To understand how individuals experience their passion when it is explicitly shared with the organization they work for, we conducted a qualitative, inductive study at Chockstone (a pseudonym), a manufacturer of climbing and skiing apparel, where the organization and individuals within it share a passion for an activity. We induce a grounded, multi-level model of passion organizing – a process by which passion coordinates work and relations through five interpersonal mechanisms: connecting, gathering, integrating, imposing, and calibrating passion within our focal organization. By adopting an organizing perspective on passion, our study challenges the existing definition of work passion. We explore how personal activities of passion, derived from nonwork domains, can become central to interpersonal interpretations of what makes a valued organizational member. This organizing process shapes, in turn, how individuals come to experience their passion inside and outside of work.
