care and compassion through an organizational … · 2017. 9. 26. · introduction to special topic...

INTRODUCTION TO SPECIAL TOPIC FORUM

CARE AND COMPASSION THROUGH ANORGANIZATIONAL LENS: OPENING UP

NEW POSSIBILITIES

SARA L. RYNESUniversity of Iowa

JEAN M. BARTUNEKBoston College

JANE E. DUTTONUniversity of Michigan

JOSHUA D. MARGOLISHarvard University

In this article we introduce AMR’s Special Topic Forum on Understanding and Cre-ating Caring and Compassionate Organizations. We outline why the time is right forsuch a forum, uncover scholarly and philosophical roots of a focus on compassion andcare, and provide a brief introduction to the diverse and rich set of articles containedin this forum. We describe the innovative theorizing uncovered by the special issuearticles and summarize the rich set of possibilities they suggest for the practice oforganizing.

Compassion surprises. In 1970 twenty-four offorty Princeton Theological Seminary studentswalking to an adjacent building to deliver atalk—for some of them, about the Good Samar-itan—either failed to offer aid to an ill victimthey encountered on the way or failed to noticethe victim altogether (Darley & Batson, 1973).Thirty-one years later and fifty-five miles to the

north, in New York City, as the bare-knuckledcenter of capitalism scrambled to get back on itsfeet, Wall Street veterans extended a helpinghand to one of their competitors in the wake ofSeptember 11 (Whitford, 2011). Such surprisingpuzzles extend beyond the United States andencompass care as well as compassion. In Mum-bai, India, in 2008, kitchen workers at the TajHotel risked their lives to care for customersunder terrorist siege (Deshpandé & Raina, 2011),whereas in 2011 in Kolkata, medical staff fledfrom their patients as fire raged through theirhospital (Times of India, 2011). Care and com-passion, it would seem, may emerge where theyare least expected and may well be endangeredwhere they are most expected.

Compassion is a timely topic. According to theOxford English Dictionary, compassion comesfrom the ecclesiastical Latin stem compati, or to“suffer with.” Clearly, the world does not lacksuffering. In the course of their daily work lives,people suffer the death of loved ones, lossesfrom illness, and grief from restructuring andchange (e.g., Hazen, 2008). On a larger scale,

We offer a well-deserved thank you to all who made thisSpecial Topic Forum on Understanding and Creating Caringand Compassionate Organizations possible. First and fore-most, we thank Anne Tsui, whose foresight, compassion, andleadership inspired the “Dare to Care” annual programtheme for the 2010 Academy of Management meeting, aswell as this special topic forum. We also thank former AMReditor Amy Hillman and her editorial team for feedback onearly drafts of this proposal and their ultimate decision to goahead with the project. Thanks, too, to managing editorSusan Zaid, who traveled to Boston to help us master theintricacies of Manuscript Central and who facilitated theprocess throughout completion of the issue. Finally, wethank Sherry Immediato, Erik Jansen, copy and productioneditor Sandra Tamburrino-Hinz, and the authors whose workappears in this forum for their helpful input on earlier draftsof this introduction.

� Academy of Management Review2012, Vol. 37, No. 4, 503–523.http://dx.doi.org/10.5465/amr.2012.0124

503Copyright of the Academy of Management, all rights reserved. Contents may not be copied, emailed, posted to a listserv, or otherwise transmitted without the copyrightholder’s express written permission. Users may print, download, or email articles for individual use only.

suffering is everywhere. The recent global fi-nancial crisis has destroyed the livelihoods ofmillions, and daily we witness those in our owncountries and throughout the world living withinadequate food and shelter. Natural disasterssuch as hurricanes, tornadoes, tsunamis, anddroughts have created thousands of orphans,disabled victims, and homeless in their wake.Similar results have occurred as a result of man-made catastrophes, such as the Fukushimapower plant disaster and the BP oil spill in theGulf of Mexico. Residential, energy, and agricul-tural developments have dislocated both nativepeoples and animal species, while wars con-tinue to maim and kill thousands in variousparts of the world. The gap between the rich andpoor continues to increase, while more than abillion people do not get enough to eat (Foodand Agriculture Organization, 2011).

