Tompkins and cheney's organizational control theory

ORGANIZATIONAL COMMUNICATION

2

ORGANIZATIONAL COMMUNICATION A Critical Approach

Dennis K. Mumby The University of North Carolina

at Chapel Hill

3

FOR INFORMATION:

SAGE Publications, Inc. 2455 Teller Road Thousand Oaks, California 91320 E-mail: order@sagepub.com

SAGE Publications Ltd. 1 Oliver’s Yard 55 City Road London, EC1Y 1SP United Kingdom

SAGE Publications India Pvt. Ltd. B 1/I 1 Mohan Cooperative Industrial Area Mathura Road, New Delhi 110 044 India

SAGE Publications Asia-Pacific Pte. Ltd. 3 Church Street #10–04 Samsung Hub Singapore 049483

Acquisitions Editor: Matthew Byrnie Editorial Assistant: Stephanie Palermini

Production Editor: Eric Garner

Copy Editor: Megan Granger

Typesetter: C&M Digitals (P) Ltd. Proofreader: Laura Webb

Indexer: Rick Hurd

Cover Designer: Edgar Abarca

4

mailto:order@sagepub.com
Marketing Manager: Liz Thornton

Permissions Editor: Karen Ehrmann

Copyright © 2013 by SAGE Publications, Inc.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or utilized in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

Photos for “Critical Technologies” and “Critical Case Study” boxes: Courtesy of Dynamic Graphics/liquidlibrary/Thinkstock.

Printed in the United States of America

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Mumby, Dennis K. Organizational communication: a critical approach /Dennis K. Mumby.

p. cm.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN 978-1-4129-6315-2 (pbk.)

1. Communication in organizations. I. Title.

HD30.3.M863 2013 306.44—dc23 2012018541

This book is printed on acid-free paper.

12 13 14 15 16 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

5

Brief Contents Preface Acknowledgments

PART I: D EVELOPING A CRITICAL APPROACH TO ORGANIZATIONAL COMMUNICATION 1 Introducing Organizational Communication 2 The Critical Approach

PART II: THEORIES OF ORGANIZATIONAL COMMUNICATION AND THE MODERN ORGANIZATION 3 Scientific Management, Bureaucracy, and the Emergence of the Modern

Organization 4 The Human Relations School 5 Organizations as Communication Systems 6 Communication, Culture, and Organizing

PART III: CRITICAL PERSPECTIVES ON ORGANIZATIONAL COMMUNICATION AND THE NEW WORKPLACE 7 Power and Resistance at Work 8 The Postmodern Workplace: Teams, Emotions, and No-Collar Work 9 Communicating Gender at Work 10 Communicating Difference at Work 11 Leadership Communication in the New Workplace 12 Branding and Consumption 13 Organizational Communication, Globalization, and Democracy 14 Communication, Meaningful Work, and Personal Identity

Glossary References Index About the Author

6

Detailed Contents Preface Acknowledgments

PART I: DEVELOPING A CRITICAL APPROACH TO ORGANIZATIONAL COMMUNICATION

1 Introducing Organizational Communication

Organizations as Communicative Structures of Control Defining “Organizational Communication”

Interdependence Differentiation of Tasks and Functions Goal Orientation Control Mechanisms

Direct Control Technological Control

Critical Technologies 1.1: Defining Communication Technology Bureaucratic Control Ideological Control Disciplinary Control

Communication Processes Framing Theories of Organizational Communication

Functionalism: The Discourse of Representation Interpretivism: The Discourse of Understanding

Critical Case Study 1.1: A Conduit Model of Education Critical Theory: The Discourse of Suspicion Postmodernism: The Discourse of Vulnerability Feminism: The Discourse of Empowerment

Conclusion Critical Applications Key Terms

2 The Critical Approach

The Critical Approach: A History Karl Marx

Marx’s Key Issues Critiquing Marx

7

The Institute for Social Research (the Frankfurt School) Critical Theory and the Critique of Capitalism Critical Theory and the Critique of Enlightenment Thought

Critical Case Study 2.1: McDonaldizing “Fridays” Critiquing the Frankfurt School

Cultural Studies Understanding Organizational Communication From a Critical Perspective

