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COPYRIGHT AND USE OF THIS THESIS This thesis must be used in accordance with the provisions of the Copyright Act 1968. Reproduction of material protected by copyright may be an infringement of copyright and copyright owners may be entitled to take legal action against persons who infringe their copyright. Section 51 (2) of the Copyright Act permits an authorized officer of a university library or archives to provide a copy (by communication or otherwise) of an unpublished thesis kept in the library or archives, to a person who satisfies the authorized officer that he or she requires the reproduction for the purposes of research or study. The Copyright Act grants the creator of a work a number of moral rights, specifically the right of attribution, the right against false attribution and the right of integrity. You may infringe the author’s moral rights if you: - fail to acknowledge the author of this thesis if you quote sections from the work - attribute this thesis to another author - subject this thesis to derogatory treatment which may prejudice the author’s reputation For further information contact the University’s Director of Copyright Services sydney.edu.au/copyright PhD Thesis Maurizio Floris 2014 THE STRATEGIZING AS MULTI-MODAL AND UNIVERSITY RHETORICAL DISCURSIVE PRACTICE: A CASE OF SYDNEY STUDY OF ILLITON S FAILED ACQUISITION BUSINESS BHP B ’ OF RIO TINTO SCHOOL A thesis submitted in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. | Maurizio Floris Page i PhD Thesis Maurizio Floris Statement of Originality This is to certify that to the best of my knowledge, the content of this thesis is my own work. This thesis has not been submitted for any other degree or any other purpose. I certify that the intellectual content of this thesis is the product of my own work and that all the assistance received in preparing this thesis and sources have been acknowledged. Page ii PhD Thesis Maurizio Floris Acknowledgements When asked recently to talk to first year doctoral students about how to prevent and manage ‘issues’ with supervisors, I could not recall a single issue. I was blessed with two supervisors, David Grant and Leanne Cutcher, who shared my journey towards the degree and made becoming a researcher an inspiring on-the-job experience. Thank you for your guidance, humor, and friendship along the way! While doing a doctorate can be a lonely journey, mine was not, as I was also blessed with wonderful colleagues and fellow PhD travelers within the University of Sydney Business School, and particularly within Work and Organisational Studies. Thank you for many tips, tricks, and cups of coffee over the last few years. In particular, Chris, Sharna, Helena, Sebastian, Abz and Paul – Thank you! I must also acknowledge the support and encouragement from colleagues associated with the International Centre for Research in Organizational Discourse, Strategy and Change (ICRODSC). This network has provided a great home for a budding discourse scholar, where conversations can skip the ‘what is discourse?’ stage, and which has provided many different and helpful circuit-breakers and learning experiences along the way. There are too many people to mention beyond the University of Sydney Business School who at some point in my life have provided a spark or blew the embers that fuelled this endeavor and led to this point. However, I must acknowledge my friends and colleagues at Melbourne Business School’s Mt Eliza: Malcolm, Eugene, Silvia, Michael, Terri – your exceptional professionalism, boundless curiosity, and deep understanding of people are truly unique. Last, but most importantly, Katrina and Parker. Completing a doctorate degree while working and having a young family has been indulgence of mine but an investment by all three of us. You have made this possible – I love you and I thank you most of all. Page iii PhD Thesis Maurizio Floris SUMMARY This thesis took a discourse approach to analyze BHP Billiton’s failed acquisition of Rio Tinto in 2007-08 to better understand what happens during strategizing. The research highlighted the structure and dynamics of the discourse, as well as the role of time and context in the social construction of meaning in strategizing. In doing so, the thesis provided new insights into how actors were able to influence such important strategic events. The thesis adopted a multi-modal discourse analytic framework and analyzed media reports, corporate videos, press releases and communications to shareholders, as well as slides and full transcripts of key presentations by both BHP and Rio leadership. The analysis identified the main internal and external actors as either decision-makers (BHP’s leadership, shareholders, competition regulators) or influencers (Rio’s leadership, analysts, media, customers). It further identified a range of multi-modal discursive practices and rhetorical strategies that were brought to bear to negotiate the meaning of three key constructs that shaped the discourse, that is, the additional value pool, the fair share exchange ratio, and the impact on competition. Further, the findings showed how time and context were discursively constructed and influenced the meaning of the three key constructs. These findings enabled a number of contributions to the discourse and M&A literature. While most research into acquisition discourses has routinely ignored the pre-acquisition discourse, this thesis focused on the period preceding the transaction. An initial contribution was to show that, in a pre-acquisition discourse, external actors were not a passive audience but played a significant role as rhetor and audience. Also, while previous empirical studies of discourse have emphasized the role of language, this thesis considered multi-modal discursive practices, including speech, writing, imagery, location and calculative devices. The Page iv PhD Thesis Maurizio Floris thesis made a further contribution by showing how actors worked to persuade each other through multi-layered rhetorical strategies that were also brought to bear through non- linguistic modes. This contribution was extended by showing how these practices functioned as transgression markers that signaled convergence or divergence of meaning of the key constructs. A detailed analysis of calculative devices enabled further contributions. An initial contribution was that it showed how calculative devices developed as boundary objects over four stages: identification, calculation, negotiation, and objectification. Further, the thesis showed how calculative devices were imbued with logos and ethos through, for example, the calculative logic, accounting standards and data sources that were woven together in the symbolic manipulations of the device. Lastly, the thesis showed how calculative devices acted as boundary objects, and made a contribution to theory by proposing a third criterion, legitimacy, to complement widely acknowledged criteria of adaptability and commonality. In addition to these dynamics, the thesis outlined a discursive epistemology of strategizing through its analysis of the role of time and context in the social construction of meaning in strategizing. While the role of time and context is widely acknowledged in organizational discourse, it remained unclear what was specific to strategizing. The thesis argued that the purpose of strategizing is to construct and negotiate new or improved options for a preferred future and the actions to bring this about, and made a contribution to a discursive epistemology of strategizing by showing how temporal and contextual work in strategizing extends the horizon of discourses that relate to the future and discourses that relate to the broader discourse. This reconstructs the tapestry of interwoven discourses that make up the local strategy discourse, and creates new strategic options. Page v PhD Thesis Maurizio Floris CONTENTS 1 Introduction ............................................................................. 1 1.1 Background .................................................................................................................. 1 1.2 Issues in strategy theory ............................................................................................. 2 1.3 Theoretical framework and case study ....................................................................... 5 1.4 Contributions to discourse and M&A theory .............................................................. 7 1.5 A discursive epistemology of strategizing ................................................................. 10 1.6 Structure of this manuscript ..................................................................................... 12 2 Literature Review ................................................................... 14 2.1 Introduction ............................................................................................................... 14 2.2 Recent strategy theory .............................................................................................. 15 2.3 Philosophical foundations of Strategy Theory .......................................................... 27 2.4 Strategizing as Multi-modal Discursive Practice ....................................................... 40 2.5 Analytical frame and research questions .................................................................. 87 2.6 Summary of chapter .................................................................................................. 92 3 Methods and Approach

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