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Scand. J. Mgmt. (2008) 24, 354–363

0956-5221/$ - see frdoi:10.1016/j.scama

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E-mail addresseselina.henttonen@hsesumerila@ulapland.fi

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Managerial work and gender—Ethnography ofcooperative relationships in small software companies

Paivi Erikssona,�, Elina Henttonenb,1, Susan Merilainenc,2

aDepartment of Business and Management, University of Kuopio, PO Box 1627, 70211 Kuopio, FinlandbDepartment of Marketing and Management, Helsinki School of Economics, PO Box 1210, 00101 Helsinki, FinlandcFaculty of Business and Tourism, University of Lapland, PO Box 122, 96101 Rovaniemi, Finland

KEYWORDSManagerial work;Gender;Cooperativerelationships;ICT;Software business;Ethnography

ont matter & 2008n.2008.09.001

thor. Tel.: +358 50

: paivi.eriksson@u.fi (E. Henttonen(S. Merilainen).250; fax: +358 9 4

2636; fax: +358 16

SummaryThis article provides new knowledge on how women manage small companies in thecontext of the Finnish ICT sector. Adopting a social constructionist perspective onmanagement and gender, and drawing on ethnographic research methodology, the articleexamines how women owner–managers of small software companies construct genderwhen working for the establishment and maintenance of various types of cooperativerelationships with business partners, customers and employees. The results show that thegendering processes are not dependent on individual traits, behaviour or interaction perse, but relate to the immediate business contexts in which the owner–managers operate. Itfurther suggests that research on management and gender should acknowledge the specificbusiness contexts and their effects on gendering of managerial work in more detail.& 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Introduction

Organisational research has witnessed an interest inconceptualising management and gender as social practices,which get their meaning through interaction in specificsocial contexts. Although social constructionist notions oforganisations and management (see e.g. Samra-Fredericks,2007), entrepreneurship (see e.g. Fletcher, 2006), andgender (see e.g. Gherardi, 1995; Katila & Merilainen,

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ku.fi (P. Eriksson),),

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1999; West & Zimmerman, 1987) are receiving moreattention among researchers, they have rarely found theirway into the study of women actors in small businesscontexts (Ahl, 2006). Altogether, research on how women-controlled small companies operate remains an infrequenttopic (Brush, Carter, Greene, Gatewood, & Hart, 2004,2006).

The purpose of this article is to provide new knowledge onhow women manage small Finnish software service compa-nies and how gender is constructed in these managerialprocesses. Even though the number of women-ownedbusinesses is relatively high in Finland—having variedbetween 32% and 37% of all entrepreneurs during the lasttwo decades—the small business field is strongly segregatedaccording to gender: most of the women-controlledcompanies are small and operate businesses such asretail, personal services, and personal care (Arenius &Kovalainen, 2006). As these businesses are not considered by

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Managerial work and gender 355

researchers, politicians or other practitioners to be part ofthe dynamic core of the Finnish economy, women areencouraged to get involved with high-tech, high-growthindustries such as the second largest sector of the Finnisheconomy: information and communication technology (ICT).However, women business owners and managers3 haveentered the ICT-sector only recently and in small numbers(Heilmann, 2004) and there is little research on how theymanage companies in this context.

In order to examine the managerial work of these women,we adopt a theoretical approach that conceptualisesmanagement and gender as socially constructed rather thanfixed and universal categories. In other words, instead ofapproaching management and gender as traits, styles or anyother characteristics of people, we understand gender andmanagement as phenomena that are socially produced ininteraction among people. In this respect, we rely on thenotions of ‘managerial work’ (Watson, 1994, 2000b, 2001)and ‘doing gender’ (Bruni, Gherardi, & Poggio, 2004a,2004b; Gherardi, 1995; Katila & Merilainen, 1999; West &Zimmerman, 1987) as a conceptual means to study howwomen manage small Finnish software service companiesand how they construct gender as part of their managerialwork. In particular, we focus on the constructions of genderin one central area of managerial work, i.e. the building ofcooperative relationships, which has been found to becrucial for the survival and success of small companies inparticular (Birley, 1985; Hendry, Arthur, & Jones, 1995;Johannisson, 1987).

By drawing from ethnographic research methodology, weaim to provide contextualised insights into an under-researched topic, i.e. women’s managerial work in smallbusiness context. Through studying this work in its dailycontext—the everyday life of the small ICT-companies—weargue that the gendering of cooperative relationships relateto the immediate business contexts that define what arepossible, accepted or desirable goals, activities and iden-tities for different actors in the business; as well as providedifferent subject positions (see e.g. Edley, 2001), i.e. posi-tions that offer perspectives and concepts to the actors in thiscontext to make sense and interpret their managerial work.

