08 / 2006 Historicising knowledge - intensive organizations : the case of Bletchley Park 1939 - 1945 Grey , C

This paper contributes to the emerging ‘historic turn’ in organizational analysis identified by Booth & Rowlinson (2006) by developing an historicised account of Knowledge-Intensive Organizations (KIOs). In a way parallel to McGrath’s (2005) study of early medieval Irish monastic communities as KIOs, we provide a study of Bletchley Park (BP), the WW2 codebreaking centre. In particular, we argue that not only are there parallels between contemporary KIOs and earlier organisational activities, but there is a densely connected history of knowledge intensive techniques. Furthermore, we contend that KIOs should not be seen simply as hybrids between bureaucratic and post-bureaucratic organisations, but that bureaucratic organisation is itself knowledge intensive and that the drawing of such boundaries is saturated with power, not least in categorising certain types of work and workers as privileged.