Living moments in family meetings

237 Pages·2011·1.94 MB·English

JENNY HELIN

Living moments in
family meetings

A process study in the family business context
Jönköping International Business School
P.O. Box 1026
SE-551 11 Jönköping
Tel.: [phone]
E-mail:
Acknowledgement
Though only my name appears on the cover of this dissertation, a great many
people have contributed along the way. I owe my sincere gratitude to all those
who have made my work with the dissertation such a wonderful experience.
First of all, I am indebted to my supervisors. My deepest gratitude to Leif
Melin, my main supervisor, for continuously supporting me and having faith in
this process. I have been fortunate to have an advisor who gave me the
freedom to explore and at the same time provided guidance whenever needed.
Leif, your presence makes every supervision meeting something special. Leona
Achtenhagen, thank you for your hospitality in all various ways. I am also
utterly thankful for how elegantly you have helped me formulate what I cannot
articulate myself. Many thanks to Robert Chia. Your work has inspired me
since the very start of this project. Your encouragement and guidance helped
me bring it to an end.
I want to express my gratitude to Handelsbankens Forskningsstiftelser,
Sparbankernas Forskningsstiftelse, FAS and Alfastiftelsen, which made this
dissertation possible through their financial support.
I am particularly grateful to the families who generously opened their doors
to me. I am indebted to the Stenson family for showing me the possibilities of
family meetings. My warmest gratitude also to the Philipsson family who
invited me into their home opening up for relationships unimagined, thereby
proving how wonderfully enriching a research project can be.
I wish to thank Lars-Olof Nilsson who helped me develop the manuscript
into a readable text. Your willingness to help when I needed it the most was
invaluable. Likewise, Susanne Hansson’s caring and flexibility when putting the
book together is most appreciated.
I also wish to thank friends and colleagues at Jönköping International
Business School at Jönköping University for the flow of inspiring conversations
in corridors and classrooms, at lunch and seminars. I am especially grateful to
Anna Larsson, Leif Melin, Leona Achtenhagen, Lucia Naldi, Mona Ericsson
and Olof Brunninge in the research project on continuous growth. I am also
thankful to Anna Blombäck, Annika Hall, Cecilia Bjursell, Ethel Brundin, Karin
Hellerstedt, Mattias Nordqvist and Tanja Andersson at the Centre for Family
Enterprise and Ownership.
My thanks go to those who continue to show the potentiality of academic
meetings beyond the expected. To Kenneth and Mary Gergen for the
wonderful workshop in your home 2006. To Hari Tsoukas for arranging The
International Symposium on Process Organization Studies, offering moments
when we could fully explore processual ideas and when I have been fortunate
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to engage in vibrant conversations with Frank Mueller, Robin Holt, Reut Livne-
Tarandach, Tor Hernes and others. I am grateful to Alex Stewart who kindly
offered me a place at Marquette University during autumn 2009 making it
possible for me to write critical parts of this dissertation. Not to forget Denise
Fletcher for insightful comments and a catalytic final seminar in November
2010.
Thanks also to the Hat Order, my intellectual sisters, for always being there
sharing great laughs and offering strength. The promise of what we have
together I value deeply. Anette Johansson, Benedikte Borgström, Elena
Raviola, Kajsa Haag, Lisa Bäckvall, Maria Norbäck, you make my everyday
much brighter.
I would like to express my warmest appreciation towards my family. To my
wonderful parents, Lisen and Ola, for how you are a constant source of
inspiration. Lisen, for your creativity and conviction to go with passion. Ola,
for remembering that life is what happens here and now. I owe my sister Karin
a lot for being such a treasure and always being there for me. Thanks also to
Sara, Marina, Anna, Vera and Sven for how you grace our family every day.
Finally, to Anders for your love and positive spirit: I can’t express my
gratitude for you in words. All those times, all those places where you have
supported me to make this possible, I will never forget. Thanks also to our
amazing children, Emilia and Amanda, for those special moments in our lives.

Visby, 7 April 2011.