Compassion is also timely because of thegrowing interdependence of the world’s econo-mies, nations, and ecosystems. Financial criseson one continent spill over onto others. Dwin-dling forests in one country shift weather pat-terns in others. Lax labor laws in some statesthreaten the well-being of workers in others. Atthe same time, damaging events in one part ofthe world elicit aid efforts from all over, andrevolutions in one country are emulated in oth-ers. As organizations, nations, and people be-come more interdependent, collaboration andcoordination become more essential to theachievement of both individual and collectivegoals. Care and compassion, which aregrounded in relationships and relatedness,have much to contribute to an interconnected,suffering, and surprising world.

New scientific discoveries and conversationsare causing scholars to reevaluate what wethink we know about human motivations andbehavior. A sharpened focus on care and com-passion in organizations is consistent with aparadigm shift in the social sciences that em-phasizes neurological, psychological, and soci-ological bases of human interrelating that haveother-interest as opposed to self-interest at theircore (Brown, Brown, & Penner, 2012; Mansbridge,1990). These accounts, sometimes closely alignedwith evolutionary theories of human development,give new insights into the power and pervasive-ness of compassion and caregiving systems ascentral to human survival and flourishing (e.g.,Goetz, Keltner, & Simon-Thomas, 2010). These dis-

coveries also reflect new conversations and newvisions of possibilities opened up when Westernbehavioral and social scientists engage withTibetan Buddhism (e.g., Davidson & Harrington,2002; Goleman, 2003) and when new interdisci-plinary research collaborations put compassion(Stanford University, http://ccare.stanford.edu/),generosity (Notre Dame University, http://generosityresearch.nd.edu/), the study of virtues(University of Chicago, http://scienceofvirtues.org/), and links between the role of hope andcompassion fatigue (http://www.hope-lit.ualberta.ca/ResearchHFA.html) center stage.

Together, these new intellectual paths—along with broader social collaborations suchas the Charter for Compassion (http://charterforcompassion.org/), business school collabora-tions such as 50 � 20 (http://50plus20.org/), andnonprofits such as Compassionate Action Net-work International (http://www.compassionateactionnetwork.com/home.asp)—remind usthat care and compassion are more than feelingsand actions with instrumental outcomes. Theysymbolize values that are also a “means ofexpression, a way of behaving, a perspective onsociety” (Wuthnow, 1991: 308). No less than themost famous scientist of the twentieth centurysuggested that widening our circle ofcompassion is the means by which we mightrevise the misguided assumptions we carryabout our humanity:

A human being is a part of the whole called by us“Universe,” a part limited in time and space. Heexperiences himself, his thoughts and feelings assomething separated from the rest, a kind of op-tical delusion of his consciousness. This delusionis a kind of prison for us, restricting us to ourpersonal desires and to affection for a few per-sons nearest to us. Our task must be to free our-selves from this prison by widening our circle ofcompassion to embrace all living creatures andthe whole of nature in its beauty. Nobody canachieve this completely, but the striving for suchachievement is, in itself, a part of the liberationand a foundation for inner security (Albert Ein-stein, personal letter from 1950; quoted in the NewYork Times, 1972).

The world’s growing interdependence, the re-ality of suffering as part of the human condition,and the possibilities that are opened up by afocus on care and compassion prompt this spe-cial topic forum. Compassion has deep roots inintellectual history. Aristotle described compas-sion as an emotion, directed toward “the misfor-

504 OctoberAcademy of Management Review

tune one believes to have befallen another”(Nussbaum, 1986: 306). In contrast to Plato andthe Stoics writing at a similar time, who focusedprimarily on the emotion associated with com-passion, for Aristotle the emotion of compassionnecessarily also included a cognitive compo-nent in the form of three beliefs: that the otherperson’s suffering is serious (not trivial), that itis unmerited, and that it is something that mightbefall the self (Gallagher, 2009).