Organizations Are Socially Constructed Through Communication Processes Critical Technologies 2.1: Mediating Everyday Life

Organizations Are Political Sites of Power and Control Organizations Are Key Sites of Human Identity Formation in Modern Society Organizations Are Important Sites of Collective Decision Making and

Democracy Organizations Are Sites of Ethical Issues and Dilemmas

Conclusion Critical Applications Key Terms

PART II: THEORIES OF ORGANIZATIONAL COMMUNICATION AND THE MODERN ORGANIZATION

3 Scientific Management, Bureaucracy, and the Emergence of the Modern Organization

The Emergence of the Modern Organization Time, Space, and the Mechanization of Travel Time, Space, and the Industrial Worker

Critical Technologies 3.1: Timepieces and Punch Clocks Scientific Management: “Tayloring” the Worker to the Job

Taylor’s Principles: The “One Best Way” The Contributions of Frank and Lillian Gilbreth A Critical Assessment of Scientific Management The Legacy of Scientific Management

Bureaucratic Theory: Max Weber and Organizational Communication Weber’s Types of Authority

Charismatic Authority Traditional Authority Rational–Legal Authority

Weber’s Critique of Bureaucracy and the Process of “Rationalization” The Legacy of Bureaucracy

Critical Case Study 3.1: Rationalizing Emotions

8

Conclusion: A Critical Assessment of “Classic” Theories of Organization Critical Applications Key Terms

4 The Human Relations School

Placing the Human Relations Movement in Its Historical and Political Context Elton Mayo and the Hawthorne Studies

The Hawthorne Studies The Illumination Studies (1924–1927) The Relay Assembly Test Room (RATR) Studies (April 1927–February

1933) The Interview Program (September 1928–January 1931) The Bank Wiring Observation Room Study (November 1931–May 1932)

Implications of the Hawthorne Studies Critical Case Study 4.1: Reframing Happiness at Zappos A Critique of the Hawthorne Studies

Reexamining the Empirical Data Critiquing the Ideology of the Hawthorne Researchers

The Wholly Negative Role of Conflict Rational Manager Versus “Sentimental” Worker Gender Bias in the Hawthorne Studies

Summary Mary Parker Follett: Bridging Theory and Practice

Follett’s Theory of Organization The Strange Case of the Disappearing Theorist

Human Resource Management Douglas McGregor’s Theory X and Theory Y

Critical Technologies 4.1: “Wilfing” Your Life Away Rensis Likert’s Four Systems Approach Critiquing Human Resource Management

Conclusion Critical Applications Key Terms

5 Organizations as Communication Systems

Situating the Systems Perspective The Principles of the Systems Perspective

Interrelationship and Interdependence of Parts Holism

9

Input, Transformation (Throughput), and Output of Energy Negative Entropy Equilibrium, Homeostasis, and Feedback Hierarchy Goal Orientation Equifinality and Multifinality

Organizations as Systems of Communication Critical Technologies 5.1: Organizing Food

Karl Weick and Organizational Sense Making Weick’s Model of Organizing: Enactment, Selection, and Retention A Critical Perspective on Weick

Critical Case Study 5.1: Airlines and Equivocality Niklas Luhmann and the Autopoietic Organization

A Critical Perspective on the Autopoietic Organization Conclusion Critical Applications Key Terms

6 Communication, Culture, and Organizing

The Emergence of the Cultural Approach Two Perspectives on Organizational Culture

The Pragmatist Approach: Organizational Culture as a Variable Critical Technologies 6.1: Communication Technology and Organizational Culture

The Purist Approach: Organizational Culture as a Root Metaphor A Broader Conception of “Organization” The Use of Interpretive, Ethnographic Methods The Study of Organizational Symbols, Talk, and Artifacts

Relevant Constructs Facts Practices Vocabulary Metaphors

Critical Case Study 6.1: Organizational Culture and Metaphors Rites and Rituals

Organizational Stories Summarizing the Two Perspectives

Conclusion Critical Applications Key Terms

10

PART III: CRITICAL PERSPECTIVES ON ORGANIZATIONAL COMMUNICATION AND THE NEW WORKPLACE

7 Power and Resistance at Work

Perspectives on Power and Organizations Power as Social Influence The One-Dimensional Model of Power The Two-Dimensional Model of Power The Three-Dimensional Model of Power

