Meaning Work: Making Meaning in Low Structure Situations

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Meaning Work Making Meaning in Low Structure
Situations

• Sue Ashford
• Ruth Blatt

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Our Questions to You

• Where does what were saying seem interesting or
  new?
• What conversation does this contribute to?
• Where could we be more clear?
• Relevant literatures we need to take into
  account?

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The Meaning of Work A Confusion

• Work as a life domain what does it mean to a
  person? Ruiz-Quintanilla England, Wrzesniewski
• Work as an activity what is its content how is
  it evaluated? Wrzesniewski, Dutton Debebe
• When does work have meaning? Pratt Ashforth
• Derived from the fit of what Im doing and who I
  am
• Derived from fit of where Im belonging and who I
  am
• Us How do people create and use meaning in work
  in service of outcomes?

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Meaning and Work

• Organizations help sustain contribution from
  their members by granting meaning
• Division of labor role definition set the
  premises for decision-making what do I do?
  (March Simon Katz Kahn)
• Symbolic actions by leaders define a sense of
  purpose why am I doing it? (Barnard)
• Culture, history, rituals, symbols define what is
  appropriate how should I do it? (OReilly
  Chatman)
• Organizational membership increases positive
  identity at work who am I? (Pratt Ashforth
  Dutton et al., Tyler)
• Collective sensemaking about the work in reduces
  ambiguity and uncertainty what do events mean?
  (Weick, Maitlis)

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But what if meaning is not granted?

• No role to follow
• No leaders to grant meaning
• No organization to feel a part of
• No norms to adhere to
• No colleagues with whom to make sense

The ambiguity and lack of structure often raises
the most basic of existential questions do I
matter? - and a host of more specific meaning
questions as the work is engaged.
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Our Study

• 41 individuals performing work outside of
  organizations
• 90-minute interviews about their day-today lives
• We hope to draw implications for other
  low-structure situations, such as
  entrepreneurship, virtual work, design work and
  research work.

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Sample

• N 41
• What do they do
• Artist 8
• Writer 7
• Graphic Designer 6
• Consultant 9
• Hi Tech 6
• Other 5

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Sample

• What is their life situation?
• Married/Partner 70
• Kids? 40
• Male/Female 51/49
• Years of experience
• 14 29
• 3-8 39
• lt3 32

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Sample

• Financial Success
• High 35 Med 41 Low 24
• Dependence on Income
• High 49 Med 29 Low 22
• In this by choice?
• 90 had high degree of choice

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For a NS worker, you need to make meaning yourself

• However, you have lots of data to use in meaning
  making because in NS work, your actions are
  self-implicating
• Your choices tell you about you
• Your reactions and emotions are important
  information about your functioning
• These realities push you to self examination to
  clarify what matters most
• And can engage pressures to preserve a positive
  self-concept (which may need to be guarded
  against at times)

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You need to figure out

• Who am I?
• What do I do?
• How can I do it in a way that is right for me?
• Why am I doing it?
• What do various events mean?

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Meaning Narrative (an plausible story of the
self at work)
Make sense with
Revise
Make sense with
Revise
Realm of Ongoing Action
Interrupt
Interrupt
Make sense with
Institutional society occupations
organizations Economics
Make sense with
Pay attention to
Pay attention to
Vocabularies of Action
Make sense with
Make sense with
Self-knowing values choices self-concept
Create elaborate
Create elaborate
time
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Narratives

• Meaning narratives are plausible stories about
  the self at work that answer the questions who
  am I? and why am I doing what I am doing?
• Clear narratives provide
• A sense of stability in the face of flux
• Direction in the moment and for the long-term
• A framework for making sense of actions already
  taken
• Motivation
• Resilience
• Help in sustaining a positive self-concept
• An aesthetic

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Invocation and creation of meanings in the
everyday

• Meaning Functions. The created meanings help
  these workers to
• Energize action
• Direct action
• Cope with interrupts
• Modify the narrative
• In everyday life, people in ambiguous situations
  use a wide variety of resources to create meaning
  in service of sustaining action
• Their narratives
• Their experiences
• Their reactions to their experiences
• Words pulled from various vocabularies of
  action to make sense of experience

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Vocabularies of Action

• Institutional vocabularies
• Society (ideologies)
• Occupations (predecessors, norms)
• Organizations (rules, roles, and structures)
• Economics (profit, self-interest)
• Self-knowing vocabularies
• Values
• Choices
• Self-concept

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Everyday Meaning Making is Created by and Creates
the Narrative
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Meaning Narrative (an plausible story of the
self at work)
Make meaning with
Revise
Make meaning with
Revise
Realm of Ongoing Action
Interrupt
Interrupt
Make sense with
Institutional society occupations
organizations Economics
Make sense with
Pay attention to
Pay attention to
Vocabularies of Action
Make sense with
Make sense with
Self-knowing values choices self-concept
Create elaborate
Create elaborate
time
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Interrupts

• Occasions for meaning-making that happen when
  something disrupts the narrative as a device for
  making sense of work and the self-at-work.

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Types of interrupts
Actions Actions
Taken
Not taken
Not taken
Taken
No interrupt Diversion challenge
Self-expression challenge Ego challenge
Expectations challenge Authenticity challenge
Performance challenge No interrupt
Doesnt feel valuable
Doesnt feel valuable
Self View
Feels valuable
Feels valuable
Others appear to value
Others do not appear to value
Others View
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When is meaning-making negative?

• No coherent narrative
• Meaning-making becomes a diversion (e.g.,
  nonprofit entrepreneur)
• Lack of resourcefulness in drawing from
  vocabularies of action
• Limited sensemaking constrains possible action
  (e.g., independent film producer)

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Propositions

• Sustaining effective action in a low-structure
  situation is aided by the development of a
  meaning narrative of the self that is plausible
  to the actor and answers who am I? and Why am I
  doing what Im doing?
• Meaning narratives help actors cope with and
  respond to interrupts in the ongoing flow of
  action
• Interrupts stem from discrepancies between
  actors own view of actions taken or not taken
  and evidence they have of others views of these
  actions.

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Propositions, cont.

• Meaning-making in low structure situations is
  aided by a competence at observing, analyzing,
  and honoring the self in action.
• Meaning narratives are revised through time by
  drawing upon meaning vocabularies in response to
  interrupts
• The broader the meaning vocabularies created and
  used, the better the ability to sustain action
• Expanding attention to external vocabularies
• Making usable a preoccupation with the self