Although care and compassion are not new tophilosophical, theological, and scientific in-quiry (indeed, their study goes back thousandsof years), they have only occasionally been theexplicit focus of management scholarship. AnneTsui (2010) challenged management scholars toadopt a more explicit focus on compassion inher call for papers for the 2010 Academy of Man-agement meeting, and, indeed, there are soundrationales for bringing care and compassion tothe fore in management research at this time.

For example, comparatively recent psycholog-ical research has illuminated the positive ef-fects on well-being and resilience of empathy(Batson, Turk, Shaw, & Klein, 1995; Davis, 1996),receiving and giving care and social support(e.g., Broadhead et al., 1983; Brown, Ness, Vi-nokur, & Smith, 2003; Cohen & Willis, 1985), andforgiveness (e.g., Worthington & Scherer, 2004).Conversely, there is plenty of evidence of thenegative effects of contrasting behaviors, suchas neglect, incivility, derision, bullying, andabuse (e.g., Ashforth, 1994; Frost, 2003; Pearson,Andersson, & Wegner, 2001; Pearson & Porath,2009; Tepper, 2007). Theories and research onorganizational and individual care and compas-sion can also draw from diverse works by re-searchers writing about caring systems (Kahn,1993), care and caring work (e.g., Lopez, 2006;Meyer, 2000), caring and relational practices(e.g., Benner & Wrubel, 1989; Steyaert & VanLooy, 2010), organizational healing (e.g., Powley& Piderit, 2008), care and knowledge enabling(e.g., Von Krogh, Ichijo, & Nonaka, 2000), andapplications of an ethic of care in organizations(Gilligan, 1982; Liedtka, 1996; Walker, 1991).

Interest in compassion in the managementsciences was catalyzed by Frost’s (1999) procla-mation that “Compassion Counts!” and by his(2003) assertion that the inevitable pain gener-ated within organizations requires an academicresponse. These early forays in managementresearch on compassion were further extended

by Kanov et al. (2004), who, building on Clark(1998), proposed a tripartite model of the com-passion process. By incorporating cognitive (no-ticing), affective (feeling), and behavioral (act-ing) components, Kanov and colleaguessynthesized a long historical tradition in philos-ophy and theology and set up the rich possibil-ities for inquiry that this issue of AMR seeks toadvance.

This special topic forum explores what hap-pens to our understanding of management andorganizations when theorists focus on and drawfrom theories related to care and compassion.What happens when analysis and theorizingmove beyond efforts to explain striking individ-ual episodes of compassion and care (or theirabsence) and go on to consider the role playedby compassion and care in the ongoing life andfunctioning of organizations and the individualswithin them? What new states, processes, anddynamics are revealed when compassion andcare become more center stage in managementscholarship? What does an organization looklike when its organizing principles are based onthe logics and principles of caring and compas-sion? This special topic forum illuminates thenovel insights we gain into the work of manag-ing and organizing when care and compassionserve as a focal point for theorizing.

Together, the articles in this special issueopen new windows for seeing possibilities inand about organizations. First, they humanizepeople working inside organizations as peoplewho suffer, people who care, and people whoindividually and collectively may respond topain (e.g., Atkins & Parker; Gittell & Douglass;Lilius). Second, they illuminate how organiza-tions as contexts—with members, tasks, roles,shared values, resources, and norms—meaning-fully and importantly shape patterns of interper-sonal thoughts, emotions, and behaviors bothwithin and outside organizational boundaries(e.g., Fehr & Gelfand; Gittell & Douglass; Law-rence & Maitlis; Madden, Duchon, Madden, &Plowman). Third, they illustrate how the motiva-tions and actions of a single individual can mat-ter in terms of changing the culture of a workunit (Grant & Patil) or determining the purposeof an entire organization (e.g., Miller, Grimes,McMullen, & Vogus). Fourth, they illuminatehow the ways in which we speak about ourexperiences at work can create self-fulfillingprophecies (e.g., Lawrence & Maitlis). Fifth, they

