The ebb and flow of feeling and display in research: intermittent “failure of face” while conducting a workplace ethnography

Purpose The author responds to the call for papers on “navigating failure in ethnography” published in the Journal of Organizational Ethnography. This paper explores the “successes” and “failures” of the researcher’s emotional labour while conducting a workplace ethnography, reflecting on their positionality as both a worker and researcher in a public house (pub) setting. Design/methodology/approach The author conducted a year-long hybrid ethnographic study in a pub and employed methods of participant observation, observant participation and interviews. This resulted in over 1,200 fieldnote entries, of which more than 390 referenced 'success' and “failure” in his display and management of emotion while working as a bartender. Fieldnotes were analysed inductively through thematic analysis. Findings Using organisational requirements for feeling and display as a benchmark for the author’s success and failure, the findings indicate that he was, or assumed he was, largely effective in performing emotional labour. However, his service “shield” occasionally slipped, leading to instances of constrained or unfiltered rejection of performative expectations. This resulted in research-related anxieties that prompted the researcher to engage in damage control to “save face”. Originality/value The author argues that the passive stance typically adopted by scholars studying emotional labour reflects a lack of intimate understanding of a job role, hindering a deeper grasp of the demands in the workplace. In addition to examining both successes and failures, this paper enriches the concept of emotional labour by offering a nuanced account of the researcher’s personal experience as a bartender, detailing moments in which they “served,” “failed” and “saved face” throughout the investigative process. The author also asserts that managing performance failure is an essential component of doing this type of ethnographic research.