Sara von Platen
Reaching the inside from the outside?
Member identification and auto-communication
Organizations today are tremendously preoccupied with their public appearance and make great efforts communicating their unique and well-groomed identities in different media. But extensive organizational publicity also means that employees are exposed to messages intended for external stakeholders to a larger extent.
Externally mediated communication can convey very strong messages to the employees concerning the organization, its staff and the tasks they are supposed to perform. Considered this way external communication may be a powerful way of creating a strong member identification, but also dis-identification, with the organization, its visions and goals.
MAX IV and the ESS are heavily marketed organizations. In order to live up to the publicly displayed self-presentation and expectations (e.g. collaboration with industry, world leading research and regional development), these organ-izations are dependent on their employees also “buying” these messages.
The purpose of this research project is to contribute with knowledge on the processes of member identification and organizational auto-communication, i.e. how organizations communicate with themselves. A central question that will be pursued is: What significance does the research facilities’ external communication and PR activities have for how the employees conceive of themselves, research work and the plants?
Last modified 1 Oct 2012