Anthropology in Business

Often “business anthropology” and “corporate anthropology” are used interchangeably. In my experience, these are two very different fields of study in the Anthropology. However, too many times, I've read and met anthropologists and anthropology students who think that advertising is business anthropology. There is definitely a role for ethnography in both academic and applied research in advertising. But in my experience, advertising is a sub-field of Marketing, which in turn is a sub-field of creating and managing a business enterprise.

Business anthropology, from my 40 years of experience as a consultant, applied anthropologist, and adjunct business professor, treats the company as an "organic social" entity. As a social entity, it can take many different legal forms and organizational structures. Business anthropology focuses on the way a social group(s) engages is economic exchange, it is transactional in Malinowski's functional sense. 

Corporate anthropology is the study of a legalistic and political organizational structure in the modern marketplace. In the broader anthropological sense, academic and applied studies of corporations are conducted from the Radcliffe-Brown structural perspective to determine how this social structure functions.

There is definitely a need for and market for both business and corporate studies by anthropologists. The way one approaches these organizations differ and the focuses are different. Business anthropology would be a sub-discipline of Economic anthropology. Corporate anthropology would be a sub-discipline of Social and Cultural anthropology.

Applied anthropologist who consult for small businesses should approach their clients with an open mind about the sociocultural system that they will find and the problems they will be asked to address. They should not assume that a corporate approach will  solve the problem or that it can be resolved from an advertising approach.

The Chicken and Egg problem: Culture vs Strategy

In Business Anthropology it is important that we speak in simple language to our clients and seek to inform through clarity rather than impress through obfuscation. "Corporate Culture" and its relation to "Corporate Strategy" is a case in point. The question often comes up in the business community, What is Corporate Culture and Why is it resistant to good strategy?

A recent book entitled "Leverage" addresses this question in this interview from the Economist

From the point of view of the Applied Business Anthropologist, we might say that a simple definition of corporate culture, from a lay point of view, is

 "That's how WE do things around here and have done so ever since I've been here." 

At the same time, from a technical anthropological point of view, an applicable definition comes from Structural - Functional theory. We can begin by saying a corporation is a social institution made up of the following, as defined by Bronislaw Malinowski,

"Each institution has personnel, a charter, a set of norms or rules, activities, material apparatus (technology), and a function." (A Scientific Theory of Culture and Other Essays)

The business enterprise is an institution that has a corporate culture.  Its function is the creation of profit for its owners. It does this by investing in personnel, material apparatus to be used to perform activities that generate a product based on a certain set of norms, rules, and processes, to produce a product or service for sale at a price that is greater than the total cost of production. The owner's of the business are organized under a charter (Articles of Incorporation and By-laws) recognized by the State and empowered by the State to conduct such business under the laws of the state. The corporate culture is how all of this is done to maintain the institution.

A strategy MUST arise from the institutional base that leaders have to work with or else the strategy will fail. A good and effective strategy recognizes the basic elements of management as taught in B-School. "What are the institution's Strengths and What are its Weaknesses". A good strategy uses the former to offset the latter. The second step of the strategy is to know your business environment -- that is, "What are the opportunities for us to make a profit or increase our profits?" and, "What are the threats to our position in the market and to our profits?" All of this must be done within the principles established in the Charter and the Laws that govern the institutional Charter.

The Corporate Culture is conservative, it represents the lessons from the past that have worked and its goal is long term, .i.e. to survive. A Corporate Strategy is a plan to use what we have today to insure that we will achieve our long term goal tomorrow. That is, the relation between Culture and Strategy is a Chicken and Egg problem.

Today's Corporate Culture is Yesterday's Strategy Made Manifest,    Tomorrow's Corporate Culture is Today's Strategy Made Manifest.

Applied Anthropology - The Second Branch (2)

This is the second part of a discussion about Applied Anthropology as the second branch of anthropology and how to apply it to Business. Here we look at how to establish your identity in the Business culture. Don't be surprised if you see some similarities with successful "marketing"  yourself within the academic community. The secret to success begins by learning  to speak the language vocally and behaviorally. How do you do that?

