Understanding Identity Regulation and Identity Work

Through the Contested Identities of Interns

Bryleigh Loughlin

Western Michigan University
RUNNING HEAD: Understanding Identity Regulation and Identity Work 2

Abstract
Based on in-depth qualitative interviews with undergraduate students who completed an
internship in the last six months, this study explores the dialectical tensions that shape the
professional and personal identity development of young people entering their chosen
professions for the first time. Seeing young adults identities as sites of contestation during their
entree to professional contexts, I seek to better understand how student interns negotiate their
personal identities in light of their evolving professional identities. In addition, the interview data
will be analyzed in terms of its contribution to an understanding of the process of socialization
and the dialectic between control and resistance.
Keywords: Identity, Dialectical Tensions, Socialization, Control, Resistance, Power

RUNNING HEAD: Understanding Identity Regulation and Identity Work S

Understanding Identity Regulation and Identity Work Through the Contested Identities of Interns
This summer, I worked as an intern at Amway; the largest direct selling company in the
world. My experience showed me, firsthand, many of the issues organizational communication
scholars study and shaped my own academic interests. In fifteen short weeks, my attitude
towards the corporate world changed drastically. At the beginning of the summer, I intended to
keep my academic and personal self separate from my work self this summer. I recall a
conversation with my thesis mentor where I discussed that I did not want my interests in the
professional world to overlap with my interest in critical theory within my academic studies and
that I expected to bracket one from the other. Once I started my internship, however, I quickly
realized the task of keeping those parts of my self-identity separate would prove to be difficult
and nearly impossible. By the end of the summer I switched from using language that kept me
isolated from them or the company to inclusive language such as we and our. This very
subtle change in my spoken language represents a much larger theme of my time at Amway; it
demonstrates how I chose to accept various organizational norms and make them a part of my
own identity (Cheney,1984). At other points in my internship, I noticed myself distancing my
actions from those of my colleagues. For example, my desk was quite different from those
around me: In contrast to those of my colleagues, my desk never became decorated with flowers,
bright colors, or pictures of my family and friends. I resisted the organizational norm to combine
my personal identity with my professional one through office dcor. Through these interactions,
I was navigating a tension between assimilating and resisting that I experienced during my
internship on a daily basis.
As students are increasingly encouraged to gain hands-on experience through internships,
the issue of how young adults identities are shaped through internship programs is one that
RUNNING HEAD: Understanding Identity Regulation and Identity Work 4

should be considered further. Large numbers of college-aged students are working at companies
through internship programs to gain hands-on experience that directly relate to their future
professions. These short-term jobs presumably shape and mold these young adults into
professionals (Jablin, 2001). Companies continue to look at internship programs as a talent
pipeline and use internships as a way to conduct extended interviews of future job candidates.
Additionally, organizations wield power over the individual in more than just the professional
context (Cheney & Aschcraft, 2007). This power goes beyond the professional and
organizational context and therefore the study can bring light to the unyielding power of work
organizations over individuals. Companies value internship programs, and college students seek
internships, so the ways that internship experiences shape young adults identitiesboth
personal and professionalis a relevant and worthy topic for scholars to study.
The purpose of this research project is to understand how interns negotiate their identities
in light of their new and developing professional identities. In order to understand this interplay,
I will first consider the literatures of identity, socialization, and power, control and resistance to
make connections among them and identify areas that merit further investigation and clarity.
Various scholars have studied how individuals enter, assimilate, and exit organizational settings
(Bullis, 2003; Jablin 1987, 2001; Kramer & Miller, 1999). This literature is known as the
socialization literature and seeks to answer questions about how individuals come to know
organizations norms and rules. This process is valuable and brings great insight to the field of
organizational communication. By viewing the socialization process as laden with power, I hope
to better understand the dialectical tensions that shape young adults identities (Mumby, 2005) in
order to contribute to both theory and practice.

