A Temporal Narrative View of Sensemaking

Introduction

The full potential of sensemaking theory will only be realized if theorizing incorporates a fuller theory of time than is currently available. A fuller theory of time should explain how actors make sense of being in the flow of time and how they combine past and future events through an ongoing present. The dynamics by which actors combine past and future events in an ongoing present help them establish and maintain a trajectory through time as past and future events are enacted and (re)interpreted in the context of a changing present. However, sensemaking theory is still hampered by temporal separations, making it too static to be able to explain the temporal dynamics of sensemaking. One important underlying temporal separation is the distinction between ongoing sensemaking in the present and sensemaking of past or future events. Such a separation, if upheld, prevents us from explaining how past and future events are made sense of through the processes of encountering and navigating the present (Hernes & Schultz, 2020). In order to theorize more fully the temporal dynamics of sensemaking, it is necessary to integrate the different temporalities of the ongoing present on one hand and of past and future events on the other. We intend to show in this paper how this may be achieved by applying Ricoeur’s (1984) theory of time and narrative.

It is well established that the experience of being in the present takes the form of indivisible flows of experience (Tsoukas & Chia, 2002) in which temporal distinctions, such as that between “before” and “after,” are suspended (Hernes, 2022). This is descriptive of the temporal experience, for example, of being in a meeting where discussions connect back and forth between past, present, and future to form the indivisible experience of the meeting. Such temporal experience is basically indivisible, because isolating different threads of interaction from one another will inevitably change the very meaning of the meeting. At the same time, events before the meeting and anticipated events after the meeting may be depicted sequentially according to a before-and-after conception of time. In other words, while operating in an indivisible present, actors address events that occur before and after the meeting as separate events. The gap between lived, indivisible time and the sequential time of past and future signifies the coexistence of two different temporal ontologies. Whereas the two ontologies have been discussed separately by organizational scholars, their interplay remains to be theorized.

As argued emphatically by time scholars, the interplay between ontologically different time conceptions cannot be adequately captured by simple juxtaposition. Nevertheless, the present, past, and future are frequently treated as juxtaposed time conceptions in organizational analysis (Ancona, Okhuysen, & Perlow, 2001; Feldman, Worline, Baker, & Bredow., 2021; Kaplan & Orlikowski, 2013). Juxtaposition of these prospective views, however, overlooks the ontological primacy of the temporal present and hence the situated activity of addressing past and future events through the ongoing activity of the present (Hernes & Schultz, 2020). Actors operate in a living present, which cannot be put alongside past or future events precisely because past and future events are experienced or enacted through the activity of the present. Thus, organizational time scholars face the challenge of maintaining the dualism between different time conceptions on one hand while finding ways to conceptually theorize their interplay on the other.

In this paper, we propose a step towards resolving the above temporal dualisms in sensemaking theory and, by implication, in organizational theorizing. We draw upon Ricoeur’s (1980, 1984, 1991a, 1991b) work, in which he recognizes the two conceptions of time and how their interplay takes place as actors move through time. By drawing upon Ricoeur’s narrative theory we address two closely related lacunae related to organization and time. First, we extend the temporal understanding of sensemaking to overcome temporal dualisms inherent in sensemaking theory. Second, we extend the treatment of time in organizational research by explicating the interplay between the sequential time of past and future and the indivisible time of the present. The latter corresponds to Ricoeur’s notion of “within-time-ness” (Ricoeur, 1980, p. 173) in which actors connect disparate events into meaningful wholes. Because the present is the locus of time enactment, the connecting of events consists of “making present” events from past and future. Our dual focus on the indivisible present on the one hand and past and future events on the other, is consistent with Sandberg and Tsoukas’ (2020) argument about the necessity of theorizing sensemaking by engaging with different modes of time, which they define as existential temporality, practical time, and chronological time. Our discussion, in addition, helps organizational research explain the temporal dynamics by which actors move through time and hence overcome what Hernes (2022, p. 141) calls the “stationarity problem” of temporal theorizing, which we will address in the latter part of the paper. The stationarity problem occurs when the analysis does not take account of how the agency that unfolds in the present event creates a novel framing of the past that informs the emerging future event.