Small business management and gender

Management and gender as traits, styles or values

Previous studies on women’s small businesses and womenowner–managers describe both gender and managementmostly in terms of traits, styles or values of women and menmanagers. In small business literature, the development and

3The research terminology regarding women’s business activitiesis fuzzy and the concepts of women’s venture, women-controlledcompany, women-owned company, and women-led company (aswell as woman/female entrepreneur, woman/female owner, wo-man/female manager, and woman/female leader) are used inter-changeably. In this article, we use the term ‘women-controlledcompany’ to refer to the companies that are owned and/ormanaged by women. When we talk about the women actors of ourstudy we use the term ‘women owner–manager’, as it captures thedual-role of these women as both owners and managers of theircompanies.

management of women-controlled companies have beeninvestigated both from the perspective of small businessperformance (e.g. Catley & Hamilton, 1998; Chell & Baines,1998; Collins-Dodd, Gordon, & Smart, 2004), and from theperspective of entrepreneurship (e.g. Galloway, Brown, &Arenius, 2002; Morris, Miyasaki, Watters, & Coombes, 2006).Overall, it has been concluded that women-controlledcompanies are smaller, less profitable and less-frequentlygrowth-oriented than those led by men (see e.g. Morriset al., 2006; Orser & Hogarth-Scott, 2002). Furthermore,women’s managerial practices have been described as non-structured and non-disciplined (Neider, 1987); lacking instrategic direction (Gundry & Welsch, 2001) and focused onaffective involvement with the employees (Bruni et al.,2004b).

Several studies compare companies that have a male orfemale CEO and as a result construct women’s managerialpractices as ‘a negative’ of traditional masculinities such asauthority, rationality, control, and discipline. In otherwords, women’s managerial practices are represented assomething that masculine meanings, values and principles ofmanagement are not. Helene Ahl (2004, 2006) has suggestedthat the same is true with research on female entrepreneur-ship. The less positive image of women as small businessowners and managers has been explained by women’spersonal characteristics and family ties as well as a lack ofmotivation, educational and professional backgrounds, androle models (see e.g. Brush et al., 2004; Morris et al., 2006).Gender differences with respect to how social relationshipsand networks are built and used have been considered asone explanation for the difficulties that women face inmanagerial and entrepreneurial contexts (Burke, Rothstein,& Bristor, 1995; Fielden, Davidson, Dawe, & Makin, 2003).For instance, it has been concluded that women’s personalnetworks can be as diverse as men’s (Cromie & Birley, 1992)but literature also suggests that their networks are different(Ibarra, 1997) in a way that disadvantages women.

Also, the women-in-management literature focuses onwomen’s management behaviours and leadership styles,often comparing women to men (Burke & Collins, 2001;Burke & Nelson, 2002; Marshall, 1995). Although there is noconsensus about the differences between women and menas business leaders, some researchers suggest that womenhave a more transformational, democratic, and web-like(in contrast to hierarchical) leadership style (Fagenson,1993, p. 5), which draws on feminine meanings and values.Accordingly, it is argued that women managers and leadersare more supportive, creative, and emotional as well asattentive to increased levels of communication, coopera-tion, and participation (e.g. Burke & Collins, 2001; Claes,1999; Martin, 2000; see also Alvesson & Due Billing, 1997,pp. 143–144). Although this image is positive from the pointof view of women managers, Calas and Smircich (1993)criticize the feminine-in-management discourse for produ-cing stereotypical images of women managers as onehomogeneous group of actors with unified feminine manage-ment behaviours. In general, most of the studies of women’ssmall businesses and women managers describe both genderand management in terms of traits, styles or values ofwomen and men managers, without paying attention to howgender is constructed in everyday organisational andmanagerial practices.

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Management and gender as social practices

In this article, we take a different route and conceptualisemanagement and gender as social practices that we learnand enact in mutual interaction (e.g. Bruni et al., 2004a,2004b; Katila & Merilainen, 1999; Samra-Fredericks, 2007;Watson, 1994, 2000b, 2001). This means that, in relation toeach other, people articulate, negotiate and (re)constructthe meanings that they attach to notions such as manage-ment and gender. More specifically, we use the concept ofmanagerial work to explore how management gets itsmeaning in the context of our study (Watson, 1994, 2000a,2000b). We adopt this concept in order to highlight thatmanagement is a human social craft (Watson, 2001) withlimited rationality and significant social and culturaldimensions. In other words, management is about inter-pretation and shaping of meanings through social interac-tion, and also in relation to the context (Fletcher, 2006;Samra-Fredericks, 2007). Furthermore, Watson (1994,pp. 31–33) suggests that managerial work primarily concernsorchestrating productive cooperation of individuals andgroups both within the organisation and with externalparties. The centrality of relationships and networks inmanagerial work practice is quite evident on the basis ofprior research. This is also compatible with the widerinterest in network organisation (e.g. Nohria & Eccles,1992). Network discourse elaborates managerial work suchas communicating, negotiating, and collaborating with arange of contacts across internal and external boundaries ofthe organisation. The study of managerial work as socialpractice requires a focus on networking processes and askshow intra- and inter-organisational relationships are con-structed in social interaction within specific contexts andthrough language (Benschop, 2007).

