Thesis Defense
The Uses of Ambiguity by Managers in a Change Context.
An Ethnographic Study.

Caroline Rieu-Plichon, PhD candidate in the PhD programme ESCP

Caroline Rieu-Plichon, PhD candidate in the PhD programme ESCP, will publicly defend her PhD thesis in Management Sciences.

13 December 2019 – 2:00 p.m. (CET)
ESCP Business School Campus République
Room 4310

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Abstract

This dissertation studies how, in order to face an organizational change, managers produce and manage different types of ambiguities (by reducing, expanding or denying those ambiguities).

It shows how these managers mobilize complementary capabilities, so-called positive and negative, according to their preferences, in order to face the uncertainties of the change, and thus become ambiguity tamers.

Through a two-year ethnographic study, from the position of participant observer, we analyse seventeen managers, their subordinates and their directors. We show how these managers mobilize ambiguities and negative capability (i.e. the ability to remain in “uncertainties and doubts without reaching after fact and reason”, Keats, 1970; 43) as resources for change management.

Jury

Supervisor:

  • Mr Hervé Laroche,
    Professor, ESCP

Referees:

  • Ms Christina Garsten,
    Professor, Stockholm University
  • Mr Amaury Grimand,
    Professor, IAE de Nantes

Suffragants:

  • Ms Yvonne Giordano,
    Professor, Université de Nice Sophia-Antipolis
  • Mr François Pichault,
    Professor, HEC Université de Liège

Location

Organiser: ESCP Europe - Campus Paris

Paris - France

Map

Date

Start date: 12/12/2019

Start time: 2:00 PM

End date: 28/03/2024

End time: 8:38 PM