Employees’ Relational Work on Social Media

Given how social media are commonly used in contemporary Nordic countries, social media platforms are emerging as crucial for relational work between employers, employees, and potential employees. By means of a discursive psychology approach, this study investigates employers’ constructs of relational work on social media through the use of two interpretative repertoires: the repertoire of loss of control and the repertoire of ever-presence. The consequences of these interpretative repertoires are a masking of power relations, especially between employers and young employees in precarious labor market positions and those with limited digital knowledge or financial means. Further, the positioning of social media as part of a private sphere of life means the invasion of not only employees’, but also managers’ private time and persona. The result of this study hence calls for the need to understand relational work on social media as part of normative managerial work.

Process expertise in policy advice: Designing collaboration in collaboration

Complex societal and environmental challenges motivate scholars to assume new roles that transcend the boundaries of traditional academic expertise. The present article focuses on the specialised knowledge, skills, and practices mobilised in the context of science–policy interfaces by researchers who advise policymakers on collaborative governance processes intended to address these pressing issues. By working on the backstage of collaborative arrangements, researchers support policymakers in the co-design of tailor-made strategies for involving groups of institutional and non-institutional actors in collaboration on a specific issue. The present article examines the expertise underpinning this practice, which we term process expertise. While already quite widely practiced, process expertise has not yet been comprehensively theorised. The study employs a self-reflective case narrative to illuminate its constitutive elements and investigates the advisory work of the authors’ research team, called “Co-Creation and Contemporary Policy Advice”, located at the intersection of science, policymaking, and civil society. The findings show that process expertise, when exercised by researchers and supported by an assemblage of enabling conditions inherent to the research context, goes beyond the possession of a set of skills at the individual level. Instead, process expertise in the context of science–policy interfaces unfolds in interaction with other types of knowledge and fulfils its task by generating a weakly institutionalised “in-between space”, in which researchers and policymakers interact to find more inclusive ways of tackling complex challenges. In this realm, relational work contributes to establishing a collaborative modus operandi at the very outset of the advisory process, while working at the processual level supports knowledge co-production among multiple actors. The article argues that it is the ongoing work of process experts at the intersection of relational and processual levels that helps maintain momentum in these collaborative partnerships. By formulating and discussing five constitutive elements of process expertise, this paper untangles the complex work that is required in collaborative research settings and gives a language to the invisible work performed by researchers who offer policymakers—and other invited actors—advice on the process of designing collaboration in collaboration.

The Role of /Overlaps\ in Intercultural Workplace Interaction

<p>The field of workplace communication continues to grow, and globalisation has encouraged researchers to focus on the phenomenon of intercultural interaction in multi-cultural workplaces. Usually, but not exclusively, framed within the constructs of Brown and Levinson's Politeness Theory, intercultural studies have typically concentrated on instances of miscommunication taking a partial, one-sided account of intercultural workplace interaction. Differing social norms for what constitutes politeness have been a major focus of debate into the merits of politeness theory. Overlapping speech, in particular, is one aspect of workplace interaction that has been long neglected in the field of intercultural workplace interaction research. Moving away from the traditional views in the field, the present study takes a positive stance on the study of the interplay of interactional norms of politeness in intercultural face-to-face workplace interaction and investigates how people from different ethnic backgrounds undertake relational work in naturally-occurring workplace exchanges. As the analytic framework, rapport management (developed by Spencer-Oatey) provides a useful reconceptualisation of linguistic politeness with a greater focus on negotiated interaction. The analysis focuses on the role of overlapping speech in this context of interaction guided by two research questions: 1) how does overlapping speech function in workplace interactions in New Zealand? and 2) how are these overlaps intended and 'perceived' by culturally different interactants? To this end, the data for the present study were drawn from two meetings in a large educational institution in New Zealand. In the first phase of data collection, two meetings were video and audio recorded, from which representative extracts containing overlaps were chosen for analysis. In the second phase, individual stimulated recall interviews were held with the participants with the purpose of eliciting participants' intentions and perceptions regarding the use of overlaps. The findings suggest that this group of instructors operate as a Community of Practice (CofP) rather than as ethnic individualities with shared assumptions and expectations regarding the appropriate use of overlaps to cooperatively construct meaning in interaction. This CofP, it was noted, is also strongly oriented towards the maintenance and enhancement of social harmony in their workplace interaction, which influences the use of overlapping speech as a communicative strategy employed to this end. Overall, the study demonstrates that considering intercultural communication from the perspective of rapport management can provide positive insights into how people from different ethnic backgrounds do relational work as they construct meaning in interaction.</p>

