Unravelling the Motor of Patterning Work: Toward an Understanding of the Microlevel Dynamics of Standardization and Flexibility

This paper examines how routine patterns are recognized as either stable or flexible and which mechanisms are enacted to maintain this patterning work. We address this question through an ethnographic case study analyzing how a catastrophe management organization enacts routines in a highly dynamic setting. Our findings first of all reveal that patterns described by the participants as either stable or flexible were nevertheless both performed differently in each iteration of the routine. Our microlevel analysis shows that to enact patterns that participants perceive as stable, participants had to carry out specific aligning and prioritizing activities that lock-stepped performances. In contrast, participants perceive patterns as flexible when they enact specific selecting and recombining activities. Building on these observations, we add to extant routine literature by (1) differentiating between stability, standardization, flexibility, and change of routines and by (2) providing new insights on mindfulness in accounting for the microlevel activities enacted to orient toward a pattern that enhances standardization or flexibility in dynamic contexts. Moreover, (3) our insights point to the centrality of knowing for the enactment and recognition of patterning work.