Occupational invocation : managing experts through occupational norms

Using data from a 16-month ethnographic study of a pharmaceutical company research unit, I examine how managers can successfully manage expert contractors. These expert scientists perform essential work in advancing drug development projects. However, they often complete work late, refuse to perform requested work, and act in other ways that managers believe impedes project progress. Although the literature on expert management suggests that these challenges can be overcome by rewarding, punishing, and socializing experts, these practices are difficult to implement when expert workers are contracted from outside of the organization. I show how managers can manage expert contractors through a process I label occupational invocation. In this process, managers first publicly highlight experts' breaches of shared occupational norms. Managers then reintegrate experts by providing them with an opportunity to display a correction of their actions such that they align with the community's expectations as well as the contracting organization's interests. By referencing common norms, occupational invocation helps enable the management of expert contractors.

Name thesis:degree_name

Master

Department dc:contributor.department

Sloan School of Management

Grantor dc:publisher

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Year dc:date.issued

2018

Author dc:creator

• Conzon, Vanessa Mariangela.

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Erin Kelly and Susan Silbey.

• Sloan School of Management.

Statement dc:rights

• MIT theses are protected by copyright. They may be viewed, downloaded, or printed from this source but further reproduction or distribution in any format is prohibited without written permission.

Licence dc:rights.uri

• http://dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/7582

Language dc:language.iso

eng

Handle dc:identifier.uri

https://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/122833

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:dspace.mit.edu:1721.1/122833