Total Immersion

Become a participant- observer. Go to networking events in your community and join social or professional groups, such as Toastmasters, the Chamber of Commerce, Professional organizations in the area of your interest, Civic organizations such as the Rotary Club, Kiwanis Club, Masons, Knights of Columbus, and/or volunteer or join a non-profit organization that serves an interest that you have.

My own experience has been that one can succeed as an applied anthropologist by making personal the contacts through such groups. This is where you learn and practice the language and dialects of the business world. Here you learn about job and business opportunities that don't appear in the local want ads, or even the national ads. Most jobs, whether projects or employment opportunities, are not advertised, nor posted with the State Employment Office or posted on the Internet. Most jobs opportunities are found through connections, personal connection. As an applied anthropologist you have to learn who the right connections are. To do so, use your skills and knowledge about social networks and social organization to find out.

How to Network

To start - Don't sell Anthropology, sell yourself!

One of the biggest mistakes I see all the time at networking events can be found among the young and/or newbie participants in the group or at the event. You can spot them easily. They are the ones who either stand back and just eat and drink the goodies while looking out of place. Or they are the ones who are quick to introduce themselves and then immediately begin their sales pitch. These are the ones who after a couple of visits are most likely not to return . Why?

The former, the wall flowers, never engage in the event. Instead they just attend the event and expect people to come to them. They are like the kid who goes to a dance but is afraid to ask anyone to dance. They pay their admission fee, eat, drink, and maybe socialize with the other wallflowers. Later they wonder why nothing changed, forgetting that they did very little to make it change.

The latter, the hustlers, overly "engages." They come on too strong - to the point of turning off any contacts they try to make. Like pitchmen, after a brief introduction, they go immediately for the sale . For them, this event is just another opportunity to get their product or service in front of a large audience. They are playing the law of large numbers. Meet enough people and you will make a sale.They are not really interested in contacts as people.

The Social Networker

The smart networker is the one who starts by knowing that these events are NOT  selling situations. Selling is done elsewhere. These are social situations where you can meet and get to be know and be known by other people. This is where they get to know you as a person. Your goal is to participate, observe and listen in order to qualify and be qualified for opportunities as they arise.  This is your opportunity to show others your personality and to learn from them what they might need. This is the first step in personal sales, known in business as "qualifying the customer".

Joining social networks and qualifying the individuals who fit your needs in the group is the first step in building rapport. The second step is allowing the members of the group to qualified you.

You know this term, "rapport." You have heard it in your anthropology classes. This is the same process you would use to enter a strange village where you want to study. Once you have identified yourself and established yourself, you are ready to identify who in the group might be aware of potential opportunities of interest to you. Cultivate those relationships. Learn their social network and what role they play in these networks. Malcolm Gladwell has described these roles as the Connector, Maven, and Salesman in his book The Tipping Point.

Who are they?

You want to identify who plays these rols are and how they can be of assistance to you.

The Connector has a sociable personalities who brings people together. He or she knows who you need to talk to or meet and can arrange a meeting. The Maven is well informed and likes to pass along his/her knowledge to others. He/she is a fountain of information about all sorts of things and is happy to share. The Salesmen is, as the name implies, adept at persuading the unenlightened. The Salesman is the one you turn to to sell the idea and to help you close the deal.

It will help you, as well, to define your role in the network. Depending upon the role you chose or is assigned to you, you can approach others and ask for their assistance and recruit them to help you with your need.

These are NOT the skills that one learns in graduate anthropology classes, yet they are the skills that anyone who hopes to succeed in business must assimilate. This is why I call Applied Anthropology the second branch of anthropology. The role of the applied anthropologist is to help clients in the business community to identify and solve business problems from an anthropological perspective.

Networking is the process that an applied anthropologist uses to help make things happen and understanding why they happen.