More broadly, managerial meaning-making is sensitive tothe historical, social, and cultural contexts that we live inand operate with. Accordingly, Hales (1999) points out thatmanagers attempt to act in meaningful ‘managerial’ ways,which means that managers draw upon the resources andrules of the particular cultural, societal, industrial, organi-sational, hierarchical, professional, and functional systemsin which they are located (Hales, 1999, p. 344). According tothis view, the context in which women owner–managers ofsmall software companies do their managerial work issignificant. The women owner–managers of our studyengage with the systems and cultures around them (e.g.the Finnish society, the software business, the prevailinggender order) and these provide resources for making senseof what happens and deciding how to act.

The specific context for this study—the Finnish ICT-sector—is often described as a male-dominated environ-ment characterized by masculine meanings related totechnology, engineering, and technology business (Heil-mann, 2004; Vehvilainen, 2002; Wajcman, 1991). In thiscontext, the normative assumptions of an ideal worker,entrepreneur or manager (Acker, 1992; Tienari, Quack, &Theobald, 2002) are gendered. This distinguishes the fewwomen owner–managers in the field from the assumed normof male actors. In this context, gender is accomplished andmeanings and identities are patterned through distinctionsbetween male and female, and masculine and feminine(Acker, 1992). These socially produced distinctions of gender

structure the managerial work and the daily constructions ofgender in the everyday life of the small companies of ourstudy, and provide gendered subject positions, i.e. positionsthat offer perspectives and concepts to make sense andinterpret the managerial work (Edley, 2001) for the own-er–managers. Therefore, by applying the theoretical notionsof ‘managerial work’ (Watson, 1994, 2000b, 2001) and‘doing gender’ (Bruni et al., 2004a, 2004b; Gherardi, 1995;Katila & Merilainen, 1999; West & Zimmerman, 1987), wenext explore how gender and the socially produced distinc-tion between masculinities and femininities are manifestedin the cooperative managerial work of the women own-er–managers.

Methodology

Research on managerial work has relied on the ethnographicresearch approach (Dalton, 1959; Kotter, 1982; Mintzberg,1973; Samra-Fredericks, 2000, 2003; Watson, 1994, 2000a,2000b, 2001), which is also used in small business research(Bruni et al., 2004a, 2004b; Fletcher, 2002; Fletcher &Watson, 2007; Holliday, 1995; Ram, 1999). The ethnographicresearch approach means that the issues under study andthe meanings related to them are examined in their‘natural’ contexts, i.e. in the course of the everyday lifeof the community being studied (Eriksson & Kovalainen,2008, pp. 137–140). This means that the researcher spendstime in the community and with the people that she isstudying and documents her observations and experiences inher field notes for research purposes (Coffey, 1999). In eachof the companies of our study, we observed the womanowner–manager doing her daily work during 1 week. Thethree of us authors ‘shadowed’ (Bruni et al., 2004a) thewomen owner–managers wherever they went and observedwhatever they did within limits negotiated beforehand, andwrote down what we heard and saw in our field notes. In thefirst three companies, the fieldwork was performed by Elinaand Susan, who did part of the shadowing together and tookturns in doing the rest. In the fourth company, all three of ustook turns doing the fieldwork. Our collective fieldworkresulted in about 200 pages of field notes. In addition, weconducted interviews and collected documents and mediatexts about the companies and their women owner–managers to better understand the context of their work.

Analysing through vignettes

Van Maanen (1995, p. 3) argues that ethnography is a‘storytelling institution’ with many historical forms andchanging practices. Whereas the ethnographic researchprocess is a long-standing topic of discussion, writingethnography is a more recent issue of interest (Behar &Gordon, 1995; Clifford & Marcus, 1986; Van Maanen, 1988).Our approach resembles what Van Maanen (1988) calls the‘impressionistic’ approach, in which the ethnographertransforms herself into a teller of tales and reconstructsthose periods that the author regards particularly notableand reportable. Seen from this perspective, our ethno-graphic data is full of micro-stories offering possibilities toilluminate managerial work practices from various angles.We as researchers have chosen which elements to isolate out

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and bring to the awareness of the reader through ethno-graphic writing.

In the first phase of the analysis, the three of us read theempirical materials (i.e. the field notes) independently,focusing on their contents in terms of central issues andthemes (Stake, 1995). Our attention was drawn to the factthat the building of cooperative relationships was a keyactivity for which the women owner–managers spent muchof their time and energy. When searching for methods thatcan be used to analyse rich ethnographic data on managers-at-work, Samra-Fredericks (2003, p. 148) points out thatmanagement and organisation researchers struggle with theproblem of how much of the ethnographic description andmore fine-grained analysis can be reproduced in one journalarticle. Our solution to this problem is to offer shortvignettes, which focus on the process of building coopera-tive relationships and the meanings attached to them. In ourstudy, the vignettes are impressionist scenes that we havedramatized (Van Maanen, 1995, p. 9; see also Fletcher &Watson, 2007) with the aim of highlighting how managementand gender are done. In our study, dramatisation means thatthe vignettes are not one-to-one extracts from our fieldnotes, but constructed by us for the purpose of our research.Therefore, to intensify the point, it means telling the rightstory (the story that gets at the heart of the process),instead of telling the story the right way (the way it‘factually’ happened) (Katz, 2004, p. 238). Furthermore, wehave not written the vignettes in a way that they woulddevelop sequential plots. Instead, they are connected toeach other through the issue that they deal with. This meansthat we do not aim to provide a thick description (Geertz,1973) but rather to illustrate specific units of action andinteraction that allow a wide representation of meaningsthat are attached to cooperative relationships in the contextof our study.

