Shifting Work Rhythms in Extreme Contexts

Organizing in extreme contexts rarely means that people work in extremism all the time; they enact different work rhythms and must learn to shift from one to another. While we have a fairly good idea of the challenges involved in shifting from business-as-usual to extreme, we know relatively little about how coordination (e.g., changing routine pace) and coping practices (e.g., concealing emotions) shape one another when enacting repeated yet unpredictable shifts in extreme contexts. We examine this puzzle through an in-depth case study of Pacific City’s disaster management center, a city-based initiative responsible for ensuring adequate disaster prevention, preparedness, response, and recovery for its community. Adopting a practice-based view of coordination and extremeness, we show how multiple transitions from business-as-usual to extreme work rhythms can over time lead to chronic rhythmic dissonance, i.e. repeated, unresolved contradiction within and between coordination and coping practices across shifts in work rhythms that can generate both individual ailments and team vulnerabilities. Our study contributes to theories on temporality and coordination while also generating practical insights on key vulnerabilities underpinning organizations operating in extreme contexts.