RUNNING HEAD: Understanding Identity Regulation and Identity Work S

Identity in Organizational Contexts
In the last two decades, organizational scholars have become more interested in identity
as an area of study (Alvesson, 2010; Homer-Nadesan, 1996; Sveningsson & Alvesson, 2003;
Tracy & Trethewey, 2005). Organizational communication scholars have studied the
phenomena of identity and offered a wide variety of theoretical contributions to the
understanding of identity in the last two decades. The study of identity and self increasingly
became more popular and continues to explode throughout organizational scholars studies as
many believe that by understanding identity, scholars will better understand every other aspect of
the organizational context (Alvesson, 2010; Homer-Nadesan, 1996; Sveningsson & Alvesson,
2003; Tracy & Trethewey, 2005). As one of the most popular topics in organizational studies,
identity is defined in various ways and these definitions are disputed among scholars.
One way to understand and interpret the vast field of identity literature is viewing it as
being comprised of three primary theoretical perspectives (Alvesson, 2010; Homer-Nadesan,
1996; Sveningsson & Alvesson, 2003). The functionalist conceptualization of identity has and
continues to be the dominating perspective within the field of organizational communication.
This theoretical conceptualization is represented in the statement made by Collinson (2003) that
reads, human beings as unitary, coherent, and autonomous individuals who are separate and
separable from organizations (p. 523, quoted in Alvesson, 2010). Scholars studying identity
from this perspective focus on the individual as having a concrete, coherent, fixed and consistent
identity (Alvesson, 2010; Sveningsson & Alvesson, 2003; Tracy & Trethewey, 2005).
The second lens to view the theoretical conceptualization of identity is from the view of
poststructuralists and anti-essentialists. They reject the idea that identity lies within the
individual in a static sense; rather, they are interested in subject positions that are negotiated and
RUNNING HEAD: Understanding Identity Regulation and Identity Work 6

re-negotiated constantly in discourse (Homer-Nadesan, 1996; Tracy & Trethewey, 2005).
According to Homer-Nadesan (1996), Poststructuralists locate identity, and the meaning it
implies, in language use (p. 50). By locating identity in language, identities (or subject
positions) are seen as multiple, varying, and partial because language holds multiple, varying,
and partial meanings in each context. Thus identity from a poststructuralist perspective is never
concrete, definite, or complete and is influenced by a multitude of discourses and forces within
society. Tracy and Trethewey use the term crystalized selves to describe the multiplicity of
discourses and facets that each persons identity contains (2005, p. 170). In defining identity as
crystallized, they seek to move away from the idea that individuals have real and fake
identities and instead focus on the varying, partial, and multiple identities of an individual.
Poststructuralists reject the essentialist view of functionalists that assume individuals maintain a
consistent self and identity. Thus, they are more interested in the discourses that shape and
routinize subject positions than the individual identity.
The third conceptualization of identity is that of the interpretivist. Interpretivist view
identity as both emerging from social interactions and being constructed out of various relational
expectations (Prichard, 1999). According to Mead,
A person is a personality because he [sic] belongs to a community . . . he takes its
language as a medium by which he gets his personality, and then through a process of
taking the different roles that all the others furnish he comes to get the attitude of the
members of the community (as quoted in Prichard, 1999, p. 8).
Therefore the interpretivist perspective concludes that individuals do not maintain a concrete
identity as assumed by the functionalists. Interpretivist reject the idea of fragmentation as
assumed by the poststructuralist perspective (Alvesson & Willmott, 2002). The interpretivist
RUNNING HEAD: Understanding Identity Regulation and Identity Work 7

perspective sees the complexity of identity as it is shaped through self, work, and organization
(Alvesson, Ashcraft, & Thomas, 2008). According to Meads symbolic interactionism, identity is
constructed through an active, subjective self that drives all that creates an identity (I) and the
objective self, which is the compilation of the perspectives of how others view an individual
(me) (Prichard, 1999). This theoretical base, known as symbolic interactionism, is centered on
the concept that identity is constructed, and reconstructed through social interactions. Therefore,
interpretivist acknowledge the ability of individuals to maintain some agency, yet they are
moderated through the concept that identity is formed through social interactions and therefore
individuals agency is also limited by those that surround them. In this study, I take the
interpretivist perspective of identity to understand agency and limitation that young adults
maintain over their identities as they enter the professional world and navigate their contested
professional and organizational selves (Tracy & Trethewey, 2005).
Alvesson (2010) overviewed the extant research on identity within organizational studies
to identify the key images used to explain and theorize identity. His characterization includes
perspectives that represent all three of the lenses along the continuum. by considering seven key
images of identity within organizational studies: self-doubters, strugglers, storytellers, strategists,
stencils, and soldiers (Alvesson, 2010, p. 62). In this study, I am interested in identity as the
image of strugglers and strategists. By taking the perspective of strugglers, researchers
acknowledge the multiplicity of resources shaping an individuals identity, but also demonstrate
that the individual may act to construct a sustainable identity that is neither dependent on nor
independent from outside forces (Alvesson). The struggler view of identity emphasizes the
contradictions that undermine a complete and stable self-identity because identity is seen as
emerging from social interaction and social resources. By viewing identity from the strategist
RUNNING HEAD: Understanding Identity Regulation and Identity Work 8

