Marketing Managers (1)

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Marketing Managers and

Their Life World:Explorations in Strategic Planning

Using the Phenomenological

Interview

Barry Ardley

The Marketing Review 2005, 5, 111-127

By-Anuj |Abhiskek | Archana | Krishna |Rajeev


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The dominant research method used to study marketing planning is the

quantitative survey- which fails to adequately capture the reality of thedecision making processes

the literature review reveals that the exploration of marketing and

business planning in organisations is seriously neglected from an

interpretive, phenomenological perspective

phenomenology has as its subject matter consciousness and experience,where one returns to the self in order to discover the nature and meaning

of things as they appear.

aim of the research was to uncover what marketing decision making

expertise actually consists of


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The Crisis of the Rational Model

The traditional systemic perspective on research into marketing suggeststhat all the researcher needs to do is to uncover unproblematic general

laws and then generalisations of a prescriptive nature can be made about

marketing planning activity

this general method is unlikely to be able to advance very significantly our

view of how marketing is actually successfully implemented and managed while a quantitative methodology, employing a questionnaire based

approach, can provide insights into marketing planning, it cannot uncover

the richness and complexity of the life worlds of those working and

making marketing decisions.

complexity of marketing planning and individual action cannot be

collapsed into a textual model.

Managers draw on a qualitative, locally constructed knowledge base


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Making Initial Contact with Research Participants

The intention was set to interview senior managers from the widestpossible spectrum of organisations in order to understand how marketing

was implemented in a diverse range of situations

twenty four companies were chosen, the diary entitled `Marketing

Planning Research File was created, Eighty two organisations were

individually initially contacted by telephone, in order to establish who hadresponsibility for marketing.

Letters, Gatekeepers and Access

standard letter, outlining the research project and its requirements were

sent to all 82 organizations; The letter pointed out the open ended nature

of the interview; Twenty four responded positively;

In order to carry out the interview, the researcher tried to free himself of

preconceptions about the phenomenon, based on prior experience-


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The Phenomenological Interview

A phenomenological perspective views society and organisations as beingcomposed of differing perceptions of reality.

Any attempt to understand social reality must be grounded in people's

experiences of that social reality.

Phenomenology operates under the premise that the social world cannot

be understood in terms of causal relationships or the subsumption ofsocial events under universal laws.

A key concept in is the notion of intentionality, which refers to the internal

experience of being conscious of something. Knowledge of intentionality

requires that we recognise self and world as inseparable components of

meaning

Every intentionality is comprised of a noema and noesis. The noema is not

the real object we may be looking at or studying, but the phenomenon,

the appearance of that object to us

the noesis refers to the meaning we harbour towards that object; for

every noema there is a noesis and a person derives meanings from the

perception of that object.


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Rapport building was ensured using diverse means

At the start of the interviews, the first questions were designed to providenot only some detail about the company and the managers role, but also

to start the interview dialogue in a relatively undemanding way, thus

leading on to more analytical issues later

During the interviews, it was clear that the interviewer was accepted by

respondents, and at all times, genuine attempts were made to understandinterviewees experiences in a situation of guaranteed confidentiality


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Key Findings: Marketing Planning and the Metaphors

of Practice

The four key `metaphors of practice identified by the study are:

Navigating The Tankers And The Flotillas-the interviews

carried out indicate that virtually all respondents saw their

organizations as being successful, suggesting that a failure toadhere to the traditional marketing planning model does not

result in indifferent performance .The marketing, manager

of one of the larger companies in the study selling financial

services, differentiated his firm from the little flotillas,

pointing out that we are a big tanker..the bit I am talking

about is still annually over 100 billion premium income


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BUILDING PICTURES the marketing environment is locally perceived and

enacted

Most marketing managers in this study made sense of marketing in terms

of the local context of action, a finding reflecting the concept of indexicality.

Managing director of a marketing and design consultancy. In responding to

the question of how marketing should be defined and made actionable,

the comment was made that,

.because we are in the business of selling marketing, we package it

differently, according to the demand we perceive for it, which I believe

is only good marketing in itself. So the answer to your question is it

moves, it changes.


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The Black Art Of Marketing Planning

Marketing Plans Are About Local Logics Not Prescription

The knowledge being referred to is not easily acquired, being secretive

and esoteric in nature. To fully understand the codes and ways of the

industry, one would have to be initiated into it and learn from others

As Brown (2001) indicates, these tools are not `magic squares that solve

strategic marketing problems. Portfolio tools are blunt instruments of

analysis, if not used in conjunction with a sound basis of local contextual

knowledge and experience

There are no fundamental marketing truths, as what goes on in

organisations, in the name of marketing, is often context and language

dependent. (see Hackley 2001).In terms of marketing outcomes, the most significant variables were not

those of the marketing mix, illustrating again that the traditional

marketing plan format does not feature here.


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Fighting Alligators In Swamps

Marketing Decision Making Is Based In Day To Day Action

marketing strategy emerges not out of linear marketing plans, but out of

current situations and opportunities. One way this develops is from within

relationships and networks, where talk is very important in terms of

decision making

For many managers in this study the work is about being immersed in what

Weick (1995) calls a situation of throwness, where strategy develops out

of current situations and opportunities. The marketing director of the

Printing Company previously mentioned, pointed out that,

Inevitably the day to day tends to overwhelm the long term because it

is usual fighting alligators isnt it. I think most of the time you are

fighting alligators in the swamp


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Finally, the research makes it clear that although the marketing managers

in this study write plans, they do not follow them very closely. This does

not mean the role of these plans is unimportant however. The plans act as

a point of reference, generating cognitive activity. What appears to be

the case is that from the plans cues are extracted, which evoke action.

For Weick (2001), any old plan will work in an organisation because it is

often sufficient to get the company moving. One of the managers talked

about these types of plans as necessary features becauseif you didnthave the plan, you would be a rudderless ship.


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Conclusion: Some Reflections on the Research

findings are not obviously generalisable to

other marketing and organizational situations.

Whilst action is different depending on the nature of

the organisation, the generalisation can be made

that all action is locally constructed.

It could be argued that this inquiry could have been

more ethnographic, while still retaining fidelity to anessentially phenomenological perspective


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Another method could have used documentary data, to include

an `objective' examination of marketing plans. This however,

would have resulted in a shift of emphasis in the research

It has furthermore demonstrated how organizational

members make and enact meaning. This marketing meaning

making is different from literature based models, where a

textual framework is presented as reality, reducing the

complex interpretations and actions of individuals in

organizations to a guileless and functional predetermination.


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THANK YOU

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Marketing Managers (1)