As part of a searching for scholarly relevance, there is growing interest in how academics and practitioners might work together to produce knowledge. We offer reflections on our experiences as an academic and a practitioner co-creating a research project about leadership in UK public sector organizations. Using an autoethnographic approach we explore how we have engaged in becoming co-researchers, interactive processes which entail a multiplicity of identities and struggles with organizational and professional pressures. We suggest a way of thinking about academic-practitioner research interactions which emphasizes that, rather than forming a communion accomplished in a space beyond politics, they remain as situated and unsettling interactions. Our contribution is to offer a counterpoint to accounts of co-production which present collaborative research as a process of fusion; instead we portray it as involving relations between protagonists which are mutually constituting and uplifting but also at times disturbing and debilitating.
AlvessonMAshcraftKLThomasR (2008) Identity matters: Reflections on the construction of identity scholarship in organization studies. Organization15(1): 5–28.
2.
AndersonL (2006) Analytic autoethnography. Journal of Contemporary Ethnography35(4): 373–395.
3.
AntonacopoulouEBeechNMacIntoshR. (2010) Call for papers. In: Management Practising and Knowing: Dialogues of Theory and Practice, Special Issue of Management Learning. Available at: http://www.sagepub.com/journalsProdDesc.nav?prodId=Journal200957 (accessed 11 February 2011).
4.
ArmstrongFAlsopA (2010) Debate: Co-production can contribute to research impact in the social sciences. Public Money & Management30(4): 208–210.
5.
AshforthBE (1998) Becoming: How does the process of identification unfold? In: WhettenDGodfreyP (eds) Identity in Organizations: Developing Theory through Conversations. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 213–222.
6.
BartunekJMTrullenJ (2007) The virtue of prudence. In: BaileyEKJ (ed.) Handbook of Organizational and Managerial Wisdom. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 91–108.
7.
BeechN (2008) On the nature of dialogic identity work. Organization15(1): 51–74.
8.
BeechNHuxhamC (2003) Cycles of identity formation in inter-organizational collaborations. International Studies of Management & Organization33(3): 28–52.
9.
BeechNMacIntoshRMacLeanD (2010) Dialogues between academics and practitioners: The role of generative dialogic encounters. Organization Studies31(9/10): 1341–1367.
10.
BernsteinJM (1984) From self-consciousness to community: Act and recognition in the master-slave relationship. In: PelczynskiZA (ed.) The State and Civil Society: Studies in Hegel’s Political Philosophy. Cambridge, MA: Cambridge University Press, 14–39.
11.
British Academy (2008) Punching Our Weight. London: British Academy.
12.
BuzardJ (2003) On auto-ethnographic authority. Yale Journal of Criticism16(1): 61–91.
13.
CaplanN (1979) The two communities theory and knowledge utilizationAmerican Behavioral Scientist22(3): 459–470.
14.
ClarkeCABrownADHaileyVH (2009) Working identities? Antagonistic discursive resources and managerial identity. Human Relations62(3): 323–352.
15.
CunliffeA (2008) Orientations to social constructionism: relationally responsive social constructionism and its implications for knowledge and learning. Management Learning39(2): 123–139.
16.
DerridaJ (2005) The Politics of Friendship. London: Verso.
17.
DunnW (1980) The two communities metaphor and models of knowledge use. Knowledge: Creation, Diffusion, Utilization1(4): 515–536.
18.
EllisCBochnerADenzinN. (2008) Talking and thinking about qualitative research. Qualitative Inquiry14(2): 254–284.
19.
EveredRLouisM (1981) Alternative perspectives in the organization sciences: ‘inquiry from the inside’ and ‘inquiry from the outside’. Academy of Management Review6(3): 385–395.
20.
FineM (1994) Working the hyphens: Reinventing self and other in qualitative research. In: DenzinNLincolnY (eds) Handbook of Qualitative Research. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 70–82.
21.
FordJHardingN (2008) Fear and loathing in Harrogate or a study of a conference. Organization15(2): 233–250.
22.
FredericksonHG (1980) The New Public Administration. Tuscaloosa, AL: University of Alabama Press.
23.
FrentzTSHockerJL (2010) Layered reflections on a written story through real-time conversation. Qualitative Inquiry16(8): 621–629.
24.
GioiaDSchulzMCorleyK (2000) Organizational identity, image, and adaptive instability. Academy of Management Review25(1): 63–81.
25.
GNOSIS (2010) Impactful Learning and Knowing. An Invitation to Global Initiative to Advance Future Management and Organizational Learning Practice. Liverpool: GNOSIS, University of Liverpool.
26.
GraceC (2006) A Strategic and Practical Partnership: The Research Councils of the UK and Local Government. Co-Producing Knowledge to Maximise Public Value. A Report for LARCI. Cardiff: Centre for Local and Regional Government Research Cardiff Business School.
27.
GreyC (1994) Career as a project of the self and labour process discipline. Sociology28(2): 479–497.
28.
HandS (ed.) (1989) The Levinas Reader. Oxford: Blackwell.
29.
Higher Education Funding Council England (HEFCE) (2010) Research Excellence Framework Impact Pilot Exercise: Findings of the Expert Panels. Bristol: HEFCE.