perspective, I am interested in understanding how interns construct and navigate the socialization
process to position their professional identities in a positive light. This strategist perspective
views individuals as being capable of conducting identity work to shape positive identities for
their futures (Alvesson). The ability to view identity through these two images, strugglers and
strategists, will allow this study to answer multiple research questions. I take the perspective that
individuals identities are multiple and varying, and the perspective that individuals maintain the
ability and agency to shape parts of their identity. This combination is seen through the struggler
and strategist image because interns will shape parts of their professional identity while
understanding that identity is formed through social interactions and that individuals maintain
some agency over their own identities.
In order to better understand how individuals identities are shaped through social
interaction, and highlight individuals agency over their identities, I will utilize the framework of
Alvesson and Willmott (2002). According to the framework of Alvesson and Willmott,
individuals identities are shaped within organizational contexts through the process of identity
regulation. Identity regulation is the intentional and unintentional modality by which
organizations control and shape members; identity regulation is accomplished both by individual
organizational members (e.g., a manager) as well as by other organizational actors (e.g., written
texts) (Alvesson & Willmott). Thus organizational control is aimed at the identities of
organizational members and attempts to shape individuals into persons who act beneficently for
the company (Alvesson & Willmott). Identity regulation is enacted in a variety of ways on a
daily basis at organizations and can be summarized into nine basic strategies. The first two
strategies that establish identity regulation are to define an individual directly and describe what
he or she is and to define the individual by defining others that are different than him or her. The
RUNNING HEAD: Understanding Identity Regulation and Identity Work 9

third strategy, based on the interpretivist framework, is to provide a specific set of motives that
set the tone, meaning, and culture for an organization from upper management. Another way to
target identity through identity regulation is by maintaining outright and explicit morals and
values. Furthermore, organizations define who employees are by what they know and what they
can do. The sixth strategy employed to regulate identities is to establish groups and social
categories that individuals are members of to define their identity through them. A hierarchical
structure can target workers identities as they may define themselves by describing the level
within the hierarchy that they work. Finally, organizations create standards and norms through
distinct rules that employees and the organization must follow in order to conduct good business
versus bad business. Identity is further targeted through the way the organizational context is
specifically defined (Alvesson & Willmott, p. 629-632). These strategies are ways that
organizational control targets the identities of employees and attempts to regulate them.
While it is obvious that organizations use identity regulation as a modality to shape
employees identities, these strategies are not always successful and employees have the ability to
react to them (Alvesson & Willmott, 2002). Various scholars view identity as a process in which
employees hold some agency to shape and select their own identities (Covaleski, 2001; Homer-
Nadesan, 1996; Tracy & Trethewey, 2005; Sveningsson & Alvesson, 2003). Alvesson and
Willmott (2002) utilize the concept of identity work as a process where individual employees
have agency as they attempt to negotiate a sense of self within the complex, diverse, and ever-
changing life of modern organizations. The concept of identity work is more salient in modern
organizations as the power has shifted to concertive control because as power becomes less
visible, employees are faced with the challenge of navigating its endless complexities and
variable nature (Alvesson & Willmott). Identity work is the ability of the individual to react to
RUNNING HEAD: Understanding Identity Regulation and Identity Work 1u

identity regulation of others through a process of self-appraisal and questioning. Thus, identity
work is interpretive activity involved in reproduction and transforming self-identity (Alvesson
& Willmott, 2002, p. 627). In this study, I adapt Alvesson and Willmotts framework of identity
regulation and identity work to see how control and resistance is embedded in the ways
organizational control targets employees identities and how employees both accept and resist
these targets through identity work.
The Dialectic of Control and Resistance
Critical organizational studies scholars are interested in how workers are controlled to
make actions that benefit the organization. One of the major challenges in discussing the power
within the socialization process and everyday life is that power in organizations is increasingly
less direct and visible; rather it is embedded in the social and cultural realities that individuals
consent to as normal and neutral as they conduct identity work.
The challenge of discussing power due to its invisibility is most clearly illustrated
through the writing of various scholars who seek to understand the ways in which power is
constructed and reconstructed in organizations (Barker, 1993; Deetz, 1992; Tompkins & Cheney,
1985). Foucault (cited in Deetz, 1992) suggested that when democracy became into existence,
power changed drastically; he demonstrated that power no longer existed in basic mandates
centralized within one entity, which he defined as sovereign power. Sovereign power existed
when governments and monarchs controlled individuals under their regulations and dictated laws
that would be followed and if ignored, individuals would face punishment (Deetz). After the end
of this simple power and the rise of democracy, a shift to a more complex form of power that is
dispersed throughout society in every corner was established. Foucault described this as
decentralized, chaotic, and invisible and defined it as disciplinary power (Deetz). As Deetz stated
RUNNING HEAD: Understanding Identity Regulation and Identity Work 11