The Role of /Overlaps\ in Intercultural Workplace Interaction

<p>The field of workplace communication continues to grow, and globalisation has encouraged researchers to focus on the phenomenon of intercultural interaction in multi-cultural workplaces. Usually, but not exclusively, framed within the constructs of Brown and Levinson's Politeness Theory, intercultural studies have typically concentrated on instances of miscommunication taking a partial, one-sided account of intercultural workplace interaction. Differing social norms for what constitutes politeness have been a major focus of debate into the merits of politeness theory. Overlapping speech, in particular, is one aspect of workplace interaction that has been long neglected in the field of intercultural workplace interaction research. Moving away from the traditional views in the field, the present study takes a positive stance on the study of the interplay of interactional norms of politeness in intercultural face-to-face workplace interaction and investigates how people from different ethnic backgrounds undertake relational work in naturally-occurring workplace exchanges. As the analytic framework, rapport management (developed by Spencer-Oatey) provides a useful reconceptualisation of linguistic politeness with a greater focus on negotiated interaction. The analysis focuses on the role of overlapping speech in this context of interaction guided by two research questions: 1) how does overlapping speech function in workplace interactions in New Zealand? and 2) how are these overlaps intended and 'perceived' by culturally different interactants? To this end, the data for the present study were drawn from two meetings in a large educational institution in New Zealand. In the first phase of data collection, two meetings were video and audio recorded, from which representative extracts containing overlaps were chosen for analysis. In the second phase, individual stimulated recall interviews were held with the participants with the purpose of eliciting participants' intentions and perceptions regarding the use of overlaps. The findings suggest that this group of instructors operate as a Community of Practice (CofP) rather than as ethnic individualities with shared assumptions and expectations regarding the appropriate use of overlaps to cooperatively construct meaning in interaction. This CofP, it was noted, is also strongly oriented towards the maintenance and enhancement of social harmony in their workplace interaction, which influences the use of overlapping speech as a communicative strategy employed to this end. Overall, the study demonstrates that considering intercultural communication from the perspective of rapport management can provide positive insights into how people from different ethnic backgrounds do relational work as they construct meaning in interaction.</p>

The Role, Status and Style of Workplace Email: a Study of Two New Zealand Workplaces

<p>This thesis discusses ethnographic research carried out in two very different workplaces, one a manufacturing plant, the other an educational organisation, to explore the relationship between the organisational or workplace culture and the role, status and style of email. The research was concerned with looking at the specific functions of email alongside other means of communicating at work and how it was perceived by its users and receivers compared to these other means of communication. It also investigated when and why email was the preferred medium of workplace communication and some of its distinctive stylistic features. In addition to relating these latter to the workplace culture, the effect on email style of sociolinguistic variables was also explored. Pragmatic theories provided the framework for analysing the data which was interpreted from a social interactionist, social constructionist perspective. A combined corpora of 515 email messages provided the primary linguistic data. This was supplemented by quantitative survey data and qualitative data from observations, two diaries of reflective practice, interviews, and recordings of four people's communicative interactions over one workday. The messages were coded initially for communicative function and then, in order to explore the affective aspect of email communication, for mitigational and boosting elements. In addition to the above, a qualitative analysis of a thread of email messages was undertaken to demonstrate how email communication is used in knowledge creation. The study found that there was little difference between the two organisations in the communicative functions for which email is used. In both, the transmission and seeking of information is its predominant use followed by the making of requests. However, the two workplaces differed considerably in the use made of email which is shown to be essentially a whitecollar mode of communication. But even in the educational organisation where email is used extensively, face-to-face remains the preferred form of communication and dominates communication time. The type of organisation also seems to affect the way in which email messages are written. Email messages from the manufacturing plant displayed more features of solidarity than those from the educational organisation. There was a much higher use of greetings in these messages and more direct language forms. The messages were also longer. There was also a difference between the two workplaces in male and female style. Women in the educational organisation wrote longer messages and used more affective features in their emails than their male counterparts. The converse was true in the manufacturing plant. Stylistically, email directives were seen, in general, to lie midway between the mainly direct forms of spoken communication and the mainly indirect forms of other types of written communication. The study also found that as part of its communicative functions, email plays an important role in organisational knowledge creation, and that in addition to being a useful communication tool assisting in the functional work of an organisation, it does considerable relational work. This has implications for the way in which email messages are written.</p>