Applied Anthropology - The Second Branch

A recent comment appearing in The Anthropological Network stated the following about the role of applied anthropology and business. "In particular, it seem to me that anthropology hasn't been very successful at 'marketing' its method to industries and businesses (with some exceptions, of course). The author of the comment then asked  

"Would you agree?" 

The fact that the author was looking for an explanation of this state of affairs speaks volumes about the realities of the anthropological profession and how it approaches its role in society and to society. The traditional third world, non-literate, socially isolated, tribes and bands that spawned the development of cultural anthropology and ethnography, are today very rare and for all practical purposes no longer isolated. Instead we find ourselves today entering fields well populated by the multitude of social and behavioral sciences that arose during the 20th century. As a late comer, the professional institutions established to recruit, train and support anthropologists have been faced with a crisis of identity.  Is anthropology simply an academic discipline or does it have a distinct application to the real world?

The Institutional Structure:

 

I would say the problem is to be found in the formal professional institutions controlled by Academic anthropology -- professors, departments, and the "professional" associations. These institutions do not understand the business world or its language. Even more than the lack of understanding is a narcissistic moral "contempt" directed toward business and government organizations displayed by academic anthropology.

For those of us, and there are thousands of us, who have found a home in these non-academic institutions based on our anthropological perspective and training -- we have long ago accepted that fact that our academic colleagues look down on the work we do. We know that we are often judged by their applying academic standards that have no significant meaning nor add value to our work. 

Fifth sub-discipline or Second Branch:

 

 Applied anthropology is not academic anthropology. That is, it is not the 5th sub-field. It is the second branch of anthropology. It is client focused, service orient, and problem solving. It uses the anthropological perspective but is not constrained by academic orthodoxy, fadism or current fashion. Instead, it is pragmatic, realistic, specific and ethically relativistic. Most of all the applied business anthropologist lives in the world and culture of business and a business institution. The applied anthropologist can have many different status names and play many different roles. In this environment, these names are determined by the local organizational chart. Rarely is the name "anthropologist."

The academic lives in the world of the university, college, research institute or the museum, also known as the ivory tower. Here anthropologist have a few, well defined statuses and roles they can occupy based on the academic social structure. One of these status/roles is based on the discipline one was trained in and hire for within the institution. Most often this is as an "anthropologist."

Preparing for a Career in the Business world: 

There are similarities between academic and applied anthropology. Applying anthropology to the business world begins with the basic steps that one would take to do an ethnographic study of a tribe in some far off location.

1. Learn the language
2. Read up on the history and context in which the tribe exists. Since businesses are literate institutions, read the basic business literature (such as a text book or popular "how to" or history book on the business subject area you are interested in studying
3. Read what applied anthropologists have written about business cases that are related to your area of interest from the anthropological perspective.
4. Study the business media to keep up to date with the social, political, and economic forces affecting your particular business interest, subject, or institution.
5. Find a problem that THE BUSINESS wants to solve and apply an anthropological perspective to solve that problem for them (not just the reviewers for the American Anthropologists) 

"What does the applied ethnographer need to know about business?"

In an interesting discussion about the problems of working in a corporate and interdisciplinary / multidisciplinary environment, Gavin Johnson questions the meaning and value of disciplinary boundaries. While certainly the environment has a strong influence on how and which disciplines may be recruited and assigned to a project, there is another issue. I have addressed part of this question in an essay entitled, “What business needs to know from applied ethnography”

There is a complementary question. "What does the applied ethnographer need to know about business?" I feel that it is more important, or at least equally important, to address this problem from the anthropologist/ethnographer perspective. In particular, the status/role that the applied ethnographer is required to occupy and play in the business context.  This is as

a "Team Player"

 Rather than as

the “lone wolf.”

  
Traditionally, the ethnographer is a lone wolf, going off into the wilds of real life, encountering a herd of another species, and in chameleon-like fashion inserting oneself into the herd as a participant/observer. In this role, the ethnographer acts as both the instrument and the intelligence operating the instrument recording the data. The product of these efforts are written for an audience of other lone wolves who share their stories and observations grounded in the similarity of the status/role of the “field” experience. This is like a group of pro-golfers or tennis players getting together after the U S Opens to discuss the techniques and experience of the various matches..