Jenny Helin

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Abstract
Top management meetings, board meetings, budget meetings, planning
meetings, strategy retreats and weekly updates – the organisational world is
certainly a world of organised meetings where various kinds of meeting
practices are often focal points for people related to the organisation.
This dissertation studies meetings processually. Acknowledging the fluid,
often uncertain and inherently open aspects of organisational phenomena is
receiving increasing attention in organisation and management studies. Such an
approach, which can be labelled ‘process organisation studies’ is promising in
that it directs attention to social processes continuously in the making,
something that is often neglected in mainstream organisation studies.
The thesis builds on the current development in process organisation
studies in two ways. The first centres on an elaboration on key assumptions of
approaching organisational life from a process perspective. I here bridge
process organisation studies with Bakhtin’s work on dialogue into a dialogical
becoming perspective. This perspective calls for a distinct way of understanding
processes of becoming which makes it possible to explore meeting practices as
situated, emerging and relational world-making activities.
The second is a comprehensive processual account based on a collaborative
field study with two owner families. Organised meetings held in a family that
owns a business (or several) has proved to be of importance for family business
longevity in that the family members can help to develop strong family relations
and a healthy business. In this setting, where people are dealing with that which
is often most important to them in life, such as their identity, work, family
relationships and future wealth, a process approach is useful since it helps to
understand the emotionally loaded, complex and intertwined issues at stake.
What emerges as central in understanding movement and flow is the need
to understand the here and now moments in meetings. I refer to these
moments as ‘living moments’ as a reminder of the once-occurring, unique and
momentary transformation that can take place between people in such
encounters. Thus, the living moment is the moment of movement. In
emphasizing the ‘livingness’ of meeting conversations this study gives voice to
previously marginalised perspectives that complement existing research on
meeting practices.

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Contents
PART I: FOUNDATIONS
1. A NEED FOR CONVERSATIONS ABOUT WHAT IS YET TO BE....... 13
A PROCESS APPROACH ................................................................................................. 14
Point of departure and purpose of the study ........................................................................ 15
Intended contributions ....................................................................................................... 16
THESIS OUTLINE ........................................................................................................... 17
2. CURRENT RESEARCH ON FAMILY BUSINESS AND FAMILY
MEETINGS: ASSUMPTIONS AND APPROACHES ................................... 20
WHAT MAKES THE FAMILY BUSINESS SPECIAL? ....................................................... 21
HOW HAVE FAMILY BUSINESSES AND FAMILY MEETINGS BEEN STUDIED? ......... 23
The first wave: Planning .................................................................................................... 23
The second wave: Professionalisation .................................................................................. 26
The third wave: Performance .............................................................................................. 29
Summarising the three waves of research ............................................................................. 32
HOW CAN FUTURE STUDIES CONTRIBUTE TO A NEW UNDERSTANDING OF
FAMILY MEETINGS? ...................................................................................................... 34
3. INTRODUCING BECOMING ................................................................... 38
ROOTED IN PROCESS PHILOSOPHY ............................................................................ 38
Process organisation studies ................................................................................................ 39
A SHIFT FROM BEING TO BECOMING IS A SHIFT IN MANY DIMENSIONS ............... 41
From stable entities to entities as patterns of interactions ..................................................... 42
From detached individuality to relationality ........................................................................ 44
From the principle of sameness to preparing for difference .................................................... 46
From time as mechanical to time as experienced .................................................................. 47
From language as representational to language as performative ............................................ 49
THE FIVE DIMENSIONS VIEWED TOGETHER ............................................................ 51
4. TOWARDS A DIALOGICAL BECOMING PERSPECTIVE .................... 55
POSITIONING DIALOGUE IN THIS THESIS ................................................................. 56
BAKHTIN AND DIALOGUE .......................................................................................... 58
Ongoing forces at play ....................................................................................................... 59
To focus on utterances in a chain rather than sentences or words .......................................... 59
Voice ............................................................................................................................... 61
Dialogic meaning-making and the creation of once-occurring events ...................................... 62
A multitude of possible meanings, but not in any arbitrary direction .................................... 63
To remember embracing not only what is, but also what might become ................................. 63
THE FIVE DIMENSIONS VIEWED TOGETHER ............................................................ 65