(power) is spread out through the lines of conformity, commonsense observations, and
determination of proprietary (p. 22). The shift from sovereign to disciplinary power can be seen
as transforming the modern organization: In that context, power is exercised as new members
consent to norms and values.
The shift to disciplinary power continues to exist in todays society, especially as
organizations become increasingly globalized, knowledge-intensive, decentralized, and flat
(Barker, 1993; Deetz, 1998; Tompkins & Cheney, 1985). Barker (1993) draws upon Edwards
three strategies of controlsimple, technological and bureaucraticto discuss the ways power
has shifted within organizations. Simple control is the most straightforward of the strategies and
is authoritarian and direct. When technological control developed, it was said to improve upon
simple control because it removes the commands established by superiors on workers and
instead allows machines and technology to dictate the pace and work demanded from
individuals. Bureaucratic control intended to improve upon technological power by becoming
less demanding and visible. While bureaucratic control is less visible to workers, it is more
powerful because of that exact reason (Barker). Barker then adds a fourth strategy known as
concertive or concertive control. Concertive control is when organizations decentralize their
power structures and work within self-managing teams and flat organizational hierarchies.
Concertive control in turn attempts to loosen the amount of power organizations hold over
workers but instead creates an even stronger and less visible power structure than bureaucratic,
technological, or simple control (Barker, 1993; Deetz, 1998; Tompkins & Cheney, 1985).
Concertive control is centered within the social norms of organizations therefore it cannot be
readily seen or identified, but is constructed in the actions and communication of the workers
who consent by actively taking part in their own control (Barker, 1993). Foucaults claims that
RUNNING HEAD: Understanding Identity Regulation and Identity Work 12

disciplinary power operates through social and cultural norms of society is supported by other
scholars that exemplify the shift through the fourth strategy of control known as concertive
control (Barker, 1993; Deetz 1992; Deetz, 1998; Tompkins & Cheney, 1985). Concertive
control, similar to Foucaults definition of disciplinary power and how it continually gets less
and less visible it fails to fully encompass his claims that control and resistance emerge together.
The majority of the studies conducted to bring light to how workers resist power and
control from organizations continue to look at power and control as separate from the resistance
established by workers (Mumby, 2005). As Mumby argues, bifurcating control and resistance
fails to reflect the ongoing tension between the two and how their emerge simultaneously in
organizational life (Deetz, 1992). Mumby suggests that framing control and resistance as
dialectical can help scholars encompass the relationship between control and resistance that
Foucault envisioned in his concept of disciplinary power.
Dialectical approaches allow researchers to identify and understand the relationship
between two seemingly opposing things that emerge in relationship to one another. For example,
one cannot know what hot is unless he understands what cold means and vice versa. Dialectical
tension is the interplay between two dialects or discourses within society (Mumby, 2005). In the
case of control and resistance, Mumby is arguing that the two exist in a dialectical relationship,
which means that both are present in the everyday life of organizational members. In this study,
I will consider how the dialectic of control and resistance shapes the experiences of individuals
just starting at an organization as they negotiate the ways that cultural norms of the organization
regulate their identities. One of the most prevalent way interns identities are shaped


RUNNING HEAD: Understanding Identity Regulation and Identity Work 1S

Organizational Socialization and Assimilation
Newcomers to an organization face a variety of organizational strategies to regulate their
identities and encourage them to fit-in. Since a significant amount ones life is spent working for
and within organizations, scholars have studied organizational socializationthe processes by
which individuals enter, assimilate, and exit work organizationsto understand how these
interactions affect workers identities as well as how they impact organizational effectiveness
(Jablin, 1987). This area of research is referred to in various terms such as socialization,
assimilation, and individualization. Scholars debate the meaning of each word since the terms
socialization and assimilation hold subjective and varying meanings for each scholar depending
on his or her paradigm (Bullis, 1993,1999; Clair, 1996, 1999; Miller & Kramer 1999; Kramer &
Miller 1999; Turner 1999). In this paper, I view socialization as the general area of study and
will discuss the various areas of inquiry that comprise it.
The majority of socialization research is based on a heuristic model that encompasses all
of the processes an individuals entrance, assimilation, and exit of an organization to understand
how it advantages and helps organizations meet their goals (Bullis, 1993). As defined by Bullis
(1993) Most broadly, socialization may be considered as a central process through which the
individual-societal relationships are mediated. More narrowly, it is examined as a process
through which newcomers become organizational members (p. 10). The first definition
emphasizes the power that organizations have to create and shape workers identities on a
continual basis and how these identities are established to match the social norms of a society.
Organizational scholars have focused more on the latter definition of socialization and I will seek
to better understand the link between the two in this paper (Bullis, 1993; Clair, 1996). The extant
organizational research views socialization as a process that proceeds through distinct phases in a
RUNNING HEAD: Understanding Identity Regulation and Identity Work 14

