Rhetoric in bureaucratic careers: managing the meaning of management success

Abstract

In career research, we have often operated as if there were some specific content of human action, an already objectivized world; but, in fact, there is not. A. Collin and R. A. Young, 1986 INTRODUCTION The point of departure for this chapter is provided by Weigert (1983:316), who, when discussing biographies and careers, comments that to make sense, a biography must be sustained by a social structure that renders the story plausible (Berger 1967; McLain and Weigert 1979). Storytellers are important sustainers of the social structures that provide a meaningful context for the grunts and groans of life. In a bureaucratically organized society, the structures accept individuals as holders of prearranged careers. The faded pictures behind the idea “career” are of a wagon on a path or a runner on a racetrack. The commonsense notion of a career restricts it to highly visible occupations such as law, medicine, politics, or sports. In a bureaucratically organized society, however, the term career is appropriately applied to all members. Our choice of these comments has been influenced by their direct reference to the construction of meaning in social contexts, which clearly reflects an emerging stance toward the study of careers (Arthur and Lawrence 1984; Collin and Young 1986; Van Maanen 1977). However, as indicated by the opening quotation, we find it fruitful to modify the suggestion that a given social structure in some way determines the form and meaning of careers . Instead, we argue that the rhetorical construction of careers is not only determined by our social environments, but also creates and legitimates them .

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