The context of managerial work of the four womenowner–managers

According to the National Software Industry Survey 2006(Lassila et al., 2006), the rapidly growing Finnish ICT-sectorincludes hundreds of success-seeking SMEs. Software produc-tion is a central area of the sector, and the software businesshas recently expanded to include services such as testing,installation, training, and customisation (Lassila et al., 2006).The strength of the Finnish software business originates froman increased national focus on R&D, on strong technologyknow-how developed by well-trained engineers and a skilledproduction workforce. However, there has also been anincreasing need for managerial skills in the areas of strategyand organisational learning, marketing, and internationalisa-tion in the high-tech SMEs (Rautkyla-Willey & Valtakari,2001). Although the employees of software companies aremostly young men working in R&D and production, there isalso a small number of women working in managerial,administrative, and support jobs (Heilmann, 2004). The fourwomen owner–managers of our study belong to the smallnumber of women owner–managers who manage softwarecompanies in Finland. Three of them were involved inestablishing the company that they manage as CEOs, and allof them own part of the company in which they work.

All four companies of our study can be defined as softwareservice companies. The first company, Firemot Ltd.(the names of all people and companies that appear in thetext are pseudonyms) operates in a rapidly expanding areaof the software business offering specialized services tolarger software companies. Engineer and CEO Jaana Niemiestablished the company with two of her colleagues about 7years ago. Firemot is her second venture within the softwarebusiness, which makes her an experienced business ownerand manager. Kollabs, the second company, helps othercompanies to automate their business processes throughmachine-to-machine communication. The CEO of the com-pany, Kaisa Aho, was recruited to the 12-year-old firm about5 years ago. She has a degree in business studies and hasbeen working as a business expert and manager within theICT-sector for all of her 22-year career. The third company,TRICT Ltd., is an ICT-training centre, which specializes inthe development and use of ICT applications, systemmanagement, and data security. Merja Palo has been theCEO for 5 years. She has a bachelor’s degree in publicadministration, an MBA degree in progress, and a 15-year-long work history of administrative work in the business.TRICT is the fourth ICT-training company in which Merja hasworked and she knows the business and the people like herown pockets. The fourth company is Content Ltd.; a tinycross media and e-business company involved in customizingvarious types of software solutions for its customers. TiinaSavo established Content Ltd. with her business partnerabout 4 years ago. Tiina has commercial training and a lot ofexperience as a manager and an entrepreneur. During ourfieldwork, Tiina worked as a Development Manager, but formost of the time she has worked as the CEO. In thefollowing, we will present and analyse one or two shortvignettes focusing on the managerial work done by thewomen owner–managers in each company of our study.

More contacts!

As agreed, Elina and Susan arrive at Firemot’s premises ateight o’clock on a Monday morning. The first thing we noticeis the small size of the office; there are named desks only forthe CEO Jaana Niemi and the Sales Manager Tom Lindholm,plus some more desks for the occasional joint use by thetechnology experts who mostly work at the customers’premises. Jaana, whom Elina has met before a couple oftimes, introduces us to Tom, who arrives a few minutes afterus, and to a recently recruited technology expert, Teemu.Eager to get started with our work as observing researchers,we sit on two vacant chairs, dig out our notebooks and startto watch and listen to what is happening. Jaana and Tom areinvolved in a vivid discussion about a pre-Christmas partythat they attended last Friday while Teemu sits alone anddigs out a pile of business cards from his bag.

Vignette 1: A fruitful experience

Tom asks Jaana if she has sniffles. Jaana replies: ‘Notreally’; the hoarseness is more about too much whisky andcigarettes at the Friday evening party. A couple of Jaana’sold workmates ended up in her apartment after the party,and Jaana describes colourfully how she was quite dead the

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next day. Jaana emphasises to Tom, however, that theevening was a fruitful experience—in fact, she attracted anew customer! She continues by reflecting on her reluc-tance to participate in seminar-type networking. Instead oftrivial conversations and officious people, she preferspicking up new contacts by going to bars with friends. Still,she gives Tom a challenging task to accomplish in a formalbusiness gathering tomorrow: he should chase down one oftheir old contacts, Petri, in order to find out whether hispresent employer would be a possible customer for Firemot.Jaana continues by pointing out that if Tom succeeds inmaking a lot of new contacts, he will naturally also comeacross Petri. Creating plenty of new contacts is the wholepoint here, she emphasises.