Organizational Communication and Ideology Critical Case Study 7.1: Ideology and Storytelling

Ideology Represents Particular Group Interests as Universal Ideology Obscures or Denies Contradictions in Society Ideology Functions to Reify Social Relations

Examining Organizational Communication Through the Lens of Power and Ideology

Organizational Communication and Corporate Colonization Engineering Culture

Resisting Corporate Colonization The Hidden Resistance of Flight Attendants

Critical Technologies 7.1: Social Media as Resistance Conclusion Critical Applications Key Terms

8 The Postmodern Workplace: Teams, Emotions, and No-Collar Work

Disciplinary Power and the Postmodern Organization The Postmodern Organization: From Fordism to Post-Fordism

The Fordist Organization The Post-Fordist Organization

The Post-Fordist Organization: Teams, Emotions, and No-Collar Work Teams at Work

Critiquing Work Teams Critical Technologies 8.1: Virtual Teams

Emotions at Work Critical Case Study 8.1: What Does Drinking Coffee Have to Do With Organizational Communication?

Doing “No-Collar” Work Conclusion

11

Critical Application Key Terms

9 Communicating Gender at Work

Feminist Perspectives on Organizational Communication Liberal Feminism: Creating a Level Playing Field Radical Feminism: Constructing Alternative Organizational Forms Critical Feminism: Viewing Organizations as Gendered

Critical Technologies 9.1: Gender, Technology, and Power Masculinity and Organizational Communication Critical Case Study 9.1: Why My Mom Isn’t a Feminist Conclusion Critical Applications Key Terms

10 Communicating Difference at Work

Defining Difference Race and Organizational Communication

Putting Race and Organization in Historical Context Race and the Contemporary Workplace Interrogating Whiteness and Organizational Communication

Critical Case Study 10.1: Interrogating Mumby Family Whiteness The Body, Sexuality, and Organizational Communication

Instrumental Uses of the Body and Sexuality Critical Technologies 10.1: Technologies of the Body Critical Case Study 10.2: Sexing up the Corporate Experience

Sexual Harassment in the Workplace Resistant/Emancipatory Forms of Sexuality

Gay Workers and “Heteronormativity” Conclusion Critical Applications Key Terms

11 Leadership Communication in the New Workplace

Traditional Perspectives on Leadership The Trait Approach The Style Approach The Situational Approach Summary

12

New Approaches to Leadership Leadership as Symbolic Action Transformational Leadership Followership

Critical Case Study 11.1: Leadership Lessons From “Dancing Guy” Critical Technologies 11.1: E-Leadership A Critical Communication Perspective on Leadership

Leadership and Disciplinary Power Resistance Leadership Narrative Leadership Gender and Leadership

Conclusion Critical Applications Key Terms

12 Branding and Consumption

Branding Critical Case Study 12.1: Diamonds Are Forever? Branding and Identity Critical Case Study 12.2: When Brands Run Amok Marketing, “Murketing,” and Corporate Colonization Organizations, Branding, and the Entrepreneurial Self Critical Technologies 12.1: Do You Have Klout? The Ethics of Branding Conclusion Critical Applications Key Terms

13 Organizational Communication, Globalization, and Democracy

Defining Globalization Spheres of Globalization

Globalization and Economics Globalization and Politics

Globalization and Resistance Globalization and Culture

Critical Case Study 13.1: Culture Jamming Nike The Globalization of Nothing

Gender, Work, and Globalization Critical Technologies 13.1: Work, Technology, and Globalization in the Call

13

Center Communication and Organizational Democracy

Mason’s Theory of Workplace Participatory Democracy Stohl and Cheney’s Paradoxes of Participation

Paradoxes of Structure Paradoxes of Agency Paradoxes of Identity Paradoxes of Power

Deetz’s Stakeholder Model of Organizational Democracy Conclusion Critical Applications Key Terms

14 Communication, Meaningful Work, and Personal Identity

Meaningful Work A Sense of Agency Enhances Belonging or Relationships Creates Opportunities for Influence

Critical Technologies 14.1: How Does Communication Technology Affect Our Experience of Work?

