Managing as transcending: An ethnography

SummaryThe aim of this paper is to better understand how management influences organizational becoming. We suggest an alternative conceptualization based on the strong process view. Management is regarded as a process of enactment. Past and future situations are immanent in situations of the present, in the form of experiences and expectations. In turn, each present situation has an impact beyond the situation only. Through enactments, the situation is transcended, thereby influencing temporally and spatially dispersed situations. By mobilizing specific experiences of the past and expectations about the future, management judges and justifies current issues. In this process, management influences the transcendence of the actual situation, potentially influencing organizational becoming in the future. Our case study of a Swiss textile company reveals several modes of how management creates such potentialities for future enactments.

► An alternative conceptualization of management is developed, based on the strong process view.
► The conceptualization addresses the interplay between managerial action and organizational becoming.
► Management is conceptualized as transcending present situations by potentialization and generalization for future becoming.
► Management mobilizes specific pasts and futures to judge and justify current issues and situations.
► An ethnography reveals modes of how judgment and justification creates potentialities and generalization for the future.