Organizational Identity and Memory: A Multidisciplinary Approach

Organizational Identity and Memory analyzes the relationship between organizational identity and organizational memory, in particular history and commemoration. The goal is to further our understanding of the role of this relationship in processes critical to today’s organizations: the evolution of organizational identity, the creation and use of organizational memory, organizational learning and change, and employee identification with organizations.

The literature on organizational memory and organizational identity has developed independently and at times in separate disciplines. Scholars have debated whether organizational identity is mutable or enduring. In this debate, organizational history, a form of organizational memory, has been a key factor, but neither side of the debate has pursued indepth the well-developed literature on collective memory to understand this relationship and its impact on organizational identity. Organizational memory defined as commemoration and history has been connected to different forms of identity, both national and organizational, but this relationship and its impact on organizational memory processes has not been explored.

Organizational Identity and Memory takes a multidisciplinary approach to explore and articulate the dynamic relationship between organizational identity and memory, drawing on work from anthropology, history, organizational studies, and sociology. A multidisciplinary theoretical framework for future research on organizational identity and memory is presented. Implications for managers are discussed with engaging insights from organizational research and practices in creating corporate museums, galleries, visitor centers, and other displays of this relationship.

Andrea Casey is an Associate Professor of Human and Organizational Learning at The George Washington University Graduate School of Education & Human Development.