Permits Use and Development of Talents Offers a Sense of Contribution to a Greater Good Provides Income Adequate for a Decent Living

Managing Work Identity: Some Historical Context Creating and Managing Work Identities

Identity, Identification, and Disidentification Conformist Selves Dramaturgical Selves Resistant Selves

No Collar, No Life Critical Case Study 14.1: A Tale of Two Countries Conclusion Critical Applications Key Terms

Glossary References Index About the Author

14

Preface

I have a confession to make (well, two actually). I have never been a huge fan of textbooks. So, you may legitimately ask, what on earth am I doing authoring one? Good question. The simple answer (only partially true) might be that I finally caved to student-consumer pressure to provide something that makes a bit more sense than all those interminable academic articles I assign to students. If I am to be “coerced” into adopting a textbook, I thought, at least I can write one that I actually like!

Okay, so that was just a minor consideration. There are actually several good organizational communication textbooks available, though none of them really fits the way I like to teach this class. In fact, one of my major problems with the typical textbook is that it’s written as if from nowhere. It’s hard to tell from reading the book if the author even has a particular perspective or set of assumptions that he or she brings to the study of organizational communication. Every textbook reads as though it’s an objective, authoritative account of a particular body of knowledge; the author’s voice almost never appears. But the truth is that every theory and every program of research you’ve ever read about in your college career operates according to a set of principles—a perspective, if you like—that shapes the very nature of the knowledge claims made by that research.

Now, this does not mean that all research is biased in the sense of simply being the expression of a researcher’s opinions and prejudices; all good research is rigorous and systematic in its exploration of the world around us. Rather, I’m saying that all researchers are trained according to the principles and assumptions of a particular academic community (of which there are many), and academic communities differ in their beliefs about what makes good research. That’s why there are debates in all fields of research. Sometimes those debates are over facts (this or that is or isn’t true), but more often those debates are really about what assumptions and theoretical perspectives provide the most useful and insightful way to study a particular phenomenon.

Certainly, the field of organizational communication is no different. In the 1980s our field went through “paradigm debates” in which a lot of time was spent arguing over the “best” perspective from which to study organizations—a debate in which I participated (Corman & Poole, 2000; Mumby, 1993, 2000). Fortunately, the result of these debates was a richer and more interesting field of study; some disciplines are not so lucky and end up divided into oppositional camps, sometimes for many decades.

Overview of the Book

15

But what does this have to do with writing a textbook? It’s my belief that not only should a textbook adequately reflect the breadth of different perspectives in a field, but it should also adopt its own perspective from which a field is studied. It makes no sense that an author should have to check his or her theoretical perspective at the door when he or she becomes a textbook author—the pretense of neutrality and objectivity is, for me, a nonstarter. In fact, I would argue that, from a student perspective, reading a textbook that’s explicit about its theoretical orientation makes for a much richer educational experience. It’s hard to engage in an argument with someone when that person refuses to state his or her position; when you know where someone is coming from you are better able to engage with his or her reasoning, as well as articulate your own perspective. Dialogue is possible!

So, it’s important to me that you know up front who you’re dealing with here. For the past 25 years I’ve been writing about organizations from what can broadly be described as a critical perspective. This means that I am interested in organizations as sites of power and control that shape societal meanings and human identities in significant ways. Thus, I am less interested in things like how “efficient” organizations are (a perspective that some researchers would take) and more interested in how they function as communication phenomena that have a profound—sometimes good, sometimes bad—impact on who we are as people. We spend almost all our time in organizations of one kind or another, and certainly our entire work lives are spent as members of organizations, so it’s extremely important to understand the implications of our “organizational society” of various kinds for who we are as people.

Furthermore, the way I have structured this textbook does not mean that it is only about the critical perspective. In some ways it is a “traditional” textbook in its coverage of the major research traditions that have developed in the field over the past 100 years. The difference from other textbooks lies in my use of the critical perspective as the lens through which I examine these traditions. Thus, the critical perspective gives us a particular—and, I would argue, powerful—way of understanding both organizational life and the theories and research programs that have been developed to understand it. So as you are reading this book, keep reminding yourself, “Dennis is a critical theorist—how does this shape the way he thinks about organizations and lead him to certain conclusions about the theory and practice of organizational life rather than others?” Also ask yourself, “When do I agree with Dennis, and when do I disagree with him? Why do I agree/disagree, and what does that tell me about my own view of the world?”