2012 505Rynes, Bartunek, Dutton, and Margolis

suggest the underlying dynamics by which al-ternative organizational forms that are typicallyregarded as mutually exclusive can be meldedinto hybrids that incorporate the strengths ofeach (e.g., relational bureaucracies for Gittell &Douglass and social entrepreneurship for Milleret al.). Sixth, they respond to a call from organi-zational researchers (e.g., Feldman & Rafaeli,2002; Felin & Foss, 2009) to create a deeper un-derstanding of the micro emotional and rela-tional mechanisms that underlie caring andcompassion at the organizational level (e.g.,Fehr & Gelfand; Gittell & Douglass; Maddenet al.).

In order to place the articles in this specialissue in context, we first examine some of theintellectual foundations of research on care andcompassion, both historically and in recentyears. We then introduce the articles and theircentral contributions.

CARE AND COMPASSION:BOTH TIMELY AND TIMELESS

Care and compassion have very long intellec-tual and moral histories. Compassion “lies atthe heart of all religious, ethical and spiritualtraditions, calling us always to treat all othersas we wish to be treated ourselves” (Armstrong,2011: 6). For example, in Confucianism compas-sion (rén) or benevolent love and humanenesstoward others is “the loftiest ideal of moral ex-cellence” (Chong, 2007: 24). In Hinduism the con-cept of ahimsa, the injunction to do no harm andto treat all creatures as oneself, is key (Jackson,2008). In Judaism there are mandates to pursuejustice and righteousness, to imitate God’s com-passion, to seek peace, and to work for the heal-ing of the world (Sears, 1998). In Christianityactions of mercy or compassion are “central forJesus. To gain his favor, the poor and the sickhad only to say, ‘Sir, have mercy on me’” (So-brino, 2009: 454). Gülen (2004) suggests that toler-ance, love, and compassion have been primaryvalues throughout Islamic history and reflect God,or Allah, as the source of compassion, from whomthese values flow to individuals.

In philosophy compassion has had a morecontentious history. Many influential philoso-phers (including Plato, the Stoics, Descartes,Nietzche, and Kant) were skeptical of compas-sion as a basis for decision making and takingaction (Gallagher, 2009; Sznaider, 2001). Focus-

ing mostly on compassion’s emotional aspects,they viewed compassion (and emotion moregenerally) as potentially incompatible withother moral principles, such as reason and jus-tice, which were held in higher regard. Theyworried that feelings of compassion might leadto sentimentality, which would cloud judgmentand reasoning. Moreover, they argued that com-passion actually increases suffering by causingpeople to share in the misery of others (White,2008). In addition, the Stoics often portrayedcompassion as a weakness and a feminine trait.

Still, the historical view of compassion in phi-losophy has sometimes been very positive. Phi-losophers such as Aristotle saw compassion ascomplementary with concepts such as justice,reason, and self-interest. Rousseau emphasizedcompassion as the foundational virtue thathelps society to develop. He did not see compas-sion as a substitute for justice or as inconsistentwith reason. Rather, he argued that compassion“can modify and be modified by reason for theindividual’s good and the good of others”(Marks, 2007: 728). Similarly, Schopenhauer(1998/1840) argued that compassion—rather thanrational rules or God-given commandments—was the central basis of morality and ethics(Madigan, 2005). Even Adam Smith, who is ofteninvoked as the patron saint of self-interest,wrote about the positive effects of compassion.Indeed, compassion was the first virtue men-tioned in his The Theory of Moral Sentiments(Smith, 2010/1759). Smith viewed pity and com-passion (he used the terms interchangeably) ascomplementary to self interest: “Nature en-dowed us with these sentiments for the good ofmankind,” and they “persist because they pro-mote the survival of people as a species”(quoted in Frank, 1988: 44). Contemporary moralphilosophers have continued with the line ofargument that compassion fundamentally con-tributes to the well-being of individuals and so-ciety, although they are also mindful of compas-sion’s limits and blinders (e.g., Nussbaum,1996, 2003).

