As an organizational theorist, I study how organizations and institutions are constituted by human action and meaning-making. Underlying my work is a commitment to understanding how organizations can address pressing societal challenges, including democratic backsliding and increasingly precarious forms of employment. Amid the backdrop of these concerns, I examine how organizational capacities to endure adversity and respond to disruption are shaped by the practices and relationships through which organizational members coordinate action. I explore these questions within a variety of settings, including low-autonomy service workplaces, rapidly scaling ventures, and democratically governed social movement organizations. Drawing on members’ lived experiences through interviews and field observations, I primarily use qualitative methods to develop process-oriented theories that explicate how members actively and recursively shape the organizations and institutions they constitute.

Enacting habits of the heart: Practicing democracy in the Girl Scouts of the USA

Building on an inductive study of democratic organizing within the Girl Scouts of the USA—including over 70 interviews and 100 hours of field observations—my job market paper develops a theory of how democracy, as an institution, is maintained through the practices of organizational members. I document the existence of micro-breakdowns in democratic organizing through interactions that call into question (1) the equal standing of each member in decision-making and (2) the ability of the group to arrive at a collective resolution. I find that, in the face of micro-breakdowns, members enact two sets of mutually reinforcing practices: (1) deliberative practices, which uphold personal dignity and collective coherence, and (2) integrative practices, which preserve members’ belief in the consequence and efficacy of decision-making. Together, these practices enable members’ ongoing commitment to the democratic process and each other, thereby maintaining democratic organizing. By conceptualizing democracy as an ongoing social accomplishment and specifying the practices and mechanisms central to its maintenance, this research advances our understanding of the microprocesses through which democracy is enacted and reproduced within organizations.