Beating the monochrome: emerging market multinationals and the bricoleur approach to embracing heterogeneity

ABSTRACT

The research aims to analyse the social identities of emerging multinational corporations from India. It looks at whether the difference of geography and ethnicity can be overcome with a multi-dimensionality or bricolage approach as a managerial paradigm – where the manager, as bricoleur, adopts a socially efficient hybrid approach of changing the arrangement of socio-historical rules through negotiation of both past and present practices, rather than assuming a revolutionary or disruptive engineering approach. We present thematic and discourse analyses of the communication (interviews, blogs, press releases, and public statements) made by the top and middle management of 15 Indian MNCs. The findings reflect the strategies adopted by the firms to fit their public image to a particular culture or audience, and the ways firms migrate to a transnational image with changes in its geographical identities.

KEYWORDS:

• EMNC
• social identity
• bricolage
• multi-dimensionality
• hybridity

Acknowledgement

The support received from FORE School of Management for this research is gratefully appreciated.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.