The philosophy that perhaps elevates com-passion to the highest level is Buddhism. ForBuddhists all beings desire happiness, while atthe same time all beings suffer. Compassion is afundamental attribute or potential inherent inall people—the highest form of moral wisdom(Dalai Lama, 1995). However, Buddhism recog-nizes that people are often more motivated by


greed, anger, hatred, or similar hindrancesrather than by this fundamental attribute (e.g.,Sullivan, Wiist, & Wayment, 2010). Compassionis generated by the mind but focused outward.It manifests in generosity directed toward oth-ers. The ultimate goal of Buddhist compassion(karuna) is to remove suffering (dukkha), includ-ing that which arises from our (self-centered)desires and attachments to various ambitions,people, and material objects.

It may seem odd to juxtapose Buddhist com-passion with business enterprises where theprimary focus is so often material in nature. So,in attempting to place this long and venerablehistory of compassion in context, it is useful todraw on recent empirical evidence and concep-tual arguments that suggest the potential fruit-fulness of focusing more explicitly on care andcompassion in management and organizationalstudies. In the past twenty-five years or so, em-pirical evidence has begun to suggest the pos-sibility of symbiotic positive relationships be-tween emotions and reason, compassion andjustice, and altruism and self-interest. For exam-ple, there has been a growing understanding byneuroscientists that emotions are not separatefrom reason and that, contrary to earlier beliefs,emotions often enhance reasoning abilitiesrather than detract from them (e.g., Damasio,1994; Frank, 1988). Related findings concern theenhancing effect of positive emotions and posi-tive interrelating on creativity, motivation, emo-tional and physical well-being, resilience, andmany types of performance (e.g., Amabile &Kramer, 2011; Chiaburu & Harrison, 2008; Dutton& Ragins, 2007; Fredrickson, 2001, 2009; House,Umberson, & Landis, 1988; Staw, Sutton, &Pelled, 1994). These arguments are consistentwith efforts in psychology (e.g., Seligman &Csikszentmihalyi, 2000) and organizational re-search (e.g., Cameron & Spreitzer, 2012) tobroaden consideration of the types of psycholog-ical and social conditions and processes thatfoster individual and collective flourishing.

In social sciences, which have human behav-ior at their root, there is increasing recognitionthat we are born to interrelate. For example,Brown, Brown, and Preston (2012) offer a neuro-scientific model of compassionate motivationsuggesting that humans enjoy a dedicated neu-robiological system that is responsive to socialbonds and that fosters other-interested feelingsand behaviors. Similarly, Crocker and Cane-

vello (2012) describe and compare an egosystemversus ecosystem, where the latter model, incontrast to self-interested theories, portrays in-dividuals as being motivated by caring aboutthe well-being of others. In their account thesemotivations arise from people seeing them-selves as part of a larger whole and seeingdesired outcomes of the other and self as nonzero sum. Although fairly new to the field ofexperimental psychology, theoretical modelsthat put care and concern for others at their corein order to explain behavior, personal and pro-fessional development, and even organizationaleffectiveness have long been staples of applieddisciplines, such as education and nursing,where relationships are foundational to thework of the profession (e.g., Noddings, 2003).

Rather than seeing care and compassion asantithetical to or outside of “normal” or “impor-tant” work in and of organizations, the contrib-utors to this special issue view them as central:“Compassion and care are not separate from‘being a professional’ or ‘doing the work of theorganization.’ They are a natural and living rep-resentation of people’s humanity in the work-place” (Frost, Dutton, Worline, & Wilson, 2000:25). Further, the authors in this issue make im-portant contributions toward enriching our un-derstanding of relational dynamics and behav-iors in organizations (Bradbury & Lichtenstein,2000; Ferris et al., 2009; Gersick, Bartunek, & Dut-ton, 2000).