Firemot is a young and fast-growing company in an emergingbusiness area, which is new to the company owners as wellas to their customers and employees. This is why there is acontinuous need to make more contacts with people whowould be interested in the company either as employees oras business partners and customers. The vignette illustrateshow Jaana, the CEO, sends her employees to businessseminars and other formal occasions where they canactivate pre-existing business relationships and initiatenew ones according to her instructions. As far as Jaana’sown work is concerned, the pursuit of new contacts is notrestricted to professional and business occasions, butextends to her leisure time as well. In fact, Jaana explainsthat she prefers chitchatting in social situations such asChristmas parties and bar rounds, which she considersexciting and convenient ways to meet new people whomay turn into customers, business partners, or employees.Casual contacting outside working hours, boosted bywhiskey shots, allows for non-restricted exploration ofpotential links between people and companies throughjoking, friendly teasing, and social bonding. Whenever thereis chemistry in terms of mutual interest, these circumstan-tial relationships will be discussed further through organisedmeetings at the company premises. What is noteworthy isthat in the Finnish context the consumption of alcoholduring leisure time or in certain business-related gatheringssuch as pre-Christmas parties is a common and culturallyaccepted custom; however, in business meetings organisedduring office hours or in company premises alcoholicbeverages are not usually served.

Vignette 2: The magic of business cards

Teemu got a job at Firemot because he promised to self-sellhis expertise. On his first day at work, he sits and leafsthrough, with obvious content, the huge pile of businesscards that he has collected. After about half an hour hegoes over to Jaana’s desk to announce that he has selectedsome of his contacts for calling. Jaana would like to browsethrough all Teemu’s contacts in his computer before hemakes any phone calls, but they are unable to do thatbecause his laptop is not yet attached to the companynetwork. Instead, Jaana suggests that Teemu browsethrough Firemot’s customer database. While doing this,Teemu asks Jaana several questions about the statusof various customers. Jaana explains to him that the

companies at the end of the list are called ‘prospects’,which means that they show great future potential. Sheinsists that they keep a strict record of all their contactswith these prospects. Jaana gives a green light for some ofthe customers who Teemu is interested in; he can call themand offer his know-how.

The best employees for Firemot are computer engineers orIT-experts who already have a good number of pre-existingcontacts for Jaana to consider and activate in a way that shesees appropriate from the perspective of the business. Thesecond vignette shows that whereas her pursuit of newcontacts during leisure time is informal and accidental, theactivation of pre-existing personal, professional, and busi-ness relationships is well-organised and disciplined. She usesthe pre-existing relationships in a systematic way as meansto develop her business and, furthermore, she is the onlyone who evaluates their potential. Therefore, no contactsare activated without Jaana’s approval. Overall, she makesit her key responsibility to envision how personal, profes-sional, and business relationships are combined and used inthe company. This also means that there are certain limits todemocracy in terms of what is considered the employees’role and position in building cooperative relationships withthe customers.

Strictly business

During our fieldwork at Kollabs, Elina and Susan observe thatthe daily work of the CEO Kaisa Aho centres on meetingswith pre-existing and potential business partners. Kaisa andthe company secretary are the only women in the company;all the employees are men with a strong technologybackground. Kaisa is the only person with her own room inthe open plan office of Kollabs. If either one of us wants totalk to her, we have to knock on the door, even though weare allowed to move freely everywhere else in the office.Therefore, we experience that Kaisa wants to define clearlimits to our observational activities. Today, she invites bothof us to join two meetings that address cooperation betweenKollabs and its partner companies. She tells us that sheknows both of her guests from other occasions: The sonsof Pete and Kaisa played on the same soccer team andJori worked in the same large corporation as Kaisa manyyears ago.

Vignette 1: From the edges of the soccer field

In the beginning of the first meeting, Kaisa tells us (theresearchers) how she by chance met Pete—the father of herson’s soccer mate—at the airport last winter. When theystarted talking, the idea of cooperation between thecompanies soon popped up. Kaisa had revealed to Pete thather company has been stable but not growing, which is a bigproblem for them. Pete nods to her introduction and Kaisaquickly moves on to introduce the agenda of the meeting.She confirms with Pete that their aim is to discuss whetherthe software technologies used by the two companies arecompatible enough to establish an intensive businessrelationship between them. Kaisa and Pete exchange and

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discuss several ideas about the technologies used in bothcompanies. As a summary, they conclude that if their plansucceeds, they could even consider merging some of thefunctions of both companies together to form a jointventure. Pete mentions that he knows some venturecapitalists and affluent families from his schooldayswho could be of help in financing the new cooperativeefforts.

Vignette 2: More muscle

Jori, the CEO of a partner company, opens the secondmeeting by telling Kaisa that a customer mentioned Kollabsto him. Kaisa asks in a very straightforward manner: Are youselling or buying? Jori answers that: ‘As a matter of fact,we’re buying.’ Kaisa concludes that her company hasnothing against this option, as they need more musclearound them. However, after some detailed discussionabout the software business, both of them agree that evenafter a merger the new company would not be big enoughfor the global software market. Kaisa concludes thediscussion by saying that in any case, the bigger size wouldgive them more credibility in the eyes of large customers,and with a bit of luck, they could also find a buyer for theUS-based operations of Kollabs. They agree to continue thenegotiations in a couple of weeks.