We structure the paper as follows. First, we briefly review different conceptualizations of time in sensemaking theory and the emerging role of narrative. Second, we discuss Ricoeur’s theory of narrative and time in relation to alternative notions of narrative, then how Ricoeur’s theory integrates the two facets of time. We introduce Ricoeur’s three modes of engagement in time—prefiguration, configuration, and refiguration—and suggest the terms prefigurative, configurative, and refigurative sensemaking. We then tie together these terms to suggest a more dynamic model of sensemaking. Finally, we suggest how our discussion may improve our understanding of the recursive dynamics by which actors move through time.

Sensemaking and Time: a brief review and the status quo

Sensemaking offers a crucial lens through which to study the dynamics of time and organization. First, sensemaking draws attention to the ongoing process of defining and (re)imagining of past and future. For example, Kaplan and Orlikowski (2013) draw explicitly on sensemaking theory in their discussion of temporal work: the ongoing activity involved in rethinking the past, reimagining the future, and addressing present concerns. Second, sensemaking assumes interplay between situated activity and interpretation in social settings (Colville, Brown, & Pye, 2012; Maitlis & Christianson, 2014; Rouleau, 2005). Early works on sensemaking also introduced situated activity and interpretation to the temporality of organizational life, notably by bringing attention to the interplay between enacting the future and making sense of the past (Weick, 1995). Taken together, these two aspects of sensemaking and time invite theorizing of the situated dynamics through which time is enacted in organizations.

The temporality of sensemaking theory has evolved since Daft and Weick’s (1984) paper, discussion about the conditions under which organizational interpretation systems evolve and are maintained over time. Taking a more situated view of time, Starbuck and Milliken (1988, p. 51) subsequently defined sensemaking implicitly as activity involving both retrospection and prospection, by suggesting that sensemaking involves, at minimum, the dimensions of “comprehending, understanding, explaining, attributing, extrapolating, and predicting.” Weick (1995) then emphasized the retrospective quality of situated sensemaking, arguing that the fact of events makes them objects of interpretation through the “reflective glance” (Weick, 1979, p. 194). The unknowability of the future, in contrast, makes looking forward in time conjectural rather than an object of interpretation, and therefore reliant on action as a basis for interpretation. Weick justified this by arguing that only action can point to the future. In the absence of action, cognition (about the future) is empty, merely summarizing previous action rather than anticipating future activity.

In response to Weick’s (1995) extensive discussion of sensemaking and time, other scholars have argued against Weick’s exclusively retrospective orientation of sensemaking and have, instead, advocated a prospective view (Gephart, Topal, & Zhang, 2010; Gioia et al., 1994, 2002; Stigliani & Ravasi, 2012) . Gioia, Corley, and Fabbri (2002) follow Weick’s discussions of Schütz’s (1967) notion of “future perfect,” whereby actors envision a future event and then act as though it has already taken place. Offering a different approach, Stigliani and Ravasi (2012) studied how actors used retrospective accounts to arrive at prospective sensemaking. Although these positions modify Weick’s sensemaking theory, they do not fundamentally advance the temporal understanding of sensemaking. In spite off extending the temporal scope of sensemaking from Weick’s (1995) initial definition, current views remain dichotomous by considering the past and future as separate, both from each other and from the temporal present. Although one could see sensemaking as prospective and retrospective, the problem is not solved by simply turning the sensemaking arrow back and forth between retrospective and prospective orientations. Additionally, as Brown, Colville, and Pye (2015) remind us, much work remains regarding how actors make sense of the future as well as of the past, implying that what is a stake is the conjunctive process of combining past and future through sensemaking. A related concern voiced by Sandberg and Tsoukas (2015) is how retrospective and prospective approaches to sensemaking suffer from different problems. The either-or assumption (past or future) ignores longstanding writings on the philosophy of time that debate the multidirectional temporality in which actors find themselves in an ongoing present (Schultz & Hernes, 2013). The both-and assumption (past and future juxtaposed), while overcoming the shortfalls of the former, does not accommodate the assumption that the past and future are mutually constitutive.

