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Organizational identification links together organizational and member identity, yet we currently lack theory explicating the role of organizational and member identity variations in members' evaluations of organizations as identification targets. In this theoretical paper, I outline a model of organizational identification that aims to do three things—account for the role of identity in the identification process, integrate and extend disparate approaches to organizational identification, and illuminate social comparison processes underlying members' organizational evaluations. The model proposes that members undertake two identity comparisons to assess the value of organizational membership for identification purposes. In one, they compare the organization's current identity with their own identity, allowing them to assess the organization's ability to meet their motivation for self-continuity. In the other, they compare the organization's current identity with its expected identity, allowing them to assess the organization's ability to meet their motivation for self-esteem. After introducing the identity congruence framework, I apply to it the identity orientation lens to make specific predictions about how organizational and member identity shape the nature and outcomes of the specific social comparison content drawn upon in each of the two identity comparisons. This analysis reveals how the metrics used to evaluate organizations fundamentally vary by organizational and member identity. Implications for organizational studies are addressed, including those related to organizing and stakeholder theory.

To better understand the connection between organizational identity and how organizations relate to their stakeholders, this paper introduces the construct of identity orientation, previously applied at the individual-level of analysis, at the organizational-level of analysis and proposes that organizations have three distinct identity orientations: individualistic, relational, and collectivistic. In a field study using qualitative and quantitative methods and including 1,126 participants from 88 organizations in the legal services and non-alcoholic beverage industries, I assess the construct's viability, explore its properties, and analyze its predictors at multiple levels of analysis. Results reveal that organizations' relations with stakeholders constitute a prominent feature of organizational identity, that relations with external and internal stakeholders are perceived as tightly coupled, that both pure and hybrid identity orientation types are relatively common, and that identity orientation varies widely among business organizations. Further, specific organizational variables bearing on organizations' stakeholder relations appear to be stronger predictors of identity orientation than general organizational-level or individual-level variables. Implications for a range of literatures addressing organizations' external (stakeholder management, interorganizational relations) and internal relations (human resource management, psychological contracts) are discussed.