As part of an interdisciplinary or multidisciplinary team, however, the ethnographer is constrained by both his/her status as “anthropologist” on the team and by her/his role as “ethnographer” in the specific research assignment. Playing a team sport is very different from an individual sport. In a team sport, there is an overall game plan. In the game plan, each player has a specific assignment, the effectiveness of the team and the plan is dependent upon each player sticking to their assignment. This means subordinating one’s ego to the team’s mission. The applied anthropologist, playing the position of “ethnographer” must understand what his/her role is, in general, and also specifically, on his/her team.

He/she must also recognize that for any specific play, i.e. research assignment, that role may change. The ethnographer may be asked to be a “surveyor,” or “historian” instead of participant/observer. She/he must be prepared to adjust to the new assignment when the play is called without any second thoughts or reservations. The success of the team depends on the player’s ability to adjust on a moment's notice.

So yes, the disciplinary lines that are so pronounced in the academic world, become blurred in the “fog of corporate research” where the goal is to contribute to the corporate bottom line, and not to some disciplinary Hall of Fame.

What Business needs to know from the Applied Ethnographer

Recently the American Anthropological Association republished an essay by Ashkuff, entitled What Anthropologists Do, and What They Do Wrong in Business in which the author argues that a major problem between anthropologists and businesses is the method of communication. The problem extends not just to business, she concludes, but to almost all communications that take place between anthropology and the outside world.

The heart of Ashkuff’s argument is the contrast between the "needs" of two actors-- the applied ethnographer and the business client -- in the business context. The operand word here is "need" and how each actor defines their need. This is a real issue and conundrum for the applied ethnographer to which I can attest from personal experience.

Applied ethnographers tend to be influenced by their training to write for an academic audience. The whole question of academic writing in anthropology has been brought into question by one of the modern demi-gods of anthropology, Clifford Geertz. Geertz and his followers attack the traditional ethnography using an analysis based on a post-modernist theory of literary criticism. They argue that it is the TEXT rather than the subject which should be the key to the analysis. They point out that the text, written by the ethnographer, creates a bias in our understanding of the subject being written about.

While I don't subscribe to literary criticism as a core anthropological theory or method, I do accept that it calls attention to, and addresses a larger issue in modern science. That issue is uncertainty. The uncertainty arises from the fact that the writer’s conclusions are drawn from an analysis of a particular unique set of observations bounded by time and space carried out by a single observer.

The applied ethnographer is often reflective and cautious. S/he is as concerned about how his/her work might be viewed by academic colleagues as s/he is about not wanting to mislead a business client with "incomplete" data. The result is the temptation to write lengthy and detailed reports. The effect may be good academic ethnography but poor applied ethnography. It can become little more than an exercise in CYA.

For the business person, the need is accurate and timely information. That is, the basic input needed to develop a strategy, create a policy, make a decision, or evaluate an outcome. The business person is action oriented. S/he is aware that things change and it is precisely because of this that s/he looks to internal and external consultants and technician to collect, analyze and interpret the complex data that are generated and required to operate in today's economy. S/he wants the bottom line

The "bottom line" is an accounting term which has a more general meaning in the real world business context. It means simply "what is the meaning and consequence of the situation for our business?"

For the applied ethnographer then, the lengthy report is only the first step in the delivery of the contracted research. It is the interpretation and condensing of that data into a simple set of action statements that answer the business client's question and address her needs in an uncertain context.

The uncertainty that exist in the situation is real and it will result in errors in interpretation and mistakes in any actions arising from it. It is the responsibility of the expert to absorb and reduce the uncertainty. The client needs that information in order to to proceed. And, more important, the circumstances are that the client will proceed with or without the report if he has to.

