A 'Pas de Deux' of strategy with art: the practices of the Corpo de Balé Ballet group

This work aims to understand the organizational strategies used by the ballet company Grupo Corpo, based in Belo Horizonte, Minas Gerais, Brazil. It is based upon the premise that such practices are configured (in) this organization's daily management practices. In order to achieve the proposed objective, four questions considered to be recursive in this field were used as guidelines: (a) What is strategy? (b) Who is the strategist? (c) What do strategists do? (d) What can explain an analysis of strategists and their actions? As methodological support, an ethnography was conducted. In addition, the Grounded Theory procedure was used to develop the proposal of bringing about a substantial concept of strategy. A situational analysis was also done (Clarke, 2005) and at the end of the study, three organizational spheres within the Corpo de Balé group: its Ballet Group sphere, its Citizen sphere, and its Dance School sphere. The practices and relationships constructed between these and the subjects that actually included them in the organization under study were also identified. Thus, a relational scheme was established, involving the observed practices and the individual and collective actors. Based on the analysis of the relational scheme a strategy concept was elaborated for the Corpo de Balé group.