In addition to the critical perspective I adopt in this book, I’m also bringing a particular communication approach. Rather than thinking of this book as exploring theories of organizational communication, you can think of it as developing a communication mode of explanation that enables us to understand organizations as communicative phenomena. Organizations can (and have) been studied from

16

psychological, sociological, and business perspectives (among others), but to study them from a communication perspective means something distinctive and, I think, unique. From this perspective, communication is not just something that happens “in” organizations; rather, it is the very lifeblood of organizations. It is what makes organizations meaningful places that connect people together to engage collectively in meaningful activity. The implications of this communication perspective will become clearer as we move through the chapters of the book.

Pedagogical Aids

I’ve also included some elements that will assist you in getting to grips with the various and sometimes complex issues that we’ll be addressing. First, each chapter contains at least one Critical Case Study that enables you to apply the issues discussed in that chapter to a real-world situation. Think of these case studies as an effort to demonstrate the fact that “there’s nothing as practical as a good theory.” Second, each chapter contains a Critical Technologies box that provides some insight into the increasing and now-ubiquitous role of communication technology in everyday organizational life. Because any chapter on technology is quickly outdated these days, the box format seemed the most useful way to go. Third, the book is unique in its inclusion of full chapters on (1) postmodernism and the post-Fordist organization, (2) gender and organizations, (3) difference and organizations, (4) branding and consumption, and (5) the meaning of work. All these chapters in various ways address the changing nature of work and organizations. Finally, each chapter highlights key terms in bold throughout the text and lists the key terms at the end of each chapter, along with definitions in the glossary at the end of the book.

Ancillaries

In addition to the text, a full array of ancillary website materials for instructors and students is available at www.sagepub.com/mumbyoc.

The password-protected Instructor Teaching Site at www.sagepub.com/mumbyoc contains a test bank, PowerPoint presentations, chapter summaries, and web resources for use in the classroom.

The open-access Student Study Site at www.sagepub.com/mumbyoc contains web resources, quizzes, and interactive flashcards for key terms to enhance student learning.

The Critical Perspective of the Book

17

http://www.sagepub.com/mumbyoc
http://www.sagepub.com/mumbyoc
http://www.sagepub.com/mumbyoc
Let me say one last thing about the perspective I adopt in this book. I view this textbook (and, indeed, any textbook) as political in the sense suggested by organizational communication scholars Karen Ashcraft and Brenda Allen (2003):

As they orient students to the field and its defining areas of theory and research, textbooks perform a political function. That is, they advance narratives of collective identity, which invite students to internalize a particular map of central and marginal issues, of legitimate and dubious projects. (p. 28)

As I suggested above, knowledge is far from neutral, shaping our understanding of it in particular ways. The “map” I want to lay out for you will, I hope, enable you to negotiate organizational life as more engaged and thoughtful “organizational citizens.” As such, I hope you will be better equipped to recognize the subtle and not-so-subtle ways organizations shape human identities—both collective and individual.

REFERENCES

Ashcraft, K. L., & Allen, B. J. (2003). The racial foundation of organizational communication. Communication Theory, 13, 5–38.

Corman, S. R., & Poole, M. S. (Eds.). (2000). Perspectives on organizational communication: Finding common ground. New York: Guilford.

Mumby, D. K. (1993). Critical organizational communication studies: The next ten years. Communication Monographs, 60, 18–25.

Mumby, D. K. (2000). Common ground from the critical perspective: Overcoming binary oppositions. In S. R. Corman & M. S. Poole (Eds.), Perspectives on organizational communication: Finding common ground (pp. 68–88). New York: Guilford.

