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The Erosion of Expert Control Through Censure Episodes

Author

Listed:
  • Ruthanne Huising

    (EM - EMLyon Business School)

Abstract
Organizations depend on experts to oversee and execute complex tasks. When faced with pressures to reduce their dependence on experts, managers encounter a control paradox: they require experts to explicate the very knowledge and discretionary approaches that are the basis of their control for the purpose of undercutting this control. Experts rarely consent to such a situation; therefore, attempts to reduce dependence on experts and control their work are more often aspirational than actual. Drawing on an ethnography of an organization that was required by a government agency to transfer the work responsibilities of experts to employees throughout the organization, this paper describes how a network of actors developed a discursive, political process to renegotiate control of expert work practices. Through censure episodes, long-standing and largely successful expert practices were examined one by one and relabeled as problematic in relation to established goals. The constructed breaches opened expert practices to evaluation, questioning, and eventual delegitimation within the organization. This process depended on the introduction of new roles that revised dependencies and generated new resources. This paper contributes to the understanding of control in organizations by theorizing how the emergent, symbolic work of censure episodes are a means of gradually subverting expert control. Further, these struggles are reconceptualized as multiple-role negotiations rather than bilateral manager–expert struggles.

Suggested Citation

  • Ruthanne Huising, 2014. "The Erosion of Expert Control Through Censure Episodes," Post-Print hal-02311927, HAL.
    • Handle: RePEc:hal:journl:hal-02311927
    as

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    Citations

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    Cited by:

    1. Jillian Chown, 2020. "Financial Incentives and Professionals’ Work Tasks: The Moderating Effects of Jurisdictional Dominance and Prominence," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 31(4), pages 887-908, July.
    2. Ruthanne Huising & Susan S. Silbey, 2021. "Accountability infrastructures: Pragmatic compliance inside organizations," Regulation & Governance, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 15(S1), pages 40-62, November.
    3. Afshin Omidi & Cinzia Dal Zotto, 2022. "Socially Responsible Human Resource Management: A Systematic Literature Review and Research Agenda," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(4), pages 1-20, February.
    4. Aruna Ranganathan, 2023. "When the Tasks Line Up: How the Nature of Supplementary Tasks Affects Worker Productivity," ILR Review, Cornell University, ILR School, vol. 76(3), pages 556-585, May.
    5. April L. Wright & Gemma Irving & Asma Zafar & Trish Reay, 2023. "The Role of Space and Place in Organizational and Institutional Change: A Systematic Review of the Literature," Journal of Management Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 60(4), pages 991-1026, June.
    6. Kurt Sandholtz & Daisy Chung & Isaac Waisberg, 2019. "The Double-Edged Sword of Jurisdictional Entrenchment: Explaining Human Resources Professionals’ Failed Strategic Repositioning," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 30(6), pages 1349-1367, November.
    7. Steven J. Kahl & Brayden G. King & Greg Liegel, 2016. "Occupational Survival Through Field-Level Task Integration: Systems Men, Production Planners, and the Computer, 1940s–1990s," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 27(5), pages 1084-1107, October.
    8. Katherine C. Kellogg & Jenna E. Myers & Lindsay Gainer & Sara J. Singer, 2021. "Moving Violations: Pairing an Illegitimate Learning Hierarchy with Trainee Status Mobility for Acquiring New Skills When Traditional Expertise Erodes," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 32(1), pages 181-209, January.
    9. David Courpasson & Vanessa Monties, 2017. "“I Am My Body”. Physical Selves of Police Officers in a Changing Institution," Journal of Management Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 54(1), pages 32-57, January.
    10. Melissa Mazmanian & Christine M. Beckman, 2018. "“Making” Your Numbers: Engendering Organizational Control Through a Ritual of Quantification," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 29(3), pages 357-379, June.
    11. Roman V. Galperin, 2020. "Organizational Powers: Contested Innovation and Loss of Professional Jurisdiction in the Case of Retail Medicine," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 31(2), pages 508-534, March.

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