ABSTRACT
Recent developments in cultural sociology and organization studies view culture as a repertoire of resources that individuals flexibly draw upon to support their strategies of action. While more established perspectives on culture rely on consolidated methodological conventions, methods adopted by past studies of organizational cultural repertoires are still varied. In this chapter, we disclose behind-the-scenes from a published paper to articulate guidelines for data analysis based on our own experience with analyzing longitudinal changes in the cultural repertoire of an organization. Our study tracked the enrichment of the cultural repertoire of Alessi, an Italian producer of kitchenware, over three decades. Our analysis revealed the gradual incorporation in the cultural repertoire of the organization of different and partly contradictory conceptualizations of products, product value, and production. It also enabled us to observe how these concepts had practical implications for the way products were designed, manufactured, and marketed. Methods used by past studies trade off a comprehensive analysis of the relationship between cultural repertoires and the broad field-level register for the in-depth examination of cultural processes, or vice versa. The method we propose addresses this limitation by combining a systematic content analysis of organizational communication to map changes in the cultural repertoire of the organization, with longitudinal tracking of connections between cultural resources, organizational practices, and strategies of action to document the material implications of cultural changes on organizational action.
