Which Way Do I Go? How Non-managerial Employees Navigate Conflicting Logics in an Indian Hybrid Organization.

This study examines how non-managerial and contractual employees in hybrid organizations navigate institutional contradictions arising from conflicting public and private sector logics, focusing on Vidyut Trade Pvt Ltd (VTPL), a public–private hybrid firm in India’s energy sector. Through qualitative case analysis, the research identifies four key coping strategies—pragmatic role-switching, symbolic compliance, contractual resilience, and legitimacy shielding—that employees use to make sense of and adapt to tensions between bureaucratic norms and market-driven demands. The findings highlight that these employees actively construct hybrid work identities and contribute to organizational adaptation from the bottom up, challenging prior managerial-centric views of hybrid organizing. The study underscores the importance of recognizing informal, situated employee practices in sustaining hybrid organizations, particularly in emerging-market contexts characterized by institutional complexity and fluid employment arrangements.