The silver bullet of branding: Fantasies and practices of organizational identity work in organizational identity change process.

This paper studies the role and function of corporate branding in organizational identity change, contributing to the increased scholarly interest in the organizing effects of branding, particularly corporate branding. Based on an ethnographic case study of corporate brand planning and implementation at a European telecommunications corporation, MGP, this paper demonstrates how corporate branding logic functions as a management fantasy that settles the tensions of planned organizational identity change. The findings illuminate the important implications of corporate branding logic for the professionalized practices of organizational identity work, with branding fantasized as a “silver bullet” by the organizational branders while in practice emerging as a self-defeating prophesy.