Recent advances in time research drawn from philosophy and sociology have advocated a temporal understanding of the present, past, and future as mutually constitutive and evolving to avoid the dominance of sequential views of time in sensemaking (Dawson & Sykes, 2019). Extending this view to sensemaking implies that although past and future events are separate in analytical terms, they also become mutually constitutive through sensemaking in the present, which is the challenge that we address in the introduction to this paper, except that we emphasize the phenomenon of addressing separate past and future events through an indivisible present. Several scholars of sensemaking have called for such a temporal view (Maitlis & Christianson, 2014; Wiebe, 2010). However, research has yet to offer frameworks that combine sensemaking with a richer, more dynamic and integrated present-past-future view of time. Hence, sensemaking scholars have begun to search for more elaborate temporal perspectives that address the interwoven relationships among the present, past, and future (Dawson & Sykes, 2019; Gephart et al., 2010; Hernes & Maitlis, 2010; Kaplan & Orlikowski, 2013; Wiebe, 2010). Nevertheless, the temporal dynamics of combining present, past, and future on an ongoing basis remains something of a puzzle in sensemaking research.

Arguably, narrative theory plays a potentially important role in addressing this puzzle by extending our understanding of the temporality of sensemaking. Narrative, or narrating, is the primary form by which humans make time-based experience meaningful (Polkinghorne, 1988) and is, therefore, an essential part of sensemaking in organizations (Weick, 1995). Thus, scholars have argued that narrative theory may advance sensemaking beyond debates about retrospective versus prospective sensemaking (Gephart et al., 2010; Gioia et al., 1994, 2002; Stigliani & Ravasi, 2012), and that actors employ narrative to capture ongoing activity by meaningfully connecting and reconnecting past and future events to establish their trajectory through time (Cunliffe & Coupland, 2011; Sandberg & Tsoukas, 2015; Tsoukas & Hatch, 2001; Weick, 1995; Weick, Sutcliffe, & Obstfeld, 2005). For instance, in their review of the sensemaking literature, Sandberg and Tsoukas (2015, p. 9) state that sensemaking involves focusing on salient cues of an unfolding situation and developing them into a plausible “narrative” about what is going on. In a similar vein, Weick and colleagues (2005, p. 414) suggest that retrospective attention performs a “narrative reduction” of material bracketed from flows of events to generate a plausible story oriented toward the future, which is also tentative and provisional.

Some sensemaking scholars have taken the narrative dimension of time to pursue the question of how sensemaking helps actors move through time as well as the role of narrative in sensemaking (Abolafia, 2010; Cunliffe & Coupland, 2011; Cunliffe, Luhman, & Boje, 2004; Hernes, Hendrup, & Schäffner, 2015). These scholars have argued that actors employ narrative to capture ongoing activity because narratives are experienced in the “living moment by perpetually drawing upon past events and conversations, present interactions, and by anticipating future events and actions” (Cunliffe & Coupland, 2011, p. 67). This notion corresponds to what Wiebe (2010, p. 216) calls “temporal sensemaking,” which he defines as the “the act of configuring (and reconfiguring) the relationship of past, present, and future.” Sensemaking scholars have also emphasized actors’ collective sense of meaning of their pasts and futures as a basis for moving through time (Cunliffe et al., 2004; Cunliffe & Coupland, 2011; Dunford & Jones, 2000; Maclean, Harvey, Sillince, & Golant, 2014).

However, narrative approaches to sensemaking have yet to bridge the dualisms between different time conceptions, as pointed out above, and, more specifically, the ontological divide between the sequential time of past and future on one hand, and the indivisible time of the present on the other. Actors operate with both conceptions simultaneously and it is arguably in the interplay between the two conceptions of time that organizational continuity and change are decided through temporal sensemaking. In what follows, we discuss how Ricoeur’s narrative theory may allow both facets of time in a temporal narrative view of sensemaking. We discuss how his narrative theory enriches the temporality of sensemaking by combining a sequential view of time, found primarily in the prefigurative and refigurative modes, with an indivisible view of time in the configurative mode.