particular order. This process is divided into three major phases: anticipatory socialization,
assimilation, and organizational exit (Bullis, 1993; Jablin, 1987, 2001; Kramer & Miller, 1999).
Anticipatory socialization is the phase in which individuals, as children, are taught about
the communication norms to expect in work and learn specific expectations and regulations
regarding their chosen occupation before they enter the organizations in which they work.
Anticipatory socialization is a process that consists of two separate but related phases: vocational
socialization and organizational choice and entry. Vocational socialization shapes children and
young adults through their family, education, part-time jobs, peers and friends and the media.
These micro-systems socialize children into the communication practices and norms of work.
The second process, organizational choice and entry, occurs as individuals begin to look for full-
time employment and provides socialization into a specific organization prior to membership.
Organizational literature and interactions with other applicants, current employees, and
interviewees establish a perceived culture and organizational norms that applicants begin to
determine as acceptable or not. The two phases of anticipatory research occur separately but are
related in the way they shape the identity of individuals as workers (Jablin, 1987, 2001).
The second phase of socialization, known as assimilation, is defined by Jablin (1982) as
the process by which an individual becomes integrated into the reality or culture of an
organization (p. 693, emphasis in original). The term assimilation refers to the specific phase
when a newcomer becomes part of the organization and simultaneously influences that
organization by individualizing roles and schemes to meet his or her needs. Thus, assimilation is
the socialization of the individual and the individualization of the organization (Bullis, 1993;
Jablin, 1987, 2001; Kramer & Smith, 1999; Smith & Turner, 1995). As Bullis noted (1993), most
socialization research refers to these two processes within the assimilation process as separate
RUNNING HEAD: Understanding Identity Regulation and Identity Work 1S

entities (p. 11). The socialization of the individual is when an individual adopts the cultural
norms of an organization and parts of his or her identity are shaped through those norms. On the
other end of this process is the individualization of the organization, which is how individuals
shape the cultural norms and social constructions of the organization through their own
interpretations. The majority of socialization research, while claiming to look at assimilation as
two-way process, does not explain the ways individuals potentially resist aspects of the
organizational culture. Furthermore, the research ignores the presence of power as organizations
seek to regulate new member identities (Alvesson & Willmott, 2002). By looking at assimilation
as a unified interplay between individualization of the organization and socialization of the
individual new insights to the field could be developed (Bullis, 1993; Smith & Turner, 1995). I
take an interpretive approach using in-depth interviews to understand how interns negotiated the
expectations of becoming an organizational member (i.e. socialization) and their previous
constructions of self (i.e. individualization).
The heuristic model established by Jablin (1982) that continues to be the base of
socialization literature establishes the longitudinal process many individuals and workers face
throughout their occupational lives, but does not take into can account how these individuals
maintain agency in the process and determine what norms and aspects of organizational culture
to accept (Bullis, 1993; Smith & Turner, 1995). This project seeks to develop alternative
understandings of organizational socialization at a localized level to depict socialization as a
context within which individuals potentially adopt and reject various aspects of the
organizations culture as they negotiate and narrate selves in light of their new organizational
membership.
RUNNING HEAD: Understanding Identity Regulation and Identity Work 16

In this thesis project, I will seek to understand how interns conduct identity work while
navigating the dialectic of control and resistance to construct identities that match the larger
organizational norms. While many employees have already negotiated their identities in light of
personal and professional discourses, the identities of internswho are entering the professional
workforce for the first timeare contested, meaning that they are up for grabs and must be
actively negotiated by the interns. Drawing upon the Alvesson and Willmotts (2002) theory of
identity construction, I approach interns identity negotiations as a constant interplay between
identity work and identity regulation that incorporates both control and resistance. Through
these processes, interns craft selves in light of professional and personal discourses. The primary
research questions that I am interested in answering are:
1. How are their interns identities being regulated through the socialization process?
2. How do the interns conduct identity work in response to identity regulation?
3. How are control and resistance laden within the identity construction and identity
regulation process?
Methodology
In order to study these research questions, I will utilize in-depth qualitative interviews
with students who had completed an internship at Amway Corporation in the previous summer.
The interviews will ask participants about their experience in Amways internship program and
will solicit information regarding their assimilation to the organization, their perception of
organizational norms, and how they made sense of their emerging professional identities amidst
their personal identities. Interviews will be based on a semi-structured interview guide (See
Appendix A). Each participant will be interviewed in a 60-90 minute, in-depth, qualitative
interview. After the interview are conducted and transcribed, I will utilize an emic approach to
RUNNING HEAD: Understanding Identity Regulation and Identity Work 17

