Narrative Inquiry and the Study of Collaborative Branding Activity.

This paper examines the distinctive features of narrative inquiry, reviews how narrative has been taken up in a range of disciplinary areas, and argues for the use of a narrative approach to the study of social processes in marketing organisation. An illustration is provided of narrative analysis of an exemplar case with the aim of surfacing tacit knowledge and drawing lessons from practice on a successful collaborative branding activity. A series of practices, including accounting, justifying and empathising are identified as important in the development of this emergent branding project. The findings resonate with Boje's (1991) contention that being able to perform stories is an underrated yet important management skill that can assist organisation members to make sense of what is going on and to effect change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]