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1994 15: 535Organization StudiesMats Alvesson

Advertising AgencyTalking in Organizations: Managing Identity and Impressions in an

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Talking in Organizations: Managing Identityand Impressions in anAdvertisingAgency*Mats Alvesson

MatsAlvessonDepartment ofBusiness

Administration.

GothenburgUniversity,Sweden

Abstract

This paper treats discourses in organizations in relationship to the managementof identities and impressions. It is based on an ethnographic study of an advert-ising agency and explores how advertising professionals describe themselves, theirwork and organizations, the profession and their clients. Various functions ofsuch descriptions are proposed, from identity work to marketing. The relation-ship between the level of discourse and deeper cultural levels is investigatedthrough the cultural sociologies ofAsplund and Bourdieu. The habitus ofadvertising workers is discussed and anti-bureaucracy is proposed as a concep-tual figure a basic way of conceptualizing vital segments of ones culturalreality characterizing the advertising industry (in Sweden), informing themeaning of the particular ways of talk that is typical among advertising workers.

Introduction

Talk comprises a major part of organizational life. This is especially thecase in many forms of professional and semi-professional work withinthe service sector (Czarniawska-Joerges and Joerges 1990; Svensson

1990), but also within many other activities where the tasks are uncertainand ambiguous and agreements on problem definitions and solutions

presuppose a far-reaching sharing of ideas and negotiations of meaning.Many functions can be fulfilled by talk apart from the obvious ones of

providing information, triggering actions and expressing feelings. In this

paper, I address how the people in a Swedish advertising agency, regulatetheir professional identities by means of particular kinds of expressionsand verbal symbols as well as support their claims to have a specificcompetence and orientation to offer their clients.

The paper deals with some of the ways in which advertising peopledescribe their work, the industry, advertising agencies as organizations,themselves as professionals and their clients. I focus on certainpeculiarities which appear to be typical of the field and investigate their

meaning. My research question - the puzzle towards which, after some

time, the ethnographic work led - thus concerns how we can understandthe sometimes strange ways in which people talk. In the present study,for instance, clients are described in rather pejorative terms. This leadsto an exploration of the relationship between the use of language, the

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constitution of identities and a basis for impression management,together with efforts to symbolically regulate the interaction between

advertising agency and customer.The paper thus connects with emergent traditions in organization theory

and social psychology which focus on the significance of subjectivity andidentity formation in work and organizations, as well as on the centralityof language and discourse in this process (Deetz 1992; Knights andWillmott 1989; Shotter and Gergen 1989). I also draw broadly upon acultural perspective in organizations in which meanings, verbal symbolsand the ability of actors to manoeuvre in a culturally competent way is

explored (Alvesson 1993a; Bourdieu 1979; Geertz 1973; Swidler

1986).The paper is based primarily on ethnographic work - a case study of a

small Swedish advertising agency. I try to make sense of my materialwith the aid of two somewhat different theories/ideas: first, a model of

the relationship between discourses (including talk), conceptual figure(figure of thought) and the material base, developed byAsplund ( 1979);second, Bourdieus notion of the habitus (Bourdieu 1979), i.e.internalized dispositions associated with the cultural orientations andsocial practices of a particular field of activity.The paper starts by referring to these two theoretical ideas. Then followsa very short account of the empirical work informing this paper and,

after that, a brief characterization of the advertising work.After thesepresentations, I treat how advertising professionals describe (talk about)their customers and relate this to their struggle to get recognition and

prestige from the environment (the market) and, partly through this, asense of identity. The habitus of advertising workers is highlighted.Finally, the meaning and role of the conceptual figure which integratesand informs the self-understandings and assumptions that guide variouskinds of discourses within advertising agencies is treated. This conceptualfigure is interpreted from the point of view of advertising work as an

anti-bureaucracy. This notion is explored and related to the ways inwhich advertising professionals build upon this in their work identity andtheir struggles for recognition.

.,

Theoretical Inspiration

.,

The two theoretical ideas that are used to interpret - more than strictlyguide or structure - the empirical material are loosely coupled in this

paper. Within the general understanding of organizations as culturalphenomena - in which subjective and intersubjective experiences,shared and negotiated meanings, centred around the ambiguities of

language are seen as crucial -Asplund and Bourdieu point at significantdimensions and themes associated with cultural relativity and collectivelyshared ideas and dispositions which simultaneously enable and constrainmembers of a particular community.