‘We don’t need to abide by that!’: Negotiating professional roles in problem-solving talk at work

Abstract

In this article, we focus on problem solving talk in the business meeting event. We zoom in on the processes of formulating, negotiating and ratifying an issue as a problem, and we argue that individuals negotiate their stances in relation to their perceived/projected professional roles. The processes of problem-solving are, simultaneously, processes of self/other positioning. We take an Interactional Sociolinguistic perspective and draw on audio-recorded meeting talk collected in a multinational corporate workplace. Our analysis shows that interactants draw on issues of accountability, perceived/projected responsibilities and expertise in pursuit of their own interactional agenda in the problem-solving meeting. We close the article with directions for further research.