Ricoeur on Narrative and Time

Scholars of sensemaking have described narrative in different ways. One view describes narrative as a form of situated storytelling (Boje, 1995), which is more often story snippets than complete accounts. In addition to being the preferred “currency of sensemaking” in organizations (Boje, 1991, p. 106), stories may be used purposely, for example, to support organizational agendas (Rouleau, 2005) or to reduce ambiguity or equivocality (Colville et al., 2012). Illustrative of this view of narrative is Patriotta’s (2003) study of team members at Fiat Auto Italy, who, when confronting interruptions or breakdowns, referenced shared narratives of past events to solve problems. Patriotta found that actors employed “narrative devices” such as “detective stories” in their search for solutions.

A second, and more structured, view of narrative derives largely from literature (Czarniawska, 2004) and imposes a sequential event structure to explain processes in relation to certain genres. For example, Eshraghi and Taffler (2015) show how fund managers used epic modes of storytelling in their work. In temporal terms, in this view actors narrate reality by the imposition of a beginning, a middle, and an end (Vaara, Sonenshein, & Boje, 2016). This structure enables actors to associate narrative structure with different genres, such as comedy, tragedy, or drama. Barry and Elmes (1997), for instance, suggest that strategy as narrative stands somewhere between theatrical drama, the historical novel, futurist fantasy, and autobiography. This view considers plots to be essential to conveying the meaning of the narrative. Narrative plots may be in the form of tropes, which are figurative expressions, such as metaphor, metonymy, synecdoche, or irony (Czarniawska, 2004).

We follow Ricoeur (1980, 1984) in what we see as a third view of narrative that accommodates the two previous views while showing how they may interrelate. Ricoeur defines narrative as unfolding from within time, as a particular way of being in the world (see also Cunliffe et al., 2004; Pedersen, 2009). We may recognize in his view both the rise of narrative as situated stories created in response to the contingencies of the context and the more structured approach, which relies on emplotment (i.e., of a story line) to connect unfolding episodes to sustain a particular meaning over time. Importantly, for Ricoeur, narrative and time are reciprocal and inextricably linked as a “form of life” (Ricoeur, 1980, p. 169). In arguing for narrative as a way of being in the world, Ricoeur refers extensively to Heidegger (1927) and most notably present-past-future dynamics as coming to be, having been, and making present (Ricoeur, 1984, p. 61). Still, while adhering to a present-past-future view of time, Ricoeur does not abandon the view of actors encountering and coping with sequentially ordered events as they move through time. Rather, he reconciles these two basic facets of time described above, in an account of actors moving through time by sequentially encountering events that form a narrative trajectory. From this narrative trajectory (Hernes, 2022) actors draw on disparate (Ricoeur, 1980) events and experiences to configure their present-past-future narrative to resolve dilemmas or puzzles they confront. The presence of the two distinct modes of time in Ricoeur’s theorizing is shown by the following quote,

[..] every narrative combines two dimensions in proportions, one chronological and the other nonchronological. The first may be called the episodic dimension, which characterizes the story as made out of events. The second is the configurational dimension, according to which the plot construes significant wholes out of scattered events. (Ricoeur, 1980, p. 178)

Ricoeur’s theory may be described as involving first prefiguration, which gives primacy to how an actor encounters experiences and events sequentially, as each event adds cumulatively to the reservoir of experience. In the prefigurative mode, an actor embeds cultural codes and rules in sequentially lived events and experiences through time, from which the actor draws and articulates everyday coping. Ricoeur calls a second mode configuration, whereby actors turn events and experiences into a provisional story to resolve new issues or puzzles they confront. This crucial element of Ricoeur’s narrative theory is where he argues that narrative connects to the direct human experience of time. This is narrative time; the non-representative making-present performed by actors (Ricoeur, 1980). Importantly, configuration, while being temporally indivisible, draws on the prefigured reservoir of events, actors, intentions, and outcomes that an actor has encountered sequentially through time. Whereas prefigurative time helps actors cope in society more generally, actors use configuration towards more focused ends. Thus, configuration involves the selective weaving together of prefigured events in the face of situations that require novel solutions. Through configuration, actors “step outside” prefigured time, which enables them to expand their agentic qualities (Rindova & Martins, 2021, p. 3) by holistically creating and assembling an indivisible “story” about what lies in front of them. This is how we see Ricoeur approaching the indivisible dimension of time, by weaving sequential time from past and future into a holistic, indivisible “story” expressed through interwoven processes. By stepping out of the flow of prefigured time, actors enact a provisional and as-yet-untold story (Ricoeur, 1984, p. 74) that does not lend itself to segmentation of temporal elements. Finally, Ricoeur calls the third mode refiguration of time, in which configured narrative is translated into action in response to a novel event encountered in the world. Whereas configuration involves the more complex form of indivisible time, refiguration references a more sequential form again, of one action following the previous action. Refiguration moves between newly configured time and sequential prefigured time in the form of action in response to the novel event unfolding. What emerges is a theoretical frame that captures continuous, situated actions and interpretations in a time-based experience in action. These three temporal narrative modes connect to form an evolving cycle of recursive dynamics, whereby refiguration connects back to prefiguration, as shown in the discussion below.