When Kaisa was hired to Kollabs, her main tasks weredefined as putting the company’s finances in order, gettingsales and customer relations rolling, and negotiating forvarious types of cooperative arrangements and relation-ships. She considers the other Finnish software companies aspotential business development partners for Kollabs. There-fore, she routinely arranges meetings with their managers toexplore the opportunities. Hot discussion topics in thesemeetings include strategic alliances and joint ventures aswell as mergers and acquisitions. Both of the vignettes arescenes in which Kaisa meets old acquaintances in order toexchange information and negotiate about the possibility tocombine knowledge and resources, which would give themall opportunities to grow. Despite the pre-existing personaltie between Kaisa and Pete in particular, the meetings arestrictly about business matters. Therefore, all partiesexplicate their expectations and goals in a clear-cut manner.The purpose of the meetings is to envision the futureprospects of cooperation and to evaluate its consequencesin terms of business development. What seems to be of lessimportance is the form of the cooperative business relation-ship that they are building. In the second meeting, it doesnot even seem to matter which company would buy theother. What is of importance in the software business isgetting ‘more muscle’ around you through some kind ofcooperative arrangements between the companies. This isthe overall strategic goal that guides Kaisa’s work and herefforts to build cooperative business relationships.

Personal and business

This morning Merja Palo is going to meet her old colleagueand friend Leena, who is part of the sales team of a

competing ICT-training firm, but considers accepting a joboffer as Sales Manager in TRICT. Most of the sales people inthe business are women with commercial training andexperience whereas many of the trainers are men with abackground in IT combined with an interest and experiencein education and professional training. Paivi sits in a brightlycoloured classroom waiting while Merja connects her laptopto the company network and starts browsing through here-mails, passing a few comments to Paivi about them. Thisactivity is interrupted when a young woman announces atthe door that Leena has arrived.

Vignette 1: Recruiting colleagues, friends, andstrangers

Merja tells Leena that in the near future, TRICTwill receiveseveral invitations to submit tenders, which means thatthey will need to strengthen the sales function and find newtrainers. Leena advertises her customer contacts and theyspeculate about what would happen if TRICT got involvedwith some of the large public sector organisations. The bigquestion is still whether these organisations will chooseMicrosoft or Linux. Merja thinks that although there hasbeen much talk about Linux, the local governments may stillstick with Microsoft. This would, of course, suit TRICT,which is a licensed Microsoft-trainer. Nonetheless, Merjahas started to head-hunt Linux trainers, as she does notwant to miss any business opportunities. However, findingteachers has been tricky because the technology expertsthey came up with did not consider teaching their primeinterest. Leena asks details about her salary as she wouldlike to minimize her own financial risk. Merja does not wantto change her offer, but explains how the salary consists of afixed amount of money plus bonuses. Leena seems happyabout the salary, and is still a bit uncertain how to combinebeing a single mother with her new work. Merja explainsthat she has a 6-year-old son and an 8-year-old daughter,and continues by convincing Leena that there is a lot ofunderstanding concerning family issues in this company: ‘Itis not the working hours but the results that matter here.’They finish the meeting when Merja welcomes Leena to thecompany and they hug each other.

TRICT is fighting for the position of market leader in Finland.This means that part of Merja Palo’s daily work deals withrecruiting new employees, who often work for the compe-titors. As she puts it: ‘There are few cold contacts made inour company’, meaning that most people who get intocontact know each other from work-related occasions. Thesmall circle of the Finnish ICT-training business provides anopportunity to use personal and professional relationshipsfor the purpose of business development. The vignetteillustrates how, Merja and Leena, who have a strongcommon ground on the basis of knowing both the businessand each other for years, rebuild their personal and businessrelationship in an open and supportive atmosphere. There isa pre-existing friendly connection between them, whichenhances mutual understanding and trust to the extent thateven difficult family issues can be brought up and discussedin supportive spirit. However, when it comes to Leena’ssalary, Merja retains the role of a strictly rational and

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professional manager who does not change the humanresource policy of the company because of Merja’s familysituation or because of their friendship. Furthermore, as faras Linux trainers are concerned, she describes the recruit-ment process as highly rational and based on competencecriteria alone.

Changing tactics

Elina and Susan spend the week with Tiina Savo, theowner–manager of Content Ltd., travelling with her in oneof the eastern counties of Finland. Tiina’s office is locatedelsewhere but as she had allocated this week for a businesstrip, we decide to travel with her. During our travel, Tiinatalks verbosely about her life, family, and business. Herspeech bounces from business ownership and managementto kids’ illnesses and marriage troubles, and sometimes wefind it difficult to follow the constant flood of words. We findout quickly that the reason for this ongoing business trip isan assignment commissioned to Tiina’s company by regionaladministration: they want Tiina to survey the use ofelectronic business in local small- and medium-sizedcompanies. Besides pursuing this assignment, Tiina alsoaims to find new business partners who would be interestedin building a web service for care sector entrepreneurstogether with her company. During the week, Tiina makesplenty of ‘cold calls’ with local entrepreneurs that she didnot know beforehand.