18

Acknowledgments

Oh, yes—the second confession. I started writing this book years ago. In fact, I’ve completed three other book projects since I started this one. There’s no single explanation for why it took so long—certainly, changing jobs and becoming a department chair (always a productivity killer) had an impact. To make matters worse, my original publisher was bought out by a much larger company, and my new editor didn’t seem invested in the project—a hard lesson in the politics of the corporate world. Bringing ideas to fruition is just as much about the relationships you have with the people around you as it is about your own ability and discipline. And in that regard I finally got lucky—Todd Armstrong at SAGE knew I was working on a textbook and kept pestering me to sign up with him. I’d worked with Todd on several other projects and knew what a smart, energetic, and all-around great person he was. It’s due in good measure to Todd that this book has finally seen the light of day. Todd left SAGE before the project was finished, but his successor, Matt Byrnie, and Associate Editor Nathan Davidson kept the project moving along with well-timed feedback and plenty of encouragement. Other SAGE staff, including editorial assistant Stephanie Palermini, Assistant Editor Terri Accomazzo, marketing manager Liz Thornton, and Production Editor Eric Garner proved to be an excellent support team. Last, but not least, Meg Granger was a phenomenal copy editor with a great eye for detail; whatever she gets paid, it’s not enough.

Speaking of feedback, this might well be the most reviewed textbook in the history of publishing. Sometimes reviewer feedback can drive you nuts because it’s inconsistent and at times even contradictory. But I was lucky enough to get a wealth of constructive and encouraging comments from organizational communication scholars across the field. In alphabetical order, they are, Patrice M. Buzzanell, Theresa Castor, Jennifer R. Considine, Nancy J. Curtin, Maria A. Dixon, Jennie Donohue, Francine Edwards, Kristine Fitch, Marie Garland, Bethany Crandell Goodier, Liane M. Gray-Starner, Di Grimes, Terry L. Hapney Jr., Jessica Katz Jameson, Jeannette Kindred, Erika Kirby, Tim Kuhn, Dan Lair, Kurt Lindemann, Gina Marcello, Caryn Medved, Rebecca Meisenbach, George W. Musambira, Karen K. Myers, Majia Holmer Nadesan, Todd Norton, Andrea M. Pampaloni, Robyn V. Remke, Maria E. Rodriguez, Jennifer Mize Smith, Patty Sotirin, Rob Whitbred, Lynda R. Willer, Mary E. Wilson, Jason S. Wrench, and Heather Zoller, plus a couple of folks who wished to remain anonymous. Reviewing takes a lot of time and energy, and I appreciate everyone’s willingness to give detailed comments that, I’m sure, took up time they didn’t have.

Thanks also to my excellent colleagues in the Department of Communication

19

Studies at UNC–Chapel Hill—it would be hard to imagine a more stimulating and supportive environment in which to be a scholar and teacher.

The completion of this book was aided greatly by a one-semester Research and Study Assignment from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill during fall semester 2011. In addition, the Danish Otto Mønsteds Foundation provided a generous research grant that underwrote a 4-month appointment at Copenhagen Business School (CBS) during spring and summer 2011. My colleagues in the Department of Intercultural Communication and Management at CBS—especially Robyn Remke, Mikkel Flyverbom, Christina Frydensbjerg, Dan Kärreman, Esben Karmark, Eric Guthey, Hans Hansen, Linda Harrison, and Dorte Salskov-Iversen— provided a wonderfully supportive, collegial, and stimulating research environment in which to work. Tak for alt! Thanks especially to Mikkel for the loan of the bike! Majbritt Vendelbo was especially helpful with the logistics of moving to and living in a new country.

It will become clear as you read this book that I don’t spend a whole lot of time writing while shut up in an office somewhere. I prefer to be out in the world and engaged with people. Most of this book was written “in public,” as it were. The bucolic pleasures of Caffé Driade in Chapel Hill provided an ideal writing environment away from the hustle and bustle of campus, in addition to the best espresso drinks anywhere. Thanks to all its baristas and patrons for tolerating my hogging the corner table. In Copenhagen, The Living Room, Log Lady, and Paludan Books were similarly welcoming and accommodating.

Thanks also to Al, Bazza, and Pete (founding members of the Department of Philosophy and Popular Culture at Stoke Rochford University) for organizing annual summer symposia, and for reminding me that it’s alright to be out standing in the field, as long as you do some good mantlin’ around, god aye.

Finally, thanks to my family for their continued love and support, and for reminding me about life’s real priorities.

20

PART I

Developing a Critical Approach to Organizational Communication

21

© Can Stock Photo Inc./wacker

Humans are organizational animals; modern life is defined by organizations and corporations.