From the Geertzian perspective, this calls for a TEXT that communicates what the client needs to know to do and what he needs to do. This is a TEXT that presents the applied ethnographer’s "best guess" answer to the business client’s basic question.

This places a burden on the applied ethnographer. She must translate the ethnography from a descriptive to a proscriptive state. Further, she gives up control of the research project. She must design the project to conform to the client’s timeline. This often calls for mini- or micro-ethnography. Mini-ethnography is a totally different art form from the traditional 1 year in the field and 3 years to analyze and write it up the data academic format.

Finally, there is the applied ethnographic format. The applied ethnography does not follow the traditional literary arch in the business context. Instead it begins with the ending -- the executive summary which contains the recommendations and two to three critical points to justify each. Then, comes the back-story, which we would consider as the meat of the ethnography. This back story is read by staff advisers, may contribute to their recommendations and may be used for future reference to defend the client’s decision and actions. Then there are appendices. This is where the mini-ethnography detail will appear. The appendices consist of documentation to support the report and recommendations e.g.the various detailed reports, analysis and budgets etc.

Ashkuff's advise is something that any ethnographer, hoping to work in the real world of business, should take to heart. The applied ethnographer’s most important role is his/er role as a cross cultural communicator who understands the business client’s needs and language, and can produce a product that improves the client’s decision making success.

Salvage Ethnography never ends

One of the chief motivators for the development of ethnography, in the American experience, has been the desire to record the histories of non-literate societies before those societies and their cultures became extinct. In the 19th century, this concern was due to the incursions of western civilization and the affects of acculturation on these societies. Today, such a noble enterprise is seen as passe, especially in the light of globalization. Besides, except for New Guinea and the Amazon Basin, where are we going to find a "primitive” tribe to study?

But are we missing the point of our scientific purpose?

I live in Rhode Island, the home of industrialization in the United States where, in the 19th century, the power of the Blackstone river

provided the energy to build fortunes, and transform an agriculturally based local economy into a national and international powerhouse of manufacturing. And with this this development came its concomitant impact on the socio-economic-cultural life in the northeast United States.

The first influx of labor to staff the textile mills came from the farms changing the social structure of the country side. Later they came from French Canada, England, and Ireland. Craftsmen from Italy, and southern Europe came to man the emerging jewelery factories and related industrial complex. Germans and eastern Europeans immigrated drawn by the jobs in the machine tool industry. Each has left its mark on the landscape, yet their stories go largely untold.

Today I am surrounded by the artifacts and architectural remains of that era. In my life time, I have witnessed the decline of such great industrial giants as Brown & Shape Manufacturing, Nicolson File, Gorham Silver as well as the many smaller firms that fed, and fed off these companies and industries. Today many of these businesses no longer exist as Rhode Island's economy, like many other states, has been transformed into a largely service economy as manufacturing moved south and then off shore.

Much of this transformation has taken place over the past 40 years. Today there are many older workers and retirees who participated in that manufacturing culture. But like the survivors and veterans of WWII, these workers are dying off. And with them an insight into this important period in American culture history is being lost. Except for a few business historians, no one to my knowledge, especially ethnographers, is systematically engaged in salvaging this great period in American cultural evolution.

In my applied ethnography career as a consultant and business coach I have often found myself engaged in a process of salvage ethnography. Much of the history of small firms, and especially family owned firms, is not documented. I found that I had to first document the business traditions in order to get a handle on the client's socio-cultural dynamic before we can address the client's immediate concern.

As any good consultant knows, the client's presenting problem is rarely their real problem. Instead, it is just the final step in a process that has been going for some time. Getting a handle on the real problem is a process of uncovering the past and how it has created their present.

Over the past twenty some odd years as part of my consulting assignment, I have collected data from my business firm and non-profit clients. In many cases, I have written up a mini-ethnography or ethno-history for them as part of the final report. Many of these studies document the changing socio-cultural environment to which they have had to adapt to over their life time.

