Edward Elgar Publishing Poetry and Organizing: Perspectives on the Uses and Value of Poetry in Organization Studies

This creative book discusses the value of poetry within the field of management and organization studies. It examines how researchers can understand poetry and incorporate it into their work, exploring ways that poetry encourages readers to defy the status quo and engage in activism. Bringing together two supposedly contrary concepts, poetry and organization, the authors highlight sensorial and feminist approaches to organization rooted in affect and embodiment. Drawing on their unique experiences, authors share their own poems and outline how these relate to organization, illustrating a poem’s capacity to be either politically inclusionary or exclusionary. Combining narrative chapters with poems, they demonstrate how the organizational dimensions of renowned poetry reflect contemporary management practices. The book invites readers to consider what constitutes ‘good’ management, using poetry to destabilize existing paradigms concerning the social and the organized. Poetry and Organizing is an invigorating read for students and academics in business studies, organization studies and literature. Its insights into working landscapes, enriched by the authors diverse international backgrounds, expertise and perspectives, will also greatly benefit researchers and practitioners in business management.