Choose, compose, contemplate: Semantic theorizing in management research

By analyzing life stories through a reflexive semantic theorizing process, this article introduces an alternative to many conventional coding-based qualitative analyses techniques. Rather than relying on coding techniques that often strip narrative data of its context and nuance, following the proposed approach helps preserve the richness and complexity of interviewees’ lived experiences. The approach we present comprises three stages: (1) vertical analysis using chronological coding and phenomenological writing to explore individual trajectories, (2) horizontal analysis involving the construction of thematic axes and analytic writing to uncover collective patterns, and (3) reflexivity, interwoven throughout, to account for the researcher’s positionality and influence on the research. Drawing on an example, our article demonstrates how this reflexive bricolage enables both concrete and abstract semantic theorizing. Specifically, the approach we present is intended as a guide for researchers who seek to theorize from rich qualitative data that reconstructs social or individual events from the perspectives of the interviewees. This theorizing process contributes to management research by offering a pluralistic and context-sensitive method that bridges individual experiences with broader theoretical insights, challenging dominant trends toward extreme standardization and abstraction in qualitative inquiry.