek greater stakeholder department than the university did when designing its new logo and identity standards. As Cheney et al. point out, "Although 'participation' and 'diversity' have become management buzzwords . . . , few managers today seem willing to tolerate unfettered communication about the organization's identity by employees and external stakeholders" (p. 129). When former SJSU President Robert Caret imposed the SJSU tagline "Silicon Valley's Metropolitan University" and changed the SJSU logo from the Tower to the bricks, faculty were angered, viewing the change as arrogant because so few were involved in the decision. Cheney et al. observe, "Corporate identity management is typically the domain of a relatively small clique of decision makers speaking on behalf of the rest of the organization" (p. 129). This was true of the Caret decision and of the more recent decision to change the SJSU logo and no longer allow units to develop their own logos. The new identity standards make clear the university's priorities: "The primary brand of San José State University is San José State University. All the colleges, departments, etc, make SJSU the great institution that we are, but the university as a whole is the most important aspect of our identity." Public Affairs has created "lockups" or logos for all university units. Units have no need to create their own identities; PA has already done that for them.

~ Professor Cyborg

organizational culture as fragmented

In Chapter 4, the authors of the text discuss Martin's three perspectives on organizational culture: integration, differentiation, and fragmentation. Although Martin's work is a bit dated (1992), her work is cited widely and provides useful insight into this perspective on organizational culture. The most important contribution from Martin's work is the identification of the fragmentation approach.

An integration approach to culture stresses harmony and similarities; the differentiation approach focuses on separation and conflict; and the fragmentation approach turns our attention to multiplicity and flux. Thus, from a fragmentation perspective, there is no one interpretation of meaning and meanings change from moment to moment. The world does not have the order and predictability found in the other two perspectives. The fragmentation approach to organizational culture is clearly rooted in postmodernism.

Martin defines culture from a fragmentation perspective as, "a web of individuals, sporadically and loosely connected by their changing positions on a variety of issues. Their involvement, their subcultural identities, and their individual self-definitions fluctuate, depending on which issues are activated at a given moment" (p. 153). Martin uses the jungle metaphor to stress the unknown and unknowable nature of culture from the fragmentation perspective.

In applying the fragmentation approach to organizational culture, co-cultures (Martin uses the term subcultures, but co-cultures is a more accurate term) are no longer clearly defined. Organization members move in and out of co-cultures, so insiders and outsiders are less differentiated and boundaries are porous and mutable. Ambiguity is central to organizational life and must be an integral aspect of any study of organizational culture.

Recognizing the centrality of ambiguity in organizations moves organizational scholars away from oppositional or dichotomous thinking and toward more complex views of organizational culture. So the fragmentation perspective explores multiple meanings of what is present as well as what is absent. For example, in analyzing stories, researchers from the fragmentation perspective seek multiple story interpretations and also consider what stories are not told or which organization members are not part of the story. The fragmentation perspective recognizes ambiguities in symbols, ideology, and action. These ambiguities and multiple interpretations do not necessarily come together as a coherent whole. Organizational cultures are characterized by inconsistency, paradox, and contradiction.

~ Professor Cyborg