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Discourse interns use to make sense of work and professional
life in organizationsMark Aakhus
William Voon
Rutgers University
The Setting• Interns were asked to write about dilemmas they experienced at
work and in professional life
• They completed an online form composed of 5 questions– What is the situation and what is the dilemma?– What question do you have about handling this dilemma?– What advice may others typically offer to solve this dilemma?– What do I think should be done in this situation?– How has this situation influenced your beliefs about how communication
works at work or in professional life?
• Research Question: – What do they talk about when writing the updates?– What are the implications for understanding knowledge management?
Data
• 6 Semesters of contributions – Corpus of 1,168,765 words
– 1,626 updates, 471,780 words
– 7,661 responses, 696,985 words
Approach to Analysis
• Focus on “Topics” in Updates to assess what interns talked about – Top nouns from Intern Corpus
• Content words are simple indicators of how interns represent their experience
– Comparison with top nouns from Business Corpus– Analysis of Topics - “Key”ness of terms
• Compare Topics with Intern Corpus• Compare “Quadrants by Popularity” with Intern Corpus
– Distribution of Topics by Top Nouns and Keywords • “Popularity” of topics containing nouns/keywords
• Focus on “Questions” in updates to assess interns orientation– Analysis of Question form– Analysis of Modal Verbs
Top nouns in Intern Corpus
work 9847
time 4931
boss 4348
people 3932
job 3795
supervisor 3539
internship 3153
situation 3010
things 2252
intern 1958
company 1947
4183 5664
1899 3032
1420 2928
1845 2087
1474 2321
1240 2299
1235 1918
1242 1768
844 1408
862 1096
895 1052
Total Updates ResponsesNoun
Do interns engage in “business” discourse?
• Since interns were based in organizational settings, we use “business discourse” as a point of comparison to understand intern’s discourse.
• Compare top nouns with Mike Nelson’s Business English Corpus, top 100 most key words list (http://users.utu.fi/micnel)
Top Nouns – Intern versus Business Corpus
work 9847
time 4931
boss 4348
people 3932
job 3795
supervisor 3539
internship 3153
situation 3010
things 2252
intern 1958
company 1947
company *
business
market
work *
time *
people *
services
product
price
thing *
system
Intern Corpus Business Corpus
Interns’ use of “business” terms
• Interns use some of the top terms from the business corpus – work, time, people, thing, company
• Tend not to use ‘business of business’ terms – business, market, services, product, price, system
• Instead they use terms that emphasize interpersonal relations
– boss, job, supervisor, internship, situation
• This suggests that the interns do not frame their experience in terms of the business of business.
The Interpersonal Dimension
• Frequent words in updates when further analyzed in terms of unusual frequency relative to the corpus further reveals an orientation that: – Attends to the Interpersonal– Attends to the interns immediate social
environment– Attends to struggles with superiors and peers
“Key” terms in Topic - relative to Corpusderived using Wordsmith Tools
JOB
WORK
INTERN
PARTY
WORKER
GOSSIP
OVERLOAD
BORED
LOST
GENDER
TIME
INTERNS
BARRIER
AGE
“Key” terms in Topic – Top versus Bottom-half
SEX
INTERNS
WORK
PARTY
TIME
OVERLOAD
JOB
STAY
JOB
WORK
REVISED
POLITICS
BARRIER
SCHEDULING
Top-half Bottom-half
Top Nouns and Keywords in Topics – Popularity by Response
keywordAverage
Responses Tot Resp Max Resp Topics % top % bot
time 5.0 171 14 34 68 32
intern(s) 6.1 242 20 40 68 33
sex(ual) 5.7 17 11 3 67 33
boss 6.4 141 20 22 64 36
work 4.8 388 17 81 56 44
gossip 4.5 59 9 13 54 46
supervisor 3.7 44 8 12 50 50
job 4.3 183 14 43 49 51
(mis)communication 4.3 51 15 12 33 67
company 1.8 7 3 4 0 100
Mean of Corpus 4.6 54 46
Questions about Dilemmas
• The questions interns pose about dilemmas signal their orientation.
• Questions were examined by looking at word choice in the questions they posed about the dilemmas they reported. – How is the question set up (e.g. who, what, where,
when, etc.)?– What modal verbs are frequently used?
Ways interns pose questions – Analysis of the Question element
Should I 1058
How do 261
How can 116
What should 98
How should 97
What do 43
What is 27
What can 24
How much 18
Would it 16
FrequencyQuestion
Analysis of Modal Verbs by Update Element
Modal verb
should
could
would
may
will
Topic Dilemma QuestionOther’sadvice
Intern’sAction Learned
40 339 1282 1195 438 253
1 220 97 148 96 122
3 692 211 386 701 266
2 137 39 121 519 220
4 368 205 500 319 355
Types of questions interns pose about their dilemmas
• Questions are dominated by “should”– Even “how” and “what” questions collocate
with should– Modal verb frequency – “should” outnumbers
“could”
• Suggests a “rule” rather than a “possibility” orientation
Discussion
• Interns orientation toward the interpersonal – Represented by the content words (nouns and verbs) they use
to write their dilemmas– Evident frequency of response to updates with topics containing
key nouns. • Frame interpersonal in terms of tensions• Seek appropriate and definitive advice more than
alternatives/options• Use conversational, vernacular expressions to talk about
work– They don’t use “business of business” terms– They tend not to use theoretical terms from the communication
discipline• Networks, proxemics, face, cognition, etc.
Implications for KM
• System Design:– Provision of different update elements help contributors articulate
various "facets" of the tacit, thus facilitating its explication.
• Methodology:– Demonstrated a methodology to analyze a "body" of discourse. The
approach could readily be extended to analyze the discourse of a "Community of Practice" to articulate aspects of their "Common Knowledge".
• Further Research:– Analyzing patterns of participation with what is "talked" about in online
discussions, insights could illuminate the issue of "inclusion" and hence the broader dilemma of knowledge sharing.