22

23

CHAPTER 1

Introducing Organizational Communication

Perhaps at no other time in human history have organizations and communication been more central to our lives than they are now. We go to work, attend college and church, do volunteer work, join social groups, shop at numerous stores, internalize thousands of commercials from large corporations, and participate in social media. Human beings are communicating, organizing creatures, and we define ourselves largely through our various organizational memberships and communicative connections.

As simple as this assertion is, it hides a rather complex reality. The organizations that define who we are—and our relationship to them—have become increasingly complicated. Indeed, as systems of communication, we largely take for granted organizations and their role in our lives. We’re like the two young fish that one day pass an older fish. The older fish says to them, “Mornin’, boys. How’s the water?” After he has swum away, one young fish turns to the other and says, “What’s water?” Communication and organizations are both a bit like water—we navigate them without really paying much attention to how fundamental they are to our daily lives.

One purpose of this book, then, is to provide you with a map to navigate the water we all swim in and to figure out the complexities of organizational communication processes. In part, we will be exploring different theories and management perspectives and discussing their strengths and limitations, similarities and differences. But each perspective is more than just an abstract theory that has little to do with the “real world.” In many ways, each of them has profoundly shaped the organizational world in which all of us are deeply enmeshed. Indeed, I would suggest that each of these perspectives has, in different ways, shaped who we are as people—a grand claim, I know, but one we will unpack in detail as we move through this book.

In order to lay the groundwork for this claim I want first to identify a common theme that runs throughout these theories—a theme that bears directly on my claim and that will serve as a basic construct in our attempt to understand organizational communication processes. This is the theme of organizational control. As a starting point we can define organizational control as “the dynamic communication process through which organizational stakeholders (employees, managers, owners, shareholders, etc.) struggle to maximize their stake in an organization.” In this book, then, we will examine organizations as communicative structures of control. Let’s

24

explore this focus in more detail below.

ORGANIZATIONS AS COMMUNICATIVE STRUCTURES OF CONTROL

In discussing the various theories that have emerged in the fields of management and organizational communication over the past 100 years or so, we will explore how, at its core, each theory is motivated by the problems associated with controlling large numbers of people in specific settings. Beginning in the late 19th century, as capitalism became the dominant economic system, the new corporate organization and its employees became a focal point of study for social scientists in various academic fields. For more than 100 years, researchers have developed various ways of explaining how people can be motivated to come together to perform specific tasks when, more often than not, they would rather be somewhere else doing something different. Such has been the centrality of this problem for social scientists that sociologist Charles Perrow (1986) has claimed, “The problems advanced by social scientists have been primarily the problems of human relations in an authoritarian setting” (p. 53).

This problem of “human relations” in organizations is a complex one, as we will see in the course of this book. One of the defining features of an organization is that it coordinates the behavior of its members so they can work collectively. But while coordination is a nice concept in theory, it is surprisingly difficult to achieve in practice. Particularly in for-profit organizations (where most people work), a number of factors work against the perfect coordination of a large number of people. One of the most important factors is the tensions between the goals, beliefs, and desires of individual organization members and those of the larger organization (see Table 1.1). Because these goals often conflict, they have to be resolved in some way. Telephone company executive Chester Barnard (1938) was among the first to recognize that the way this fundamental tension, or conflict, is usually resolved is by subordinating the goals and beliefs of individual organization members to those of the larger organization.

Table 1.1 Some Tensions Between Individual and Organizational Goals, Values, and Needs

25

In this context, the issue of control becomes central. All organizational and management theories address the individual–organization tension in some way. As such, all organizational theories implicitly pose the question, “How do we get organization members to engage in behavior that they may not spontaneously engage in and that may even be contrary to their best interests?” In other words, “How can we exercise control over employees and get them to function in a coordinated manner?” In many ways, the history of management thought is the history of efforts to develop more and more sophisticated answers to this question. One of the earliest social scientists to focus explicitly on the issue of organizational control was Arthur Tannenbaum (1968), who stated:

Organization implies control. A social organization is an ordered arrangement of individual human interactions. Control processes help circumscribe idiosyncratic behaviors and keep them conformant to the rational plan of organization. … The co-ordination and order created out of the diverse interests and potentially diffuse behaviors of members is largely a function of control. (p. 3)