conduct my thesis. According to Tracy (2013) an emic approach gains understanding from the
meanings that emerge from the field (p. 21). This allows for a localized analysis and
understanding of how interns at one company navigated their internship to shape their identities.
Participants
The participants for this study will have completed an internship with Amway during the
summer of 2013 in various departments at the World Headquarters in Ada, Michigan. I will use
network and convenience sampling as I, myself, was an intern at Amway Corporation. These
interns are undergraduate students from a variety of universities looking to develop themselves
academically and professionally. They are the ideal population because they entered the
corporate world for the first time in an area related to their professional career. As they enter the
corporate world for the first time, their identities are contested, meaning they are under
negotiation and open for grabs. This openness provides a space in which the researcher will be
able to view the delicate process of identity work as the interns navigated the socialization
process and resisted and consented to the discourses that shaped their identities.
I am currently seeking Human Subjects Institutional Review Board approval for this
study. No interviews will be conducted until approval is granted. An informed consent process
will be utilized and verbal consent will be sought at the time of each interview.
Data Analysis
Once the interviews are conducted, I will transcribe them and then begin data analysis.
The data analysis process will take place through the use of NVivo to organize and code data
into categories present within the data. I will categorize the data based on emergent themes that
are represented in the transcripts of the interviews. Next, I will begin to re-organize the first
categorizations by using interpretation, and identifying similarities and differences among the
RUNNING HEAD: Understanding Identity Regulation and Identity Work 18

first level codes. Second-level codes will then connect to theoretical perspectives and the
research foci will result from these codes. Once the codes have become strong theoretical
perspective, the discussion portion of my thesis will then be formed. This will then lead to the
initial draft of my undergraduate honors thesis that I plan to complete in March of 2014.
Schedule
The following steps will help me move from this proposal to a completed honors thesis; for each
item, I list the date by which I anticipate it will be completed:.
December 9: HSIRB Approval
December 25: All Interviews Conducted
January 12: All Interviews Transcribed
February 17: Data Analysis and Argument Outline
March 7: Draft of Thesis
April 1: Thesis to Committee
April 14-18: Thesis Defense at Honors College Thesis Celebration Day
a. Oral Defense to Committee Directly after Public Defense
Conclusion
In this study, I seek to understand how undergraduate students who completed an
internship at Amway Corporation during the summer of 2013 experienced identity regulation and
responded with identity work. These students provide an opening into the delicate process of
identity regulation and work because their own identities are more contested than those of
seasoned employees. Through this, I hope to understand how control and resistance operate
dialectically in the process of organizational socialization. I experienced identity regulation and
conducted identity work first-hand this summer during my internship at Amway Corporation. At
RUNNING HEAD: Understanding Identity Regulation and Identity Work 19

the beginning of the summer, I was certain that I would keep my professional and personal
identities separate, but by the end of the summer, I realized that was nearly impossible. Even
now, I consider my experience at Amway to have shape my professional and personal selves and
am able to see the ways in which my internship changed me throughout time. I want to better
understand how internship experiences shape young adults identities and how young adults see
this as playing out in their own lives.



RUNNING HEAD: Understanding Identity Regulation and Identity Work 2u

References
Alvesson, M. (2010). Self-doubters, strugglers, storytellers, surfers and others: Images of self-
identities in organization studies. Human Relations, 63(2), 193-217. doi:
10.1177/0018726709350372
Alvesson, M., Ashcraft, K. L., & Thomas, R. (2008). Identity matters: Reflections on the
construction of identity scholarship in organization studies. Organization, 15(1), 5-28.
doi: 10.1177/1350508407084426
Alvesson, M., & Willmott, H. (2002). Identity regulation as organization control: Producing the
appropriate individual. Journal of Management Studies, 39(5), 619-644. doi:
10.1111/1467-6486.00305
Barker, J. R. (1993). Tightening the iron cage: Concertive control in self-managing teams.
Administrative Science Quarterly, 38(3), 408-437.
Bullis, C. (1993). Organizational socialization research: Enabling, constraining, and shifting
perspectives. Communication Monographs, 60(1), 10-17.
doi:10.1080/03637759309376289
Bullis, C. (1999). Mad or bad: A response to kramer and miller. Communication Monographs,
66(4), 368-373. doi:10.1080/03637759909376486
Cheney, G., & Ashcraft, K. L. (2007). Considering "the professional" in communication studies:
Implications for theory and research within and beyond the boundaries of organizational
communication. Communication Theory, 17, 146-175. doi: 10.1111/j.1468-
2885.2007.00290.x