Ricoeur’s narrative theory offers a temporally richer perspective than the one organizational narrative scholars usually employ, which has tended to focus either on the fictional aspect of narrative, when considering narratives as synonymous with stories, or storytelling (Boje, 1991), or an assumed sequential structure of events, often with a beginning, middle, and end. Ricoeur’s temporal view of narrative, in contrast, begins with the idea that narrative (note the singular form—Ricoeur does not assume narrative in plural form) is both sequential (prefigurative), in the sense that events are encountered in the order they took place, and configurative, which means that events are arranged into an indivisible whole of interwoven processes to provide meaning to actions. In the configurative part of this sensemaking process, an actor’s narrative becomes emplotted—whereby actors create a provisional story that provides meaning for both focal actors and those they enlist. Finally, the refigurative part enables the configurative to become integrated into a new prefigurative mode as actors move through time and engage with new experiences and events.

Towards a Temporal Narrative View of Sensemaking

We now turn to sensemaking in relation to Ricoeur’s three modes: prefiguration, configuration, and refiguration. In what follows, we relate the three modes to different aspects of sensemaking theory while drawing upon Weick’s (1993) analysis of sensemaking in the Mann Gulch tragedy as illustration. Weick draws upon Maclean’s (1992) historical account of the Mann Gulch disaster in Montana in 1949 in which 13 firefighters perished in the flames. The Mann Gulch case is relevant for illustration because it includes experience gained over time by the main actors—Dodge, the crew leader, and the 15-member firefighting crew who had parachuted in to put out the blaze. The Mann Gulch story also examines how the team adapted or failed to adapt to an invented solution to an unexpectedly novel situation. It puts focus on how the configuring moments of inventing solutions were interwoven with previous prefigurative and ensuing refigurative modes. The gist of the Mann Gulch story is that as the fire rapidly approached the firefighter crew, Dodge realized in the spur of the moment that due to the fire’s size and rapid approach, they had no chance of putting it out or running to safety, and he tried to engage the crew members in lighting a never-before-attempted escape fire that might enable them to lie down while the approaching fire passed over them. The other crew members, however, not ever having experienced such a situation, nor having ever seen an escape fire before, ran for safety. Only two of them survived by making it through a crevice in the ridge unburned. Meanwhile, Dodge, who invented the escape fire, was the only other member of the crew to survive the runaway fire.

Extending the Temporality of Sensemaking

Although Weick has repeatedly called attention to the action and process dimensions of sensemaking, and famously argued for attention to the verb rather than the noun (Bakken & Hernes, 2006), scholars have yet to provide an account of sensemaking that dynamically incorporates the present, past, and future alongside the narrative dimension that weaves these perspectives together. A temporal narrative theory of sensemaking offers a concrete response to how to navigate the onslaught of urgent challenges that individuals and organizations continually confront if studies of the situated dynamics between the three modes of time are considered. Real-time and micro-level studies could help analyse situated dynamics in more detail. Actors influence their narrative trajectory over time through their configurative sensemaking, which connects to the other two modes through the ways that experiences or solutions are selected from prefigurative sensemaking on one hand and the ways that the configured narrative is converted into refigurative sensemaking (enactment) on the other.