Vignette 1: The ambassador of ICT

Tiina chats with Jonna, a local care sector entrepreneur,and inquires about her experiences of using information andcommunication technologies. Jonna immediately expressesher disinclination to stare at the computer screen all daylong. Tiina replies firmly that nowadays there are nooptions; you just have to deal with computers, and triesher best to convince Jonna of ICT’s usefulness. DespiteJonna’s obvious uneasiness, Tiina keeps asking questionsconcerning her attitude towards the new web service, andwhether she’d be willing to use internet-based marketing.Tiina has not even finished her sentence when Jonnaopposes: ‘The grapevine is the best means of marketing!’Now Tiina changes her strategy to see whether appealing toa nation-wide web service would work: ‘Since there is anation-wide web service, isn’t having such a service atthe local level also obvious?’ At this point, Tiina’s localpartner Henry joins the discussion, trying to make a case forlow costs. However, Jonna does not give up. She makes herstand very clear by stating that ‘There’s no need at themoment’.

Tiina’s company is involved in regional projects, which aimat rooting IT-based tools into the operations of localentrepreneurs. Spending time on the spot, in the province,and meeting influential local people helps her to gain accessto the local business networks in order to form strategicalliances with other small companies. Negotiating coopera-tive business relationships with people and companies thatshe does not know beforehand is a key activity in Tiina’swork. The first vignette is illustrative of how Tiina tries to

persuade a potential but reluctant business partner torealize the benefits of forming a business relationship withher company. It shows how, by using a tactic of rationalbusiness-related reasoning, she pushes the other party toaccept her point of view about business development. Atfirst, she keeps to the local business level in her reasoningand then tries to emphasise the international dimension ofthe business operations and the strategic visions involved.This time, however, her tactic does not make the care sectorentrepreneur willing to establish a cooperative relationshipwith her company.

Vignette 2: A caring mother

Tiina meets with a care sector entrepreneur, Anna, to offerher an opportunity to attend a seminar dealing with a newnational web service for care sector entrepreneurs. Anna isinterested, but asks Tiina whether they have arrangedchild-care services for participants in the seminar. Anna hasalready told Tiina that she needs to leave at 16.30 at thelatest to pick up her son from the day-care centre. Tiinasays: ‘Oh, you have such a problem’ and continues to giveAnna a detailed description of her own four children and herrelationship with them. Tiina tells Anna vividly and convin-cingly how dreadful it is for her to leave the children for aweek to be able to make this business trip.

The second vignette illustrates how Tiina uses another tacticof providing personal attention and emotional support to theother party when trying to establish a business relationshipwith a person whom she does not know. By relating her ownpersonal experiences to the situation of the other party, shecreates a feeling of mutual interest, trust, and reciprocity.Accordingly, Tiina shares her own thoughts about thedifficulties of combining family and business and showsempathy for the other party’s situation. Overall, the twovignettes illustrate how Tiina makes strategic moves interms of acting either as a strong, daring, and influentialperson, or as a soft and motherly caretaker when trying toestablish business relationships.

Gendering of cooperative relationships

In this article we have provided an empirical illustration ofhow women owner–managers in four small software com-panies build cooperative relationships as part of theirmanagerial work. Our study shows first, that there is noone way of building cooperative relationships. The empiricalvignettes show that the women owner–managers work bothas developers of existing relationships and partnerships, aswell as visionaries of new, emerging cooperation; and howthey adapt their behaviour according to certain contextsand situations. Secondly, our study shows that the processesof doing managerial work, in this case building cooperativerelationships, are also processes of doing gender. This meansthat in adapting to different contexts and situations theowner–managers employ gendered subject positions inmaking sense of their managerial work, as well as enactcultural meanings related to gender and management invarious ways.

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In the first two company cases gender is mainlyconstructed by enacting traditional—yet also contradictory—meanings of masculinities such as authoritarianism,paternalism, and informalism (Collinson & Hearn, 1994)and also an instrumental form of rational control (Kerfoot &Knights, 1996, p. 79). In a manner similar to the socialisationso often practiced by male managers at pubs and golf clubs,Jaana Niemi explains how she spends a lot of her leisuretime in bars and parties to get into contact with people whomight become business partners for her company. Althoughthe setting and the process are informal, she initiatespersonal contacts as a strategic attempt to grow herbusiness. The goal-oriented direction of cooperative rela-tionships is particularly evident in the case of Kaisa Aho.Although it is evident that she has a personal or professionalrelationship with the people whom she meets, the meetingsare strictly about business. There is no talk about mundane,casual or private issues. Both Jaana and Kaisa are authoritiesin terms of how cooperative relationships are initiated andused in their companies. As was shown particularly withJaana, the employees are not allowed much space indecision-making; the owner–manager has the final say onwhom they can contact, for instance.