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PART II: FAMILY MEETINGS IN PRACTICE
5. A BRIEF NOTE ON THE FIELD STUDY ............................................... 71
THREE PHASES OF FIELDWORK .................................................................................. 71
Sensitive field study material .............................................................................................. 73
6. INTRODUCING THE STENSON FAMILY ............................................. 74
MEETING THE FAMILY ................................................................................................ 74
Interviews, written material and company visits .................................................................. 75
Creation of the field account ............................................................................................... 75
FROM EVERYDAY MANAGERS TO ACTIVE OWNERS ................................................. 78
Ownership and management successions ............................................................................. 81
A broader family involvement ............................................................................................ 85
Revitalising the values ....................................................................................................... 87
Another family arena is created ......................................................................................... 92
Envisioning the future: From ownership council to board of directors ................................... 96
ON DIALOGICALLY SHAPED FAMILY MEETING PRACTICES .................................... 99
7. INTRODUCING THE PHILIPSSON FAMILY ....................................... 101
WITHNESS-THINKING ............................................................................................... 101
Recognising everyday local practice .................................................................................... 102
Focusing on moment-to-moment conversations in their unfolding ........................................ 103
Remembering the contextual surrounding.......................................................................... 103
MEETING THE FAMILY .............................................................................................. 104
My first encounters with the Philipsson family (2005–2007) ........................................... 104
Reconnecting with the family (June 2008) ........................................................................ 105
Getting to know more through Jennifer and Mark (August 2008) ................................... 106
Voices from the next generation (August–September 2008) ............................................. 111
One year of collaboration (September 2008–August 2009) .............................................. 114
8. THE INNER BECOMING OF FAMILY MEETINGS ............................ 116
CREATION OF THE FIELD ACCOUNT ....................................................................... 116
ONE YEAR OF COUSIN MEETINGS ............................................................................ 119
Preparation meeting: It will crystallise vs. this is how it is (September 2008) ..................... 120
Cousin meeting: How should we manage our meetings? (September 2008) ......................... 123
Co-authoring interview summaries: I don’t want anyone to get hurt... (December 2008) ..... 126
Cousin meeting: Labelling and defining (January 2009) ................................................... 131
Cousin meeting: What is your view of the conflict? (March 2009) ..................................... 139
Co-authoring interview summaries: Let us do it again... (July–August 2009) ................... 152
Cousin meeting: Looking back, moving forward (August 2009) ....................................... 153
HOW PROCESSES OF BECOMING UNFOLD FROM WITHIN THE
CONVERSATION .......................................................................................................... 159
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9. IN THE BECOMING OF A MEETING PRACTICE: ALLOWING
FOR A PROCESS OF WAYFINDING .......................................................... 162
THE NEED FOR A NEW ORIENTATION .................................................................... 163
Wayfinding in the uttering of the not-yet-spoken ............................................................... 165
Wayfinding in the temporal unfolding .............................................................................. 167
Wayfinding in the becoming of the unfinalisable self .......................................................... 168
A CLOSING REMARK: KNOWING AS WE GO ............................................................ 169

PART III: UNDERSTANDING MEETINGS FROM A DIALOGICAL
BECOMING PERSPECTIVE
10. THE LIVING MOMENT OF MOVEMENT ......................................... 173
UNDERSTANDING THE LIVING MOMENT ............................................................... 174
A dialogically shaped moment .......................................................................................... 175
A moment of offering differences to each other ................................................................... 176
A moment in between talking and listening ...................................................................... 177
Can moments be more or less living? ................................................................................ 179
SENSING MORE AND SEEING DIFFERENTLY ........................................................... 180
11. IN THE PREPARATION OF A MEETING: LESSONS LEARNT ...... 183
POTENTIAL QUESTIONS ............................................................................................ 184
Remembering that conversations are not on/off, but better/worse: Are the
conversations enriching? ................................................................................................... 184
Remembering that moments are dialogically shaped: How can we prepare the
dialogic space? ................................................................................................................. 186
Remembering that processes of becoming unfold in between utterances and responses:
How can talking and listening be acknowledged? .............................................................. 186
Remembering that ‘moving moments’ are unplannable: How can we seize opportunities
for ‘moving moments’ to occur? ......................................................................................... 188
Valuing different voices in interplay: How can otherness emerge? ....................................... 188
Engaging with the unknown: How is it possible to utter the yet untold? ............................. 189
IN CLOSING: AN INTERPLAY OF OPENING AND STABILISING MOVEMENTS ...... 190
12. FROM STORIES TOLD TO STORIES LIVED: RESEARCH
PRACTICES FOR UNDERSTANDING THE LIVING MOMENT
FROM WITHIN ............................................................................................. 193
ENGAGING FROM WITHIN THE LIVING MOMENT: FOUR STEPPING STONES ..... 194
A relational foundation ................................................................................................... 196
Direction through compassion .......................................................................................... 197
Questioning softly ............................................................................................................ 198
Interplay between stabilising and destabilising practices ..................................................... 199
EVERYDAY RESEARCH PRACTICES AND ETHICS IN THE MAKING ........................ 200
FROM WITHIN AND THE INSIDE-OUTSIDE INTERPLAY ......................................... 203
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13. A NOTE ON WRITING AND THE CONTRIBUTION OF AN
ACADEMIC TEXT ......................................................................................... 205
THE PROBLEM OF REFLEXIVITY AS RETROSPECTIVE AND INTROSPECTIVE
SELF-ASSESSMENT ...................................................................................................... 206
EMBRACING THE READER TO BE: MEANING-MAKING IN THE MOMENT OF
READING ..................................................................................................................... 207
THE ACADEMIC TEXT AS AN OFFERING OF POTENTIALITY ................................. 208
REFERENCES ................................................................................................ 211
APPENDICES.................................................................................................. 211
JIBS DISSERTATION SERIES ...................................................................... 211

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