30.
HumphreysMBrownAD (2002) Narratives of organizational identity and identification: A case study of hegemony and resistance. Organization Studies23(3): 421–447.
31.
KeenoyTSeijoG (2010) Reimagining e-mail: Academics in the castle. Organization17(2): 177–198.
32.
KempsterSStewartJ (2010) Becoming a leader: A co-produced autoethnographic exploration of situated learning of leadership practice. Management Learning41(2): 205–209.
LynchM (2000) Against reflexivity as an academic virtue and source of privileged knowledge. Theory, Culture and Society17(3): 26–54.
38.
McCurdyHEClearyRE (1984) Why can’t we resolve the research issue in public administration?Public Administration Review44(1): 49–55.
39.
McMurrayRPullenARhodesC (2011) Ethical subjectivity and politics in organizations: A case of health care tendering. Organization18(4): 541–561.
40.
MainzerLC (1994) Public administration in search of a theory: The interdisciplinary delusion. Administration & Society26(3): 359–394.
41.
MariniF (1971) Toward a New Public Administration: The Minnowbrook Perspective. Scranton, PA: Chandler.
42.
MeadGH (1934) Mind, Self and Society. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
43.
O’HarePCoaffeeJHawkesworthM (2010) Managing sensitive relations in co-produced planning research. Public Money & Management30(4): 243–250.
44.
OhCRichR (1996) Explaining use of information in public policymaking. Knowledge and Policy9(1): 3–35.
45.
OspinaSMDodgeJ (2005) Narrative inquiry and the search for connectedness: Practitioners and academics developing public administration scholarship. Public Administration Review65(4): 409–423.
46.
PerryJLKraemerKL (1986) Research methodology in public administration review, 1975–1984. Public Administration Review46(3): 215–240.
47.
PetersTAustinN (1994) A Passion for Excellence. London: HarperCollins.
48.
PettigrewAM (2001) Management research after modernism. British Journal of Management12(S1): S61–S70.
49.
PosnerPL (2009) The pracademic: An agenda for re-engaging practitioners and academics. Public Budgeting & Finance29: 12–26.
50.
RhodesC (2009) After reflexivity: Ethics, freedom and the writing of organization studies. Organization Studies30(6): 653–672.
51.
RynesSLBartunekJMDaftRL (2001) Across the great divide: Knowledge creation and transfer between practitioners and academics. Academy of Management Journal44(2): 340–355.
52.
SantoroPBoylornRM (2008) Re-imagining possibilities. Honoring the work of Carolyn Ellis and Art Bochner. Qualitative Inquiry14(2): 195–211.
53.
SimsD (2003) Between the millstones: A narrative account of the vulnerability of middle managers’ storying. Human Relations56(10): 1195–1211.
54.
StallingsRAFerrisJA (1988) Public administration research: Work in PAR, 1940–1984. Public Administration Review48(1): 580–587.
55.
StarkeyKMadanP (2001) Bridging the relevance gap: Aligning stakeholders in the future of management research. British Journal of Management12(Special Issue): S3–S26.
56.
StarkeyKTempestS (2005) The future of the business school: Knowledge challenges and opportunities. Human Relations58(1): 61–82.
57.
StokesPGabrielY (2010) Engaging with genocide: The challenge for organization and management studies. Organization17(4): 461–480.
58.
SveningssonSAlvessonM (2003) Managing managerial identities: Organizational fragmentation, discourse and identity struggle. Human Relations56(10): 1163–1193.
59.
ThanemT (2006) Living on the edge: Towards a monstrous organization theory. Organization13(2): 163–193.
60.
Van de VenHJohnsonPE (2006) Knowledge for theory and practice. Academy of Management Review31(4): 802–821.
61.
VickersMH (2002) Researchers as storytellers: Writing on the edge – and without a safety net. Qualitative Inquiry8(5): 608–621.
62.
WaldoD (1952) Development of a theory of democratic administration. American Political Science Review46(1): 81–103.
63.
WaldoD (1968) Public administration. Journal of Politics30(2): 443–479.
64.
WalkerD (2010) Debate: Do academics know better or merely different?Public Money & Management30(4): 204–206.
65.
WamsleyGLWolfJF (1996) Introduction. Can a high-modern project find happiness in a postmodern era? In: WamsleyGLWolfJF (eds) Refounding Democratic Public Administration: Modern Paradoxes, Postmodern Challenges. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, i–xii.
66.
Warry Report (2006) Increasing the Economic Impact of Research Councils. Swindon: Research Council Economic Impact Group.
67.
WhiteOFMcSwainCJ (1990) The phoenix project. Raising a new image of public administration from the ashes of the past. Administration & Society22(1): 3–38.
68.
WyattJ (2005) A gentle going? An autoethnographic short story. Qualitative Inquiry11(5): 724–732.
69.
YanowD (2004) Translating local knowledge at organizational peripheries. British Journal of Management15(Special Issue): S9–S25.
70.
ZodyRE (1977) Academic/practitioner interchanges: Suggested guidelines. Public Administration Review37: 572–574.
