Decision-Making in Meetings as Talk-in-Interaction

Abstract Decisions in organizations are often made during some form of talk-in-interaction. In this article, conversation analysis is used to identify those interactions and linguistic features which characterize decision-making at four Dutch organizations. In taking this approach, the research highlights the ways in which organizational members collaboratively create the future of their organization. It also shows that the formulation and content of decisions is inextricably connected to the situations in which they are produced and that what counts as a decision depends on the communicative norms of the group that is talking.

[1]  D. Boden.  AGENDAS AND ARRANGEMENTS: EVERYDAY NEGOTIATIONS IN MEETINGS , 1995 .

[2]  David M. Boje,et al.  STORIES OF THE STORYTELLING ORGANIZATION: A POSTMODERN ANALYSIS OF DISNEY AS "TAMARA-LAND" , 1995 .

[3]  T. Koole,et al.  The construction of intercultural discourse. Team discussions of educational advisers , 1994 .

[4]  Erving Goffman,et al.  Frame Analysis: An Essay on the Organization of Experience. , 1979 .

[5]  Maryan s. Schall.  A Communication-Rules Approach to Organizational Culture. , 1983 .

[6]  Andrew Pettigrew,et al.  Studying Strategic Choice and Strategic Change. A Comment on Mintzberg and Waters: 'Does Decision Get in the Way?' , 1990 .

[7]  Executive problem finding: some material and initial observations , 1987 .

[8]  Anita M. Pomerantz.  Agreeing and disagreeing with assessments: some features of preferred/dispreferred turn shapes , 1984 .

[9]  K. Weick.  Making Sense of the Organization , 2000 .

[10]  Michael K. Mauws.  But Is It Art? , 2000 .

[11]  H. V. Swann.  Decision Making in Organizations , 1985 .

[12]  H. B. Allen,et al.  A Functional Grammar , 1946 .

[13]  Christina Wasson,et al.  Caution And Consensus In American Business Meetings , 2000 .

[14]  J. Dutton,et al.  Categorizing Strategic Issues: Links to Organizational Action , 1987 .

[15]  E. Schegloff,et al.  Opening up Closings , 1973 .

[16]  Henry Mintzberg,et al.  The Structure of "Unstructured" Decision Processes , 1976 .

[17]  E. Goffman.  Frame analysis: An essay on the organization of experience , 1974 .

[18]  M. Huisman,et al.  NEGOTIATING CATEGORIES IN TRAVEL AGENCY CALLS , 1995 .

[19]  J. Shotter.  Conversational Realities: Constructing Life through Language , 1993 .

[20]  T. Dant,et al.  Planning in Organisations: Rational Control or Contingent Activity? , 1998 .

[21]  Ian Alexander,et al.  An introduction to qualitative research , 2000, Eur. J. Inf. Syst..

[22]  Gail Jefferson,et al.  Caveat Speaker: Preliminary Notes on Recipient Topic-Shift Implicature , 1993 .

[23]  Srikant Sarangi,et al.  The dynamics of interactional and institutional orders in work-related settings , 1999 .

[24]  D. Boden.  The Business of Talk: Organizations in Action , 1995 .

[25]  Wayne A. Beach,et al.  Transitional regularities for ‘casual’ “Okay” usages , 1993 .

[26]  D. Hymes.  Foundations in Sociolinguistics: An Ethnographic Approach , 1974 .

[27]  A. Koerfer.  Zur konversationellen Funktion von ja aber. Am Beispiel universitärer Diskurse , 1979 .

[28]  Peter C. Gronn.  Talk as the Work: The Accomplishment of School Administration , 1983 .

[29]  Paul Drew,et al.  Analyzing talk at work: an introduction , 1992 .

[30]  M. Goodwin.  He-Said-She-Said: Talk As Social Organization Among Black Children , 1993 .

[31]  Henry Mintzberg,et al.  Studying Deciding: An Exchange of Views Between Mintzberg and Waters, Pettigrew, and Butler , 1990 .

[32]  T. Rickards.  Sense making in organizations , 1997 .

[33]  Tom Keenoy,et al.  Organizational Discourses: Text and Context , 1997 .