ABSTRACT
This chapter attempts to make sense of the world, and especially from experiences the author had where those attempts have failed miserably. Many of these experiences have occurred in the workplace. In order to explain something of the context from which his questions about the meaning of management emerged, he begins with an account of his experience of anomaly as a new manager in a large Australian corporation. The chapter defines the term anomaly based on the work of Thomas Kuhn, before presenting three attempts from academia to describe and learn from the experience of anomaly. In the first of these Tony Watson gives an ethnographic account of management practices at a large telecommunications company. In the second Karl Weick explains how academics might gain valuable insights from managers working in the midst of anomaly which could help them build better theories of management practice.
