Exploring the empty spaces of organizing: How improvisational jazz helps redescribe organizational structure

This paper uses jazz as a metaphoric vehicle for redescribing (Rorty 1989) the concept of organizational structure in ways that fit within the emerging vocabulary of organization studies. It begins with a description of some basic elements of jazz performance - soloing, comping, trading fours, listening and responding, groove and feel - and builds on these to redescribe organizational structure as ambiguous, emotional and temporal. In reflexive fashion, the paper not only demonstrates the concepts it engages, but presents a jazz-like performance of Rorty's method of redescription via metaphor.