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Articles

Creative organizations: when management fosters creative work

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Pages 314-340 | Received 28 Jun 2018, Accepted 17 May 2019, Published online: 30 May 2019
 

Abstract

Creative organizations are characterized by a tension between creative work and business. Our research mobilizes Boltanski and Thévenot’s Economies of Worth framework to explore, through the concept of compromise, how this tension is accommodated in the management of creative workers. Based on our study of eleven small advertising agencies, we identify four profiles for the management of creative work: Versatile, Creator, Manager, and Technician. Each of those profiles deals differently with the tension between creative work and business. Drawing on Boltanski and Thévenot’s framework, every profile is analyzed in terms of compromises between orders of worth, that allow the agencies to properly manage the tension. Moreover, instead of seeing management as killing creative work, we show how it can foster it. Our research contributes to the literature by developing a typology for the management of creative work that suggests four viable ways to structure creative work in advertising agencies.

Acknowledgment

The authors would like to thank Professor Richard Déry for his constructive comments on this research project

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1 The original citations from participants were in French, and they have been translated in English for this paper.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Julie Bérubé

Julie Bérubé is Professor of Management at the Université du Québec en Outaouais (UQO). She holds a PhD in Management from HEC Montréal (Canada). Her research interests are on management, entrepreneurship, and creative industries. She currently studies tensions in creative organizations.

Christiane Demers

Christiane Demers is Honorary Professor of Management at HEC Montréal. Her research focuses on organizational change and evolution, with a particular emphasis on strategic dynamics and organizational processes. She is the author of Organizational Change Theories: A Synthesis (Sage, 2007) and has published in journals such as Organization Science and Journal of Organizational Change Management.

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