Research Seminar: Dr Hilary Hoyt

Seminar Title: “I Want People to Know I’m Here”: Relational Strategies for Maintaining a Sense of Place during Organizational Growth

Abstract: As firms grow toward maturity, members experience profound shifts in their roles and relationships. Yet little is understood about how people in growing organizations weather these changes. To explore how members make sense of and respond to the relational challenges of growth, we conducted interviews and observations in a medical lab that grew from 25 to 250 employees in just 9 months. We find that growth posed a threat to members’ sense of place: their perceptions of whether they mattered in the organization and how they contributed uniquely through their work. In response to this threat, members engaged in relational place-maintenance work. First, they closely monitored relational cues from specific others (or “partners”), individuals or groups within the organization whose behaviors might provide information about their place. Then they used a range of strategies to purposively negotiate their place, with reference to these partners. Drawing principles from attachment theory and social-symbolic work, we show how each of the four strategies—reaching toward or retreating from the partner and tending to or recruiting others—were shaped by members’ assessments of the partner’s willingness and ability to respond supportively. We also note how others’ responses contributed to informants’ sense of place. The resulting model illuminates adaptive, attachment-based mechanisms that can help scholars and practitioners address the relational challenges of growth.

Bio: Hilary Hoyt is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the Oxford University Centre for Corporate Reputation, Saïd Business School. In her inductive research, she explores problems in organizational life through the eyes of participants, using both qualitative and quantitative methods to access their lived experience. Much of her work lies at the intersection of workplace relationships and organizational change.

Hilary received her PhD from the Ross School of Business at the University of Michigan, where she studied relational dynamics in three companies undergoing rapid growth. Prior to earning her doctorate, Hilary helped organizations such as the World Bank and Danone Écosystème assess workers’ experiences, develop training materials, and measure social impact.

She is currently working with Tom Lawrence and Amelia Hawbaker to better understand how workers collaborate across agencies to assist clients with deteriorating health whose housing is insecure.

Note: Tea, coffee, and sandwiches will be provided in front of Café Jolt (Lower Ground Floor) at 12 pm.

Photographs will be taken during this seminar and may be shared on social media. If you do not wish to appear, please notify tbs.research@tcd.ie.