Theoretical developments such as these pro-vide important fuel for more deeply understand-ing patterns and consequences of interrelatingthrough care and compassion in and among or-ganizations. They echo and strengthen relatedcalls to see our species (e.g., de Waal, 2009;Keltner, 2009) and our civilization (Rifkin, 2009)as more collaborative, empathetic, and caringthan typically portrayed in our managementtheories. These developments beckon research-ers to move beyond theories of human interre-lating based on reward or punishment (self-interest) and suggest that other-interest,emotion, and biology are central to explaininghow and when care and compassion happenand how and when they matter.

Ferraro, Pfeffer, and Sutton (2005) and Ghoshal(2005) remind us that theories not only attempt toexplain but also shape behavior. In the words ofeconomist Robert Frank:


Our beliefs about human nature help shape hu-man nature itself. What we think about ourselvesand our possibilities determines what we aspireto become, and shapes what we teach our chil-dren, both at home and in the schools. Here thepernicious effects of the self-interest theory havebeen most disturbing. It tells us that to behavemorally is to invite others to take advantage of us.By encouraging us to expect the worst in others, itbrings out the worst in us: dreading the role of thechump, we are often loath to heed our noblerinstincts (1988: xi).

Given this reality, it is crucial that we havetheories that reflect the accumulating evidencethat other-centeredness and interconnectednessare central aspects of humanity. Furthermore,we (and our students) need access to theoriesand discourses that help us understand the com-plex and important processes and conditionsthat enable and thwart care and compassion.With this in mind, it is our pleasure to introducethe articles selected for this special topic forum.

THE ARTICLES

The nine articles selected for this special is-sue represent an interesting mix of characteris-tics. Five are positioned mainly at the individuallevel of analysis (Atkins & Parker; Grant; Grant& Patil; Lilius; Miller et al.), while the other fourprimarily address the group or organizationallevel (Fehr & Gelfand; Gittell & Douglass; Law-rence & Maitlis; Madden et al.). Some focus onhow care and compassion might emerge and besustained without formal planning (e.g., Mad-den et al.), while others present testable modelsfor enacting planned change (e.g., Grant & Pa-til). Still others present models that appear to betypically intuitive, spontaneous, or emergentbut might nevertheless (by using the proposedmodel) be used to guide planned change (e.g.,Lilius). Some present models or theories of howone set of organizational norms or assumptions(e.g., independence and self-reliance) might bereplaced with a different set of norms (e.g., rela-tional and interdependent; Lawrence & Maitlis),while others suggest how two presumably op-positional or competing models (e.g., relationalversus bureaucratic forms of organization)might be melded into new forms (e.g., Gittell &Douglass; Miller et al.). The articles and theirmajor characteristics, including the possibilitiesthey suggest for future research and practice,are summarized in Table 1.

The first five articles in this issue focus pri-marily on the individual level of analysis. In thefirst of these, “Understanding Individual Com-passion in Organizations: The Role of Apprais-als and Psychological Flexibility,” Paul Atkinsand Sharon Parker expand on Kanov et al.’s(2004) model of compassionate responding. Spe-cifically, in addition to the three components ofcompassionate responding specified by Kanovet al. (i.e., noticing, feeling, and acting), Atkinsand Parker add a fourth (mainly cognitive) com-ponent: people’s appraisal of the situation. Ap-praisal comes between noticing and feeling andinfluences the specific types of feelings gener-ated: “After noticing that another is suffering, aperson might feel empathic concern (necessaryfor compassion), but he or she might equally feelanger, distress, sadness, coldness, or other emo-tions that do not lead to compassion” (this issue:526). This observation is consistent with discus-sions about compassion in political science,where people with a wide range of politicalviews have adopted compassion as one of theirsignature issues yet disagree considerably onwho merits compassion and what should bedone about suffering, depending on the attribu-tions they make about why people are sufferingand what will improve the situation (e.g., Marks,2007; Stone, 2008).

Drawing on relational frame theory, Atkinsand Parker then discuss how and why peoplewho are higher in psychological flexibility—“being open and curious regarding the presentmoment and, depending on what the situationaffords, acting in accordance with one’s chosenvalues” (this issue: 528