A New Wind Blowing

University of Manchester Postgraduate Conference 2-3 August, 2012

Jennifer Scoles
University of Stirling

Reconceptualising the skills gap discourse: Professional knowing in the emerging sector of renewable energy A practice-based, sociomaterial approach

PhD Topic

Situating the case study

Sector emergence Changing profession Dissatisfied employers Skills gap discourse Micro-practices

Theoretical Perspective
Knowing-in-practice (Orlikowski, 2002) Sociomaterial (Feldman and Orlikowski, 2011) Actor Network Theory (Latour, 1987)

Methodology
Ethnography Follow the actor Interviews & observation Photograph elicitation
(Harper, 1994)

Photos of practice stuff

Boundary objects (Star and Griesemar, 1989; Carlile, 2004) Professional vision (Goodwin, 1994)

Objects and sites of interprofessional knowing

Objects as inhibitors and mediators

Summary
Case study: Renewable energy Problematising skills gap discourse

Methodology and data collection

Introducing photo elicitation

Any Questions?

References
Carlile, P.R., 2004. Transferring, translating, and transforming: An integrative approach for managing knowledge across boundaries, Organization Science, 15(5), pp. 555-568. Feldman, M., and Orlikowski, W., 2011. Theorizing practice and practicing theory, Organization Science, 22, pp. 1240-1253. Goodwin, C.,1994. Professional Vision,. American Anthropologist, 96(3), pp. 606-633. Harper, D., 1994. On the authority of the image: Visual methods at the crossroads, in N.K. Denzin and Y.S. Lincoln (eds) Handbook of Qualitative Research, Thousands Oaks, CA: Sage Publications, pp. 403-412. Latour, B., 1987. Science in Action: How to follow scientists and engineers through society, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press; Milton Keynes: Open University Press. Orlikowski, W.J., 2007. Sociomaterial practices: Exploring technology at work, Organization Studies, 28(9), pp.1435-1448. Star, S.L., and Griesemer, J.R., 1989. Institutional Ecology, 'Translations', and Boundary Objects: Amateurs and Professionals in Berkeley's Museum of Vertebrate Zoology 190739, Social Studies of Science, 19(3), pp. 387- 420.