Organizational Ethnography An Experiential and Practical Guide

This textbook explores practices, first-hand experiences and emerging ideas within organizational ethnography, providing a toolkit that prepares ethnographers for the uncertainties and realities of fieldworking.

Students faced with the complexities of qualitative observational techniques and considerations, such as the scope of the research, the personal and professional intertwined life of the qualitative research or the decision of when to leave the field, will find the book an extremely useful, practical guide. A range of experiences from a variety of academics at different stages of their career, to highlight the differences in practices, approaches and encounters, are presented. The themes of the individual chapters cover three main areas: aspects to consider and reflect on before undertaking an ethnography, the process and experiences of conducting ethnographic work and considerations for after the fieldwork. Particular attention is given to appreciating the complexity and practicalities of ethnographic work, providing a more experience-driven text, and understanding perspectives from a range of different approaches to organizational ethnography.

This book should be a recommended text for advanced undergraduate and postgraduate students studying research methods within Business and Management. It is particularly important for all students and academics undertaking qualitative research, especially ethnography.

1. Outlining a practical, emotional and reflexive approach to Organisational Ethnography Part I: EMOTIONS, ETHNOGRAPHY AND FIELDWORK 2. Check Yourself Before You Wreck Yourself! Are you cut out for Ethnographic fieldwork? 3. Too close for comfort? The challenges and unexpected consequences of immersed ethnography 4. Removing the Rose-Tinted Glasses: Fear, Risk and Being Uncomfortable in Ethnographic Fieldwork 5. Choosing to reach beyond academic goalposts: Ethnographer as compassionate advocate inside an immigration detention centre Part II: ETHNOGRAPHY IN THE FIELD 6. Learning and doing autoethnography: resonance, vulnerability and exposure 7. Rapid ethnographies in organisations: ensuring rich data and timely findings 8. Deception as a Moral Project: Covert Research and the Construction of the Ethical Self 9. Ethnography on sensitive topics: children’s sexuality education in Spain 10. Reflexivity in Audio-Visual Ethnography: Thinking through Practice Part III: BEYOND THE FIELD 11.Exiting the field: when does an ethnography finish? 12. Jotting it down: Writing and analysing fieldnotes 13. Making sense of field material: from euphoria to despair and back 14. Learning to Fly: On Teaching the Ethnographic Craft 15. Futures of Organizational Ethnography: (Post) Pandemic Reflections and New Possibilities

Jenna Pandeli is a senior lecturer at University of the West of England (UWE), Bristol, UK.

Neil Sutherland is a senior lecturer at UWE, Bristol, UK.

Hugo Gaggiotti is a professor at UWE, Bristol, UK.