The contribution this research makes to practice is twofold. The first contribution has been achieved through the use of classic grounded theory methodology to produce a grounded theory that explains what is going on for learning advisors and offers them a way to understand and resolve significant concerns. The grounded theory of tactical enacting provides advisors with a way to understand their role and develop action strategies to help exert a level of control over it (Glaser & Strauss, 1967). The grounded theory contributes to learning advisor practice by raising awareness and offering insights into the practical value of performing their role tactically. In addition, the grounded theory offers specific suggestions for tactical behaviour which could help learning advisors develop a wider range of tactics than might be in their existing personal repertoire and increase their “flexibility and scope of action” (Glaser & Strauss, 1967, p. 247). A wider scope and increased possibilities for action will assist advisors in meeting their own professional standards, as well as the needs and expectations of students and the organisation, more effectively than they may have been able to do in the past.
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Although the grounded theory of tactical enacting explains what is going on for advisors and identifies some of the drivers of professional behaviour in the performativity organisation, it does not explain all of them. Thus, the second
contribution this research makes to practice is its explanation of how, in employing a tactical approach to role performance, learning advisors constitute themselves both as the performing subject and the ethical subject in order to perform their role in a way that meets student, organisational and their own professional expectations of how they should behave. The particular subject position at play in any given situation is guided by individual ethos and by how advisors wish to be and to behave in that particular situation and what takes precedence: organisational value or professional values (Ball & Olmedo, 2013). This second contribution has been achieved through the application of an analytical framework related to Foucault’s concept of governmentality to a discussion of the strongly performative grounded theory of tactical enacting.
The application of this framework to a discussion of the grounded theory offers a more nuanced explanation of what is going on for learning advisors than the grounded theory does on its own. A more nuanced explanation contributes to practice by raising advisor awareness of the influences at play in the performativity organisation, how those influences impact on the way advisors perform their role and of the
opportunities the situation offers. The research findings make visible the different ways performativity creates learning advisor subjectivities and helps advisors
understand not only how performativity’s discursive practices shape them but also the role they play themselves in shaping their own subjectivities. By increasing advisors’ understanding of the discursive practices in play and how they are shaped by these practices and how they shape themselves, the possibilities for not being governed by performativity alone can be glimpsed. These possibilities lie in maintaining a critical stance to the present (Foucault, 1972) and in ethical self-formation (Foucault, 2011) – in fostering an ethical sensibility and disposition in order to create ethical spaces
(Burchell, 1996) within which to perform differently and not be governed by performativity alone.
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Performativity is clearly normalised for advisors and there is no evidence in the grounded theory that they resist it. Rather, resistance, for learning advisors, is more about achieving a place of less domination within the performativity organisation than against the organisation; ethical self-formation helps them achieve that place. The ethical subject is constituted through practice; it is an achievement (Mendieta, 2011) and there is work advisors can do – deliberate self-formation – in order to perform their role in line with the standards they set for themselves. The research findings describe some of the self-forming activities in use, for example, self-care, developing competency where gaps exist, continuing professional development and research, and in doing so provide learning advisors with a toolbox of activities to call on. The
findings show learning advisors how working on the self to constitute themselves as the ethical subject may help them achieve “an ethics of control” (Foucault, 1986a, p. 65).
This research, in demonstrating the ways in which learning advisor subjectivities are created, shows advisors how they can be both the performing subject and the ethical subject. How, despite accepting the requirements of performativity, they can still be the kind of professional they wish to be – the kind of professional whose care for students and commitment to their learning remains at the centre of their work.
Despite being subject to performativity and constituted as the performing subject, this research suggests learning advisors perhaps can be “freer than they feel” (Martin, 1988, p. 10). The research findings give some direction to advisors on how they could be freer; specifically, by showing advisors how to use the discursive spaces made available to them to increase visibility and construct their desired identity without abandoning their professional ethos. This research provides a clear picture for advisors of the limits and opportunities of the discursive structure operating in the
contemporary TEO. In providing a clear picture, the research enhances advisor understanding of the constraints within which they work and offers them a guide for acting more freely within it (Dean, 2010). The research argues that learning advisors can use some of the performativity practices operating in the organisations within which they work to their advantage, yet remain true to their professional ethos.
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Tactical enacting shows themhow they can do this and how they can act to reconcile both the performative and professional drivers of their behaviour.
In tactical enacting, learning advisors are subject to a “complex assemblage of diverse forces” (Miller & Rose, 2008, p. 63) that produce normalising rather than resistive effects. The normalised learning advisor willingly adopts performativity practices and constitutes themselves as the performing subject. However, in an effort not to be governed by performativity alone, advisors also constitute themselves as the ethical subject and govern themselves according to their own standards of professional behaviour. The particular subject position at play in any given situation is guided by individual advisor ethos and by how they wish to be and to behave in that particular situation. Advisors must decide what holds sway; is it organisational value or
professional values (Ball & Olmedo, 2013)?
The overarching contribution the research makes to learning advisor practice is in showing advisors that by performing their role tactically yet ethically they can use organisational performativity requirements to best advantage to help secure their place in the organisation and continue to deliver effective advising services to students. The research provides learning advisors with some understanding of how to anticipate and resolve their professional concerns on a day-to-day and ongoing basis.
In considering the contribution this research makes to learning advisor practice, four recommendations are offered. These recommendations relate to being tactical, being sceptical and questioning of performativity, strengthening ethical self-formation, and using performativity requirements to help secure the role of the learning advisor in tertiary education. While none of these recommendations comprises new behaviour for learning advisors, because all are embedded in the grounded theory, the
recommendations are a call to strengthen specific behaviours for advisor benefit.