Management Fashion Adoption: Sensemaking and Identity Construction in Individual Managers’ Adoption Accounts

1. Introduction: Setting the stage.- 2. Theoretical foundations.- 3. Towards a conceptual framework.- 4. Research methods.- 5. Participants and adoption accounts.- 6. Accounts in context: Themes and issues.- 7. Sensemaking and identity work.- 8. Fashion and identity construction in management practice: Propositions and recommendations.- References.

Charles-Clemens Rüling studierte Wirtschaftswissenschaften und Soziologie in St. Gallen und Genf und promovierte an der Universität Genf bei Prof. Dr. Gilbert J. B. Probst. Er ist Professor für Management an der Ecole Supérieure de Commerce in Grenoble.

Charles-Clemens Rüling studied business administration and sociology at the Universities of St. Gallen and Geneva and holds doctorate in social and economic sciences from the University of Geneva. He is a professor of management at the Grenoble Graduate School of Business.

Contemporary management is marked by fads and fashions. While the production and diffusion of popular management concepts have over the last years received considerable attention in academic and applied research, the adoption side of management fashions remains largely unexplored.

Charles-Clemens Rüling looks at the driving forces behind the adoption of management fashions in organizations. On the basis of a broad literature review and an empirical exploration of individual managers' adoption accounts he shows how managers tie themselves and their careers to popular concepts such as Total Quality Management, Business Process Reengineering, or Knowledge Management. Particular emphasis is put on the impact of these concepts and their rhetoric on individual managers' sensemaking activities and the construction of their professional identities.