While there are always individual opportunities to configure and refigure in the face of unforeseen challenges, the most daunting sensemaking challenge concerns the ability of an individual or group to invite others into reconfiguring a narrative and the action tied to it. Our view of configurative sensemaking posits the actors continually mediating between the present, past, and future. As mediators, they select and assemble past events, people, and objects into plausible, compelling narrative form that generates followability. In prefigurative sensemaking, habit and routine take precedence, while in configurative sensemaking, creativity and agency are introduced and realized through refigurative sensemaking as the narrative is enacted through unfolding practices.

In the action characteristic of refigurative sensemaking, we also argue that the actors are mediators or brokers, not only between past, present, and future, but between the different actors they wish to enlist and influence with their narrating. We assume that enlisting others in a refigured narrative, or in collaborating in refigurative sensemaking, requires time and communicative social skill. Obstfeld (2017) identifies “moving among the past, present, and future” as one of five core attributes of the knowledge articulation crucial to brokers who bridge different social collectives. Here again, skilled actors might be mediators (or tertius iungens) in social space, assembling narrative to bridge different interests, each with their own sense of history, challenges in the current moment, and possibilities for the future. Assuming sensemaking occurring in social space, prefigurative sensemaking corresponds most closely with knowledge transfer that involves simpler movement of prefigured ideas shared between diverse people arrayed across social boundaries. Configurative and refigurative sensemaking requires a more dynamic engagement of different perspectives where new possibilities are imagined. We can infer that in transforming knowledge in highly innovative contexts, actors must be sensitive to how to connect time-based experiences and a shared future that reflects and connects a diverse set of organizational interests (e.g., marketing, manufacturing, and engineering) to a design challenge, to assemble a narrative that key actors can share.

Ricoeur’s perspective on time provides new insight into both occurrences by capturing how an actor necessarily locates and inserts an outcome that motivates a configured and refigured narrative. Actors draw that future outcome, somewhat paradoxically, from the raw content found in prefigured time. Some future states are drawn from past experiences within an iterated routine. Other future states involve a more salient leap in the form of a trajectory projection or imagined future state that motivates and guides action (Obstfeld, 2012). Paradoxically, such a trajectory projection, even if involving a novel entrepreneurial outcome (Obstfeld et al., 2020), ultimately involves an actor who combines and recombines ideas drawn from prefigured time. Moreover, as organizations navigate new distributed and pandemic-infused contexts, the search for valid future states becomes unavoidably more complex. It is difficult to draw on past individual or organizational experience to function effectively in an organization completely reliant on home-based employees who meet via Zoom. Similarly, as emerging distributed forms of organizing draw on more heterogeneous populations, often with actors who have less shared prefigurative experience, additional challenges arise for how they navigate that novelty collaboratively. Nevertheless, organizational actors must necessarily draw (like Dodge in the Mann Gulch example) from what is available in prefigured time and compose future states that motivate and guide future action.

Beyond Sensemaking: Steps towards a situated model of how actors move through time

Ricoeur’s theorizing may help us not only transcend existing temporal dichotomies in sensemaking theory. It may also help theorize the situated dynamics by which actors move recursively through time. In the context of temporality, recursiveness implies that past and future events condition ongoing activity while being conditioned by that activity in turn. For example, while bringing forward experiences and events from the past to confront a potential future, or, conversely, using future scenarios to search into their past (Hernes & Schultz, 2020), a novel present emerges with a different past and a different future conditioned by previous events. If we combine present-past-future with sequential time, as Ricoeur’s thinking invites, we may picture an indivisible “moving present” in the centre, with past and future dimensions of sequential time stretching out from it. These pasts and futures are continually “presenced” to address the everchanging “contingencies of the moment” (Emirbayer & Mische, 1998, p. 963), which evolve through the changing interplay between past and future (Lord, Dinh, & Hoffman, 2015). The added complexity of this perspective in relation to existing studies of organizational temporality is that it takes account of how the past and future change as a result of moving through time. By considering the recursive dynamics by which actors move through time we suggest a response to Bergson’s (1922, p. 5) description of how the past “gnaws into the future [and] which swells as it advances.” The “gnawing of the past” takes place through the present, and how the past “gnaws” into the future depends on how actors in the present orient their activity towards past and future.

