Narrative, identity and change: a case study of Laskarina Holidays

Abstract

PurposeThis paper aims to contribute to the understanding of organizational identity through an analysis of shared identity narratives at the UK‐based specialist tour operator Laskarina Holidays.Design/methodology/approachPredicated on a view of organizations as linguistic constructs, it is argued that individual and collective identities are narrative accomplishments, and that organizations tend often to be characterised by identity multiplicity.FindingsA case study is presented featuring three distinctive but interwoven collective identity narratives (which are labelled “utilitarian”, “normative” and “hedonic”), and these are contrasted with some “dissonant” voices. It is argued that change in organizations is, at least in part, constituted by alterations in people's understandings, encoded in narratives, and shared in conversations.Originality/valueThe research contribution that this paper makes is twofold. First, it makes an argument for theorizing organizational identities as narratives, constituted within discursive regimes, and continuously changing as they are created and re‐created by all participants. Second, it suggests that the narratological approach to theorizing and researching organizational identities is important because it both assists one's efforts to analyze identities as the outcomes of processes of hegemonic imposition and resistance, and allows one to read polysemy back into ethnographic research.