Self-direction or social support? nonprofit empowerment and the tacit employment contract of organizational communication studies

Authors: Lee Ashcraft K.; Kedrowicz A.

Source: Communication Monographs, Volume 69, Number 1, March 2002 , pp. 88-110(23)

Publisher: Routledge, part of the Taylor & Francis Group

Buy & download fulltext article:

Price: $50.43 plus tax (Refund Policy)

Abstract:

In organizational communication studies, empowerment has come to connote flatter structures, participation programs, and other techniques thought to enhance member competence and control through increased self-direction. We contend that this model-and, arguably, organizational communication studies more broadly-presumes a particular employment contract. We report a study of a different contract: staff-volunteer relations at a nonprofit organization. Our results indicate that, while volunteers prioritized the role of social support in accomplishing empowerment, staff members treated volunteers as pseudo-employees to be empowered through enhanced authority and participation. Ironically, the staff's model impeded volunteer empowerment. We use the case to mark the contingent character of empowerment, and specifically, (a) its contextual and intersubjective nature, (b) its relational and emotional aspects, and (c) the importance of members' temporal investment in the organization. We conclude that attention to diverse membership contracts and contexts can complicate and enrich empowerment theory.

Document Type: Research article

DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/03637750216538

Affiliations: 1: Department of Communication at University of Utah

Publication date: 2002-03-01