However, organization members are not simply passive recipients of control mechanisms, blithely accepting each new form of control as it is implemented. On the contrary, the history of management thought is also a history of struggle, as employees have individually and collectively resisted management efforts to limit their autonomy in the workplace (Fleming & Spicer, 2007). In this sense, we will examine control as a dialectical process. That is, control is never a linear, cause- and-effect phenomenon (like one billiard ball hitting another) but is complex and ambiguous; organizational control mechanisms often produce creative employee responses that produce unintended outcomes for the organization. For example, corporate efforts to engineer organizational culture and instill certain values in employees are sometimes hijacked by employees for their own ends, or else employees create their own countercultures in the organization, rejecting the values communicated by management (e.g., Ezzamel, Willmott, & Worthington, 2001;

26

Smith & Eisenberg, 1987). Before we can examine these different organization theories through the lens of

control, however, we need to do two things. First, we need to develop a coherent and clear notion of what organizational communication means. Second, we must develop an overarching framework that allows us to compare the competing perspectives that make up the field of organizational communication. Such perspectives are not conjured out of thin air by scholars and practitioners but emerge out of particular and long-standing research traditions, each with its own agenda. As this book unfolds, we will see that all the research traditions in organizational communication are at least partially explicable in terms of the particular social, political, and economic conditions of the time in which they emerged.

DEFINING “ORGANIZATIONAL COMMUNICATION”

One of the problems in defining the term organizational communication is that we are dealing with two phenomena—organization and communication—that are, individually, extremely complex. Placed in a dynamic relationship with each other, the level of complexity increases greatly. W. Charles Redding (1988)—widely regarded as the founder of the field of organizational communication—provides us with a useful starting point for defining organization. While acknowledging the difficulty of providing any universal definition, he argues that all complex organizations (i.e., social structures large enough to make face-to-face communication among all members impossible at all times) exhibit the following four essential features: (1) interdependence, (2) differentiation of tasks and functions, (3) goal orientation, and (4) control. Surprisingly, Redding does not include communication as a specific feature, so our fifth defining characteristic of complex organizations is communication processes. We will discuss each of these features in detail.

Interdependence

Organizations exhibit interdependence insofar as no member can function without affecting, and being affected by, other organization members. All complex organizations consist of intricate webs of interconnected communication activities, the integration of which determines the success or failure of the organization. Universities, for example, consist of complex webs of students, faculty, departments, schools, staff, and administrators, each group shaping and being shaped by all the others. While students may seem to be the group with the least agency (i.e., ability to influence others), they nevertheless heavily shape the

27

behavior of the other groups (e.g., by making courses popular or unpopular through enrollment), especially given their role as the primary “customers” of universities.

As organizations have become increasingly complex and global in the past 20 or 30 years, interdependence has become an even more significant and defining feature of organizational life. Many large organizations depend on a complicated array of subsidiaries, outsourcing processes, communication technologies, and leveraged financial structures in order to flourish. Any change in one aspect of this complex system of interdependence can create changes in the entire system. As we saw in 2008, the collapse of several financial institutions had a profound effect not only on the employees of those institutions but on almost everyone in the world, as the global economy went into recession as a result of these failures. The concept of interdependence will be explored in more detail in Chapter 5 on systems theory.

Differentiation of Tasks and Functions

All organizations, however large or small, operate according to the principle of division of labor, in which members specialize in particular tasks and the organization as a whole is divided into various departments. As the 18th century economist Adam Smith illustrated through his description of pin manufacture, many more pins can be produced when the manufacturing process is divided into many specialized tasks than if all the tasks are performed by a single individual (Smith, 1776/1937). This feature of organizations truly came into its own in the late 19th and early 20th centuries with the introduction of scientific management principles into most large organizations (Taylor, 1911/1934)—a perspective we will examine in detail in Chapter 3. While the emergence of the “postbureaucratic” organization (see Chapter 8) and job enrichment has somewhat modified this principle, it is still as applicable to today’s organizations as it was 200 years ago and remains a basic feature of modern capitalism. Anyone who has worked on a production line or in a fast-food restaurant (e.g., Subway, Taco Bell, McDonald’s, etc.) will be well aware of this principle.