Post‐acquisition integration: ways of sensemaking in a management team meeting

Purpose – The aim of this paper is to investigate actors' ways of sensemaking through the use of rhetorical strategies, frames, and categories, in a management team meeting. Design/methodology/approach – The empirical data were generated from a video recorded and transcribed management meeting, and participant observation. The analysis of institutional discourses and practices builds upon the assumption that language and texts are the main tools for understanding actors' social reality. The managers' ways of sensemaking of institutional discourses and practices is captured through their use of tools like rhetorical strategies, frames, and categories in talk‐in‐interaction. Findings – The team managers' ways of sensemaking through mobilizing rhetorical strategies, institutional categories, and how they recontextualise frames in negotiation of a disputed issue, adds new aspects to previous studies of the multi voiced complex integration processes in a cross‐border acquisition. The significance of the results is the revealing of actors' frequent use of rhetorical strategies, frames, and categories in sensemaking processes. The study calls for further research on structural features of institutional talk as related to the dynamics of talk‐in‐interaction. Originality/value – The findings and methods of analysis contribute to international business studies and to the empirical‐based research on institutional interaction through text and talk.