Publisher's Synopsis
This is the first definitive volume on organizational ethnography, an emerging field in which organizations are studied as human phenomena; unifying the volume is the thesis that organizing is a fundamental human enterprise that is social, symbolic and aesthetic as well as technological and utilitarian. Symbolic interactionism found in sociology, the notion of culture in anthropology, and stories and rituals of folklore and mythology are drawn upon; its adherents suggest that until organizing is understood as a symbolic activity, any theory of organization is incomplete. The contributors to Inside Organizations include both practitioners and scholars who discuss a variety of organizational settings in which they either participated or were participant observers. Using ethnographic techniques, they describe observed situations and behaviours in order to derive universal principles and applications of leadership, culture change and the social and psychological functions of symbolic behaviour.