Such dynamics invite the conceptual challenge of analysing how a present event is partly the result of future-oriented activity at past events while forming past of new future events in turn. Whereas in the last decade, organizational scholars have advanced the present-past-future view of time (Hernes, 2014; Hussenot & Missonier, 2016; Kaplan & Orlikowski, 2013; Reinecke & Ansari, 2015; Schultz & Hernes, 2013), they have yet to explain the recursive temporal dynamics by which actors move through time. Instead, present-past-future theorizing is hampered by what Hernes (2022, p. 141) calls the “stationarity problem” of temporal theorizing, in the sense that it does not explain what happens when the present-past-future tangle moves through time as new “presents” emerge (Mead, 1932) and successive events emerge from events whose enactment they condition in turn. This corresponds to what Mead (1932, p. 23) implies when he refers to the emergence of an event “as something which is more than the processes that have led up to it and which by its change, continuance, or disappearance, adds to later passages a content they would not otherwise have possessed.” When the indivisible present moves, the sequential pasts and futures undergo corresponding changes. For instance, the range of sequentially ordered pasts become extended as novel experiences coalesce into additional past events with the flow of time, which in turn provide new lenses through which more-distant events are interpreted.

Although organizational scholars have taken an increased interest in Ricoeur’s work and particularly his three temporal modes (Rindova & Martins, 2021), little attention has been given to his point about the three temporal modes interconnecting recursively through time. It is broadly understood that the three modes are closely interconnected, but their interconnectedness around a “moving present” remains to be discussed in the organizational literature. Still, thinking about the present-past-future view of time in such a way is consistent with the intentions behind his narrative theory of time (Ricoeur’s, 1984, p. 67). A key question is, what guides the choice of past and future events in the present? Ricoeur’s answer is an emplotment which forms a “core” of the recursive processes of moving through time. Emplotment, which weaves disparate events into an ongoing, intelligible story (Ricoeur, 1980, p. 171), provides directionality of the narrative trajectory, which enables actors at different times and places in the organization to act more or less intelligibly and consistently without knowing the precedents and consequences of the various activities and events. Ricoeur (1984) also calls this “narrative core” (p. 64) the “kingdom of ‘as if’.” By this he means that emplotment both guides actors’ trajectory through time and enables them to imagine how the trajectory could be different. This is possible insofar as the emplotment expresses the directionality of the narrative trajectory (Hernes, 2022). In other words, recursive interaction between the three modes around a “narrative core” enables “followability” (Ricoeur, 1984, p. 67), or recognizability, of the narrative trajectory as it extends through time (See Figure 1).

OPEN IN VIEWER

Figure 1.

A recursive view of how actors move through time.

Conditioned by the emplotment, the activity in the present may be oriented towards events at different temporal distances from the present, which may confer different degrees of agency of the present. We can imagine events located at different distances from the present along the past and future dimensions, going from near-future/past to distant-future/past. By evoking distant past events or addressing distant future events, the present activity may well exhibit stronger agency than if events closer to the present are addressed. Such activity is consequently more likely to influence later events and the temporal distances addressed at those events. Past and future events are considered sequentially ordered. But note that the before-and-after logic of sequentiality does not necessarily imply that past and future events are interpreted as isolated events. They may be interpreted as related immanently (Hernes, 2014, 2022), which means they are seen as intra-connected. Connecting intra-actively rather than inter-actively means that events are related through what goes on in the events rather than through their outcomes, which implies the becoming of a temporal trajectory as an on-going process of relating events immanently though time.

A consequence of studying movement through time, as opposed to over time (Feddersen, 2020) is to see the temporal modes as they connect recursively with one another. We may describe this interaction using Ricoeur’s three modes as follows (see Figure 1). In the prefigurative mode actors cope with ongoing day-to-day experience. Actors encounter experiences sequentially as they move through time and develop appropriate practices as a way of coping. Events become represented in a sequential understanding of time, in which events, although immanently connected at the time of their occurrence, are interpreted as separate and accomplished. This is also the time of historicality (Ricoeur, 1980) established by actors to provide a sense of causality: “one thing after another and one thing because of another” (Ricoeur, 1984, p. 41). Prefigured time and events can be seen in the upper part of Figure 1. Sequential time, in other words, provides actors with explanations of how their historical trajectories evolve to then be inscribed into actors’ emplotment of their trajectory.

