Managing Managerial Identities: Organizational Fragmentation, Discourse and Identity Struggle

TLDR

The study examines managerial identity work in a senior manager’s organization, conceptualizing identity as a processual work and struggle. The article explores how organizational discourses, role expectations, and narrative self‑identity interact, highlighting both fragmentation and integration, and aims to advance processual identity theory and methodology through a multi‑level intensive study. The study employs a multi‑level intensive case study of a senior manager to illustrate the advantages of a processual identity theory and methodology.

Abstract

This is a case study of managerial identity work, based on an in-depth case of a senior manager and the organizational context in which she works. The article addresses the interplay between organizational discourses, role expectations, narrative self-identity and identity work. Identity is conceptualized in processual terms as identity work and struggle. The article illuminates fragmentation as well as integration in the interplay between organizational discourses and identity. It aims to contribute to a processual oriented identity theory and to the methodology of identity studies through showing the advantage of a multi-level intensive study.