Organizational Communication

Organizational communication studies how communication constitutes, sustains, and changes organizations.

Scope

It covers organizing and sensemaking, organizational culture and identity, power and control, and communication in leadership and change.

Core questions

• How does communication constitute organizations?
• How do members make sense of organizational life?
• How is power exercised through communication?
• How does communication shape culture and change?

Key concepts

• Organizing
• Sensemaking
• Organizational culture
• Power and control
• Identity
• Communication constitutes organization

Key theories

Organizing and sensemaking

Weick reframed organizations as ongoing processes of communicative organizing and sensemaking.

Communication and control

Deetz analysed organizations as sites of communicative power and 'corporate colonization'.

History

Organizational communication moved from a container view of communication 'in' organizations to constitutive views (Weick's organizing; the CCO perspective) and critical analyses of power (Deetz).

Debates

Communication in versus communication as organization

Whether communication occurs within organizations or actually constitutes them.

Key figures

• Karl Weick
• Stanley Deetz

Seminal works

• weick-1979
• deetz-1992

Frequently asked questions

What is sensemaking?

Weick's concept of how people give meaning to ambiguous organizational situations through communication and action.