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Is The Sense We Take Equal To The Sense We Make? A Discussion on Sensemaking and Power in Organisations

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 September 2015

Raymond D Gordon*
Affiliation:
School of Management, University of Technology Sydney, PO Box 123, Broadway NSW 2007, Australia, Phone: +61 2 9514 3646, Fax: +61 2 9514 3602, Email: [email protected]

Abstract

Sensemaking is recognised as one of the key contemporary approaches to organisation studies. It not only responds to current debates in the field, but also appears to offer a way out of the unproductive and misguided paradigm wars of recent times. The sensemaking literature, however, addresses power implicitly. Sensemaking and the power-knowledge nexus is discussed, giving rise to an argument that suggests the sense people make in organizations may not be entirely their own. Rather, the sense people make may be largely constituted for them in the sense criteria (historical antecedents - constituted knowledge and codes of order) and the political context of the setting in and of, which they are making sense. Implications for managers and future research in regard to how people come to make the sense that they do are contemplated.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press and Australian and New Zealand Academy of Management 2001

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Footnotes

1

I would like to acknowledge and thank Professor Stewart Clegg and Dr. Margaret Wilkins for their helpful comments on early drafts of this paper.

References

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