Traditionally more feminine meanings and codes of actioncan be attached to the everyday life of the latter twocompanies where Merja Palo and Tiina Savo build andmaintain cooperative relationships in order to achieve theirbusiness goals. Merja regularly recruits new employees whoare her former colleagues and friends. Traditionally femi-nine meanings of trust, open communication, empathy, andsupport are characteristic of the relationships built with thenew employees, whom are well known within the smallcircle of the ICT-training business. Emotionality, care,support as well as interest in family issues and childrenare also reflected in the way in which Tiina builds businessrelationships with care sector entrepreneurs. It is note-worthy, however, that these culturally feminine meanings inbuilding cooperative relationships (e.g. democracy, recep-tivity, acceptance, emotional tone, sensitivity, and compas-sion, see Alvesson & Due Billing, 1997, p. 84) are notenacted in a way that has been suggested by the feminine-in-management literature, i.e. behaving ‘in a feminine way’by avoiding to attach any masculine meanings for coopera-tive relationships. Instead, the women owner–managersmake almost instrumental use of feminine codes for thebenefit of their business. Bruni et al. (2004a) use theconcept of ‘gender commodification’ to illustrate how smallbusiness actors use the symbolic spaces of male and femaleto construct market relations, and how the symbolic spacesof male and female become a production factor allocatedin the most efficient manner possible (Bruni et al., 2004a,p. 424).

Thus, in some cases, the owner–managers employ subjectpositions that enable them to enact culturally femininemeanings of trust, reciprocity, and empathy to createmutual interest in advancing their business; while in othercontexts they employ positions that allow enacting tradi-tionally masculine meanings such as goal-orientation,instrumentality, and authority to make sense and managetheir business relationships effectively. This socially pro-duced distinction between masculine meanings (suchauthority, control, and goal-orientation) and feminine

meanings (such as reciprocity, empathy, and emotionality)also structures the everyday work beyond concrete andconscious managerial practices. By employing discourses ofgender available in the given context—the Finnish ICTsector—the women owner–managers produce understand-ings of possible, accepted or desirable goals and practices.Furthermore, by employing discourses that break theevident assumptions of gender (i.e. women employ femininesubject positions, see also Benschop, 2007) they cross thetraditional gender order in a context that has previouslybeen characterised as a relatively homogenous, maledominated and masculine environment (Heilmann, 2004;Vehvilainen, 2002; Wajcman, 1991).

Hence, an important issue in our study is how genderingprocesses are constructed in relation to the businesscontext. Furthermore, our empirical results lead us also tosuggest that the Finnish ICT-sector should not be considereda single social and cultural context for managerial work andgendering practices although it has features such as stronggrowth orientation (see Eriksson, Henttonen, & Merilainen,2008) that are widely shared. As far as management andgender are concerned, the sector should be treated as manycontexts with their own structural and institutional rules. Inour study, the first two companies operate in businesses(testing and systems integration) which require a high levelof technological competence provided by personnel withbackgrounds in engineering and information technology,whereas the latter two companies operate in businesses(training and content production) which rely more on socialskills and human interaction. In other words, genderingprocesses and the enactments of masculine and femininemeanings relate to the immediate business context, i.e.different business areas within the software business. Inthese specific contexts, different practices and differentmeanings are functional and socially acceptable. This alsoindicates that the gendering processes are not dependent onthe individual behaviour or interaction of the individuals perse. Instead, both the gendering processes and the subjectpositions produced in these processes take place in relationto the immediate business contexts within which the womenowner–managers operate in.

Conclusions

In this article, we have addressed the under-studied topic ofwomen’s managerial work in small business context byproviding new knowledge on how women manage smallsoftware service companies within the Finnish ICT sector. Wehave outlined a theoretical perspective which considersmanagement and gender as social practices that are donethrough social interaction and offered an understanding ofthe ways in which the processes of building cooperativerelationships become gendered. As women-controlled com-panies concentrate on sectors such as retail, personalservices, and personal care our ethnographic study providesa novel context for studying women owner–managers andgendering processes in everyday managerial work.

Our empirical accounts of the daily life of women-controlled software service companies illustrate that thereis no one way in which women owner–managers in theFinnish ICT-sector perform their managerial work and build

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cooperative relationships in their immediate business con-texts, nor are these practices gendered in a unified manner.Therefore, we argue that the gendering of their managerialwork is in close relation to the immediate work and businesscontexts in which they operate; and that these contexts aremuch more specific than the ICT-sector or the softwarebusiness as a whole. Moreover, we suggest that to attainmore nuanced understandings and accounts of contempor-ary managerial work, research on management, and gendershould acknowledge the specific business contexts and theireffect on managerial work in much more detail comparedwith what has been done by prior research. It furthersuggests that research should acknowledge the specificbusiness contexts and their effects on gendering of manage-rial work in more detail.

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