The workshop explores ways in which individuals or groups in organizations discursively present themselves as competent, i.e. as having the ability and willingness (possibly including generic knowledge, motive, social role, expertise and skills) to perform tasks or functions on a superior level.

Competence here might encompass or overlap with notions of efficiency, success, accountability, excellence and self-justification.

Papers address the question of how such displays are achieved, how they are temporally projected as well as how they interact with the context in which they are generated.

Methodologically, the workshop aims to bring together research that is primarily empirical, for instance within a discourse analytical, linguistic pragmatic, text studies or ethnomethodological framework.

Contributions deal with a wide spectrum of organizational settings including leadership/management situations, gate-keeping encounters in a variety of institutions and organizations and through a wide range of media, peer interaction in the workplace, marketing and news discourse, interaction with customers, etc.