The Role, Status and Style of Workplace Email: a Study of Two New Zealand Workplaces

<p>This thesis discusses ethnographic research carried out in two very different workplaces, one a manufacturing plant, the other an educational organisation, to explore the relationship between the organisational or workplace culture and the role, status and style of email. The research was concerned with looking at the specific functions of email alongside other means of communicating at work and how it was perceived by its users and receivers compared to these other means of communication. It also investigated when and why email was the preferred medium of workplace communication and some of its distinctive stylistic features. In addition to relating these latter to the workplace culture, the effect on email style of sociolinguistic variables was also explored. Pragmatic theories provided the framework for analysing the data which was interpreted from a social interactionist, social constructionist perspective. A combined corpora of 515 email messages provided the primary linguistic data. This was supplemented by quantitative survey data and qualitative data from observations, two diaries of reflective practice, interviews, and recordings of four people's communicative interactions over one workday. The messages were coded initially for communicative function and then, in order to explore the affective aspect of email communication, for mitigational and boosting elements. In addition to the above, a qualitative analysis of a thread of email messages was undertaken to demonstrate how email communication is used in knowledge creation. The study found that there was little difference between the two organisations in the communicative functions for which email is used. In both, the transmission and seeking of information is its predominant use followed by the making of requests. However, the two workplaces differed considerably in the use made of email which is shown to be essentially a whitecollar mode of communication. But even in the educational organisation where email is used extensively, face-to-face remains the preferred form of communication and dominates communication time. The type of organisation also seems to affect the way in which email messages are written. Email messages from the manufacturing plant displayed more features of solidarity than those from the educational organisation. There was a much higher use of greetings in these messages and more direct language forms. The messages were also longer. There was also a difference between the two workplaces in male and female style. Women in the educational organisation wrote longer messages and used more affective features in their emails than their male counterparts. The converse was true in the manufacturing plant. Stylistically, email directives were seen, in general, to lie midway between the mainly direct forms of spoken communication and the mainly indirect forms of other types of written communication. The study also found that as part of its communicative functions, email plays an important role in organisational knowledge creation, and that in addition to being a useful communication tool assisting in the functional work of an organisation, it does considerable relational work. This has implications for the way in which email messages are written.</p>

Reason-giving for resistance: obfuscation, justification and earmarking in resisting informal financial assistance

Monetary assistance is a common request from social ties and can be both an economic lifeline and a financial burden. This study examines the relational work at the heart of such exchanges, examining when and how attempts at mobilizing informal financial assistance are resisted. Using qualitative data from West African factory workers, we demonstrate that individuals who wish to resist the provision of assistance without causing relational damage employ rhetorical strategies designed to justify or obfuscate their refusal, relying heavily on socially legitimate reason-giving. The findings reveal that subjective calculations of resource availability are central to the mobilization of assistance, resistant givers differentiate between justification and obfuscation of refusals, and earmarks can play a role in protecting resources from social demands. More broadly, these findings suggest ways that a differential ability to resist social capital mobilization may generate inequalities within social groups.

Resources in Relational Packages: Social Capital as a Byproduct of Relational Work

Social capital theory offers a compelling explanation as to why people are committed to making resources available to others outside of formal institutions. In this article, we build on social capital theory to explain how actors overcome two practical problems endemic to these resource transfers. We present Viviana Zelizer’s relational work theory as a complimentary framework which accounts for when an individual may act on commitments to offer resources and which commitments to act upon when they are in conflict. Drawing on our empirical work on almsgiving to social outcasts and resource transfers at mourning ceremonies in Azerbaijan, we describe how people identify and ascribe their relationships to others by relying on available cultural conventions to mark economic transactions and other media as appropriate or inappropriate. By conceptualizing social capital in this way, we also obtain a process-tracing methodology useful for social researchers and for community activists to generate ideas on how to expand social capital in their own or others’ communities.