Not play in the 'ha ha' sense but in the strategic sense. But I knew enough that we could have conversations with each other. We explored many questions, including how consulting is and is not like fieldwork and ethnography. Mal is now a principal with the Center for Applied Research, an independent management consulting firm associated with the University of Pennsylvania. The company works with organizations as systems.
Managers are parts of systems.
We try to help organizations that are facing quite serious changes because they need to, or want to, or are thrust into it. One way we help them manage change is to think strategically about who they are now, where they are, where they want to be through organizational development, management development, team building, finding new ways to think about their work, and learning how to use all their resources in more effective ways. We always try to link organizational development to the concrete tasks people face every day. We don't generally do training. We work a lot at the point where an individual's life relates to group life, as well as with the rituals that shape people's experience of organizational life.