Course detail

Welcome to Organizing and the Contemporary Workplace: The Work of Communication

Description:

Following the ‘linguistic turn’ in organization studies, the organization is considered a construct that emerges from the communicative, embodied and material efforts by the people who populate it. From this perspective, then, becoming a member of an organization is not merely a matter of being molded into shape or abiding by organizational rules and culture, as suggested by previous research into organizational socialization, but is a situated, communicative process, acknowledging the special condition of the employee.

The PhD-course will foreground communication and discourse as the vehicles for organizational socialization taking a closer look at how identity, affect, power and relationality discursively interact to construct employee-organization relations. Following changes in work, organizing, economics and politics in recent decades, this has become a pivotal discussion to address concerns such as job insecurity, precarity and anxiety as well as value creation and changes to work-life. 

The PhD-course invites students from across the social sciences and humanities to join the conversation on these concepts. In addition, students will be introduced to theories and methods that will help them analyze organizational socialization and membership from a communications / discourse perspective.

Guided by faculty with deep experience in course disciplines, students will leave this course with a more robust understanding of communicative and organizational processes of socialization that respond to ongoing societal transformations of work. Furthermore, students will be encouraged to use the insights from the course in the pursuit of their unique and diverse research interests.

Prerequisites

Students must do course readings before the course to become acquainted with the scope of research. In addition, they must read fellow students’ papers to prepare them to engage in conversations about the themes of the course and potential applications.

Post-course activities

Students must write an individual 5-page reflection paper to be discussed among fellow students and faculty at a post-course online meeting.

Description of paper requirements:

Students must hand in 8-10 pages including an abstract (in English) summarizing their PhD-work. The paper would describe the student’s problem/research question(s) and include a brief review of relevant literature, as well as a description of the student’s proposed approach to organizational socialization. We welcome students offering a preview of the PhD work/proposal

Organizers:

• Lise-Lotte Holmgreen
• Peter Kastberg

• Associate Professor Lise-Lotte Holmgreen, AAU
• Professor Peter Kastberg, AAU
• Associate Professor John McClellan, AAU
• Associate Professor Mia Thyregod Rasmussen, AAU
• Professor Sine Nørholm Just, RUC
• Professor Tim Kuhn, University of Boulder, USA
• Professor Dennis Mumby, University of Chapel Hill, USA
• Associate Professor Rebecca Gill, Wake Forest University, USA

ECTS: 3

Date: 6, 7, 8 May 2026 21, 22, 23 October 2026

Place: Kroghstæde 3, 9220 Aalborg

Number of seats: 20

Deadline: 30 September 2026

Important information concerning PhD courses:

There is a no-show fee of DKK 3,000 for each course where the student does not show up. Cancellations are accepted no later than 2 weeks before the start of the course. Registered illness is of course an acceptable reason for not showing up on those days. Furthermore, all courses open for registration approximately four months before start of the course. We cannot ensure any seats before the deadline for enrolment, all participants will be informed after the deadline, approximately 3 weeks before the start of the course.

For inquiries regarding registration, cancellation or waiting list, please contact the PhD administration at phdcourses@adm.aau.dk. When contacting us please state the course title and course period. Thank you.

Programme 

Day 1, 21 October 2026

Day 2, 22 October 2026

Day 3, 23 October 2026