As I am approaching the end of my career, I wonder what will happen to these materials and the living and extinct institutions they represent. I have not seen any anthropological interest in these dying institutions nor their cultures. Neither have I found an appropriate outlet for publishing, disseminating, or archiving this type of material.

In our rapidly changing global economy with its impact on business firms, local communities, and industries, I feel that it is imperative for anthropologist to recognize the importance of conducting salvage ethnographic research. In order to document this phase of our culture history before its become lost to some future archaeologist's trowel, we need to collect the undocumented oral histories of these dying institutions before it is lost forever.

My question is: Has any anthropologist/ethnographer looked into this fruitful area of research? Are there others out there who feel the same about salvaging these dying institutions?

Family Business: A natural subject for the business anthopologist

"Generation to Generation: Life Cycles of the Family Business" is, in my opinion, a major contribution to the study and understanding of the complex nature of this most basic of human occupations - the family business.

As a business anthropologist, I found the life-cycle model applied to the study of the family business eye opening from both an academic and practical perspective.

There is a saying among family business owners and consultants that expresses the folk wisdom of about the family business as an institution and enterprise. It goes something like this , "The first generation creates, the second builds, and the third consumes the family business."

A business is an institution and organization created to perform the function of making money, i.e. producing an income, for the owner(s) by producing a good or service to meet a public need. The business can be as simple as the one person/owner/operator start-up shoe shine stand at the airport to the $7.5 billion a year 5th generation conglomerate, S.C. Johnson & Sons.

Although each is uniquely different, yet each will face, now face or has faced, the same challenges and crisis to its survival outlined in this model.

Gersick, Davis, Hampton and Lansberg develop a life cycle model for the family business that explains in clear, objective and sound social science terms why there is so much truth to this folk wisdom. The authors define the three key domains in which the family business exists and in which it must survive. Each of these domains has its own dynamic and its own life cycle. Each responds to different and sometimes conflicting demands from its environment.

These domains are the business enterprise, the ownership, and the family. In order to understand and effectively manage a family business, the founder and his/her successors must understand how these three domains are operating at any particular time to create opportunities and threats for the business.

The life cycle model draws upon the principles of business ownership models as established in corporate law, the dynamic theory of organizational life cycles and management structures, and the theories of human and family development found in psychology, sociology and anthropology. This comprehensive, integrated model focuses on the business enterprise as a institution and is explained using examples from real family businesses and corporations. It addresses the basic survival problem all family businesses face -- succession. But more than that the authors clearly outline the issues and alternatives at each phase of the life-cycle for the enterprise and the key actors in the family and the enterprise.

As a consultant/business coach to family businesses, I find the insights here validating of the observations I have made and experienced in my practice with clients. I also find it reassuring to see how the holistic approach, which takes all three domains into account, can produce an outcome that will satisfy the personal and business objectives of all the interests involved -- the business, the owners and the family.

I strongly recommend this book to anyone who owns, operates, is part of, or interested in family business. "

The Superorganic World of Transfer Pricing

Business anthropology is an emerging sub-discipline in anthropology. As an academic discipline, business anthropologists study business practices and organizations from a cultural and cross cultural perspective. As an applied discipline, the Business anthropologist works with business owners and corporations to solve cultural and cross cultural problems that arise in the course of international business and/or working with a socially and culturally diverse workforce, market place and business environment.

One problem unique to the international business corporation is the impact of "transfer pricing" on the corporation's organizational structure and operational processes. This is a concept that the business anthropologist should become familiar with when working with international\global corporation.

Transfer Pricing is an accounting tool used in international business to account for sales between a parent company and its subsidiaries located in a different tax jurisdiction. Transfer pricing deals with the problem companies face when they have operations in several different taxing jurisdictions and engage in intra-company sales of goods and services. It can also be a tool that can be used to maximize corporate income taxes savings.

A recent NPR interview on Fresh Air with reporter Jesse Drucker, from Bloomberg News, describes how this tool is being used by such global corporations as Google,Forest Laboratories and other companies to save billions of dollars of taxes.