Organisational Myths and Storytelling as Communication Management: A Conceptual Framework for Learning an Organisation's Culture

Abstract

This paper explains how organisational myths and stories are vehicles of communication management (Kaye 1993; 1994). Contemporary scholars (eg Brown 1992; Boje 1991b) have argued that stories and myths are not only important communicative tools for learning within organisations but also powerful media for bringing about changes in people and in the culture of their workplace. People-associated changes include ways in which professional relationships and interpersonal communication are affected. In turn, the effects of mythologising and storytelling on organisational behaviour and communication are likely to have further-reaching consequences in shaping the culture of human systems.Myth-making in organisations involves the identification of heroic and legendary archetypes. Such archetypes often serve as exemplars or role models for people-in-systems. The telling of stories involving heroic role models can have a marked influence on the shaping of communication between managers and their staff. Often the exploits of heroes become embellished through repeated oral versions. Stories gradually acquire a mythical quality or status. Significantly, the incorporation of stories into an organisation's culture will depend a lot on the credibility of the storyteller. When managers are perceived to have high credibility, they have a powerful means of helping those they supervise to learn, to achieve professional goals, and thus to contribute to the strategic growth of their organisations.In this paper, myth-making and storytelling are considered to be specialised facets of communicative competence and analysed in terms of the Adult Communication Management Model (Kaye 1993; 1994). Attention is given to the effect of myth-making and storytelling on the covert ‘shadow-side’ culture of human systems. It is argued that the understanding and management of shadow-side communication is an integral component of effective organisational behaviour and survival. It is also proposed that such understanding and the ability to manage shadow-side communication is closely related to managers' awareness of prevailing myths and stories within their organisations. Finally, it is argued that managers who are skilled storytellers have the opportunity to help their staff develop communication abilities in a workplace conducive to learning.

Narrative, organizations and research

“…Narrative and its near conceptual neighbours such as story (Boje 1995), fantasy (Gabriel 1995), saga (Clark 1972) and myth (Kaye 1995) have been implicated in studies of processes of socialization (Brown 1982), learning (Tenkasi and Bolman 1993), strategic individuality (Harfield and Hamilton 1997), the exercise of power and control (Mumby 1987), sensemaking (Brown 1986), culture formation (Jordan 1996), collective centring (Boyce 1996), community mediation (Cobb 1993), IT implementation (Brown 1998), and even the policy decisions of academic journals (Boje et al 1996). This wealth of work from those who collect stories told in organizations (Martin et al 1983), tell stories about organizations (Van Maanen 1988), define organizations as storytelling systems (Boje 1991a;Currie and Brown 2003), and conceptualize organization studies as a set of storytelling practices (Clegg 1993;Czarniawska 1999;Hatch 1996) is both indicative and constitutive of narrative's impact.…”

“…The value of studying stories is that they are 'inherent and powerful in organizational communication' (Smith and Keyton 2001, 174); they are 'the blood vessels through which changes pulsate in the heart of organizational life' (Boje 1991b, 8) and are 'vehicles of communication management' (Kaye 1995, 1). From this perspective, storytelling is an important aspect of managerial behaviour (Irwin and More 1993;Kaye 1995;Morgan and Dennehy 1997). Stories are a device through which managers work to inform employees about their preferred organizational cultures (Wilkins 1984) and provide managers with a form of social and intersubjective interaction that reflects belief systems, role expectations, interpersonal norms and conditions for work behaviour (Hansen and Kahnweiler 1993;Irwin and More 1993).…”

“…Brown and Humphreys 2003), the major focus of this literature has been on how stories are a way of managing change in organizational culture. In particular, stories achieve this by encapsulating and entrenching organizational values (Meyer 1995), and by encouraging people in organizations to reformulate the meanings associated with organizational stories of both the past and the future (Feldman 1990;Kaye 1995;Kelly 1985;McConkie and Boss 1994;McConkie and Wayne 1986;Wilkins 1984). In this respect, stories are a 'powerful media for bringing about changes in people and in the culture of their workplace' (Kaye 1995, 1).…”

Successful organisational teams: Theory and practice from an adult communication management perspective

“…In short, organisational stories are vehicles for communication management. 24 The increased amount of story sharing resulted in very clear improvements in workplace practices. For example, at Hannanprint, printing press team members began to keep the printing presses and surrounding work spaces clean and tidy so that new shift workers would not have to waste time at the start removing ink or scraps of paper from the floor.…”

“…When charismatic leaders are also narcissistic, they 'act as if they are entitled to receive the service of others and tend toward exploitative and manipulative behavior'. 24 Walt Disney was perhaps a good example of this kind of leader. Based on Foucault's notion of the 'panoptic gaze' of prison warders, 35 Walt was seen by many of his employees as a tyrant, often using scare tactics at meetings to achieve his goals.…”