As experiences accumulate and novel events emerge, the experiences add to the evolving stock of prefigurative experience that actors employ to cope with the world while moving through time. Novel events, as discussed above, require configuration of experience to address a particular situation at hand. Configurative time as holistic and indivisible (Pedersen, 2009; Ricoeur, 1980) is applied as actors imagine solutions to novel issues that cannot be resolved satisfactorily by creatively combining past experience. Indivisible time, as mentioned, is expressed through complex wholes of interconnected actions that actors imagine in the present, both in the light of selected past events and of potential future events. But given that there are multiple possible combinations leading to different solutions, actors are guided by ongoing emplotment, which forms the lower part of the figure. As mentioned above, emplotment plays a dual role: while guiding the actions taken, it also enables actors to imagine how the trajectory could be different. Figure 1 demonstrates how emplotment forms a recursive relationship with configurative time.

Reconnecting to the sequential time of the prefigurative mode requires that the indivisible time of the configurative mode is translated into sequential time. Whereas indivisible time is imaginary and complex, sequential time, as applied in the refigurative mode, takes the form of sequential steps pursued by actors as the enactment of what is to come. Thus, although the refigurative mode emerges from the configurative mode, it also feeds back into the prefigurative mode and contributes to the evolving process of moving through time. In Ricoeur’s own words, “We are following therefore the destiny of a prefigured time that becomes a refigured time through the mediation of a configured time” (Ricoeur, 1984, p. 54).

The configurative mode of time plays a key role here, by revealing the emplotment in the form of a persisting narrative “core” instantiated by actions in the present. For instance, in his analysis of how actors at the Federal Reserve made sense of complex and ambiguous environments, Abolafia (2010) describes how they constructed plots from past events to anticipate the future. It should be noted, however, that emplotment in Ricoeur’s narrative theory is a verb and, therefore, denotes an emergent process of ongoing accomplishment rather than outcome. Emplotment, Ricoeur (1984, p. 33) emphasizes, implies composition, and composition implies working recursively with known materials towards an anticipated outcome. Emplotment works a bit like the residue of “narrative reduction” (Weick et al., 2005) that actors have performed multiple times in the past. The imaginary nature of the configurative mode enables it to be related to ongoing emplotment, which enables the overall trajectory to be conveyed and shared as an intelligible whole (Ricoeur, 1980, 1984). In this way, emplotment works as a historically informed and enduring framing of successive instances of configuration. Emplotment enables both a sense of continuity across time and change from that continuity. There is a slight parallel to Weick’s (1979) sensemaking model of selection, retention, and enactment, although Ricoeur’s theory adds the element of followability, expressing how a certain narrative becomes sustained over time through emplotment. Thus, Ricoeur’s narrative theory explains how the recursive dynamics of prefigurative, configurative, and refigurative sustain a certain direction through time, revolving around emplotment as emerging process intertwined with continuity and change.

Conclusion

By relating sensemaking to Ricoeur’s framework, we have been able to connect the historical sequential time dimension of narrative to the situated configurative dimension, to then translate the configured back to the realm of action. This has enabled us to resolve the dualism between different time conceptions found in sensemaking theory and in organizational research more broadly. We conclude by suggesting that time is not one facet of sensemaking but provides the ultimate context for how actors respond to challenges, particularly novel, unfamiliar challenges for which routine responses are increasingly inadequate. It is important, we argue, to consider sensemaking not merely as taking place in time, but also constitutive of time. The situated nature of sensemaking and the ways in which it combines practice and interpretation into a present-past-future dimension of time invites further time theorizing for organizational research. Beyond the field of sensemaking, an undertheorized topic is how actors move through time as pasts and futures continually feed into each other via a moving present. We have discussed how Ricoeur’s narrative theory, through emplotment, can help time theorizing account for the changing reality of actors as they through time as a non-stationary process.