RUNNING HEAD: Understanding Identity Regulation and Identity Work 21

Clair, R. (1996). The political nature of the colloquialism, "a real job": Implications for
organizational socialization. Communication Monographs, 63(3), 249.
doi:10.1080/03637759609376392
Clair, R. P. (1999). Ways of seeing: A review of kramer and miller's manuscript. Communication
Monographs, 66(4), 374-381. doi:10.1080/03637759909376487
Covaleski, M. A., Dirsmith, M. W., & Samuel, S. (1998). The calculated and the avowed:
Techniques of discipline and struggles over identity in big six public accounting firms.
Administrative Science Quarterly, 43, 293-327.
Deetz, S. (1998). Discursive formations, strategized subordination and self-surveillance.
Foucault, management and organization theory: From panopticon to technologies of self
(pp. 151). London: Sage Publications Ltd.
Deetz, S. (c1992). Democracy in an age of corporate colonization: Developments in
communication and the politics of everyday life. Albany: State University of New York.
Fleming, P., & Spicer, A. (2007). Contesting the corporation: Struggle, power and resistance in
organizations
Jablin, F. M. (c1987). Handbook of organizational communication : An interdisciplinary
perspective. Newbury Park, Calif.: Sage Publications.
Jablin, F. M., & Putnam, L. (c2001). The new handbook of organizational communication :
Advances in theory, research, and methods. Thousand Oaks, Calif.: Sage Publications.
Kramer, M. W., & Miller, V. D. (1999). A response to criticisms of organizational socialization
research: In support of contemporary conceptualizations of organizational assimilation.
Communication Monographs, 66(4), 358-367. doi:10.1080/03637759909376485

RUNNING HEAD: Understanding Identity Regulation and Identity Work 22

Miller, V. D., & Kramer, M. W. (1999). A reply to bullis, turner, and clair. Communication
Monographs, 66(4), 390-392. doi:10.1080/03637759909376489
Mumby, D. K. (2005). THEORIZING RESISTANCE IN ORGANIZATION STUDIES: A
dialectical approach. Management Communication Quarterly : McQ, 19(1), 19-44.
Nadesan, M. H. (1996). How can we have a space for identity Nadesan, M. H. (1996).
Organizational identity and space of action. Organization Studies, 17(1), 49-81.
Understand argument
Prichard, C. (1999). Identity work-moving the theory of the subject from division to depth in
critical organizational analysis. Paper presented at the Critical Management Studies
Conference, Manchester, England.
SMITH, R. (1995). A social constructionist reconfiguration of metaphor analysis: An application
of "SCMA" to organizational socialization theorizing. Communication Monographs,
62(2), 152. doi:10.1080/03637759509376354
Sveningsson, S., & Alvesson, M. (2003). Managing managerial identities: Organizational
fragmentation, discourse and identity struggle. Human Relations, 56(10), 1163-1193. doi:
10.1177/00187267035610001
Tompkins, P. K., & Cheney, G. (c1985). Communication and unobtrusive control in
contemporary organizations. Organizational communication : Traditional themes and
new directions (pp. 179-296 p. ;). Beverly Hills: Sage Publications.
Tracy, S. J., & Rivera, K. D. (2010). Endorsing equity and applauding stay-at-home moms: How
male voices on work-life reveal aversive sexism and flickers of transformation.
Management Communication Quarterly, 24(1), 3-43. doi:10.1177/0893318909352248
Tracy, S. J., & Trethewey, A. (2005). Fracturing the real-self<->fake-self dichotomy: Moving
RUNNING HEAD: Understanding Identity Regulation and Identity Work 2S

toward "crystallized" organizational discourses and identities. Communication Theory,
15(2), 168-195.
Turner, P. K. (1999). What if you don't?: A response to kramer and miller. Communication
Monographs, 66(4), 382-389. doi:10.1080/03637759909376488
Wieland, S. M. B. (2010). Ideal selves as resources for the situated practice of identity.
Management Communication Quarterly, 24(4), 503-528. doi:
10.1177/0893318910374938

RUNNING HEAD: Understanding Identity Regulation and Identity Work 24

Stacey Wieland and Bryleigh Loughlin
APPENDIX A: SEMI-STRUCTURED INTERVIEW GUIDE
Project Title: Understanding Identity Regulation and Identity Work Through the Contested
Identities of Interns

Semi-Structured Interview Guide

!"#$%& ()*+"*, -)#.
Again, I woulu like to thank you foi taking the time to talk with me touay. I want to
make suie that you aie still comfoitable with all the inteiview piocess anu ieceive
youi consent foi iecoiuing this inteiview.

/%012#)3*4 5*6)#.%,7)*
What is youi majoi.
What aie youi long-teim caieei aspiiations.
Bow uiu you changegiow thioughout youi inteinship.
o What leu to these changes.
Tell me about youi inteinship.
o Bow uiu you feel about youi inteinship on the fiist uay.
o If they uon't mention the following uetails, ask: company, uepaitment anu
position.
Bow woulu you explain what youi uepaitment uoes to a fiienu.
Coulu you please explain youi iesponsibilities uuiing youi inteinship.

8++7.7&%,7)*9-7,,7*2 5*
Bow uiu you attempt to "fit-in" with the iest of youi uepaitment.
What uoes it mean to be a membei of the oiganization.
Bow uiu you become a membei of the oiganization.
o Bow uiu you change in oiuei to become a membei.
o Was it comfoitable to change these aspects of youiself.
o Can you tell me an example of a specific time you changeu to fit in.
Bow uiu you auapt to the piofessional enviionment.

/"7*2 :766"#"*,9;,7017*2 )3,
Can you tell me a time you felt like an outsiuei.
Bow weie you uiffeient fiom the employees in youi uepaitment.
Bow uiu you feel uiffeient than othei membeis of the oiganization.
Bow uiu you maintain youi iuentity uuiing the inteinship.
Bow uo you see youi peisonal anu piofessional iuentity as being similai oi
uiffeient.
Bo you look up to anyone in youi uepaitment.
o Why.
o Woulu you like to become moie like them.
! Bow anu in what ways.
RUNNING HEAD: Understanding Identity Regulation and Identity Work 2S


().<%*= >)#.+9!%&3"+
Bow woulu you explain the goals, values, anu beliefs of the company to an outsiuei
who wanteu to know about it.
o Can you give me an example of how you enacteu these goals, values, anu
beliefs uuiing youi inteinship.
o Bow uo you see youi peisonal goals, values, anu beliefs oveilapping with
those of the company.
o Bow uo you see youi peisonal goals, values anu beliefs uiffeiing fiom those
of the company.
o Bow uiu you maintain youi own values anu beliefs when they uiffeieu fiom
those of the company.

5*,"#%0,7)*+ ?7,@ ()&&"%23"+
Bow uiu you know what it meant to be piofessional.
Bow (if at all) uiu you see colleagues encouiage you to follow theii actions.
o Which colleagues tenueu to uo this. !"#$%# '%# (#)#*$" +#%,*-./-0)% $)+ /-/"#%
-)%/#$+ 01 -)+-2-+'$"%3 )$4#%5
o Tell me about theii actions.
o Bow uiu theii actions make you feel.
o Tell me about a time you followeu theii actions.
o Tell me about a time you ignoieu theii actions.
Biu you feel the neeu to change youi behavioi oi language to match youi
colleagues'.
o If so, tell me about a time that you uiu feel piessuieu.
o Biu you change youi behavioi.
! If so, how uiu you change it.
Bow uiu youi colleagues influence the changes that occuiieu to youiself.

AB7,7*2 ,@" C#2%*7D%,7)*9E#%*+7,7)*7*2 ,) % ;,34"*,
Bow uo you see youi peisonal anu piofessional iuentity as being similai oi
uiffeient.
Bow uiu you uesciibe youi inteinship expeiience to otheis.
Bow uo you see youi inteinship affecting youi actions anu the way you caiiy
youiself at school.

A*47*2 E@)32@,+9F"6&"0,7)*+
Bow uo you see youi inteinship expeiience as a pait of who you aie.
Bow uiu you inteinship expeiience shape youi long-teim aspiiations.
What weie the majoi things you leaineu fiom youi inteinship.
Bow uiu youi inteinship help you bettei unueistanu youiself.
Is theie anything else you think I shoulu know about youi inteinship expeiience.