Paid time off as a vehicle for self-definition and sensemaking

Abstract

Qualitative data collected in a small manufacturing company following implementation of a new paid time-off policy (PTO), demonstrates how organizational members use self-conceptions in sensemaking about that policy. In turn, how they understand the policy results in application and enactment that is inconsistent with the intentions of the management team. Informed by the symbolic interactionist school of thought, we provide a micro-level examination of the introduction of the policy, an examination of the processes by which these definitions of self and others are drawn upon and advanced, and an explication of the micro-level processes by which the policy is implemented and responded to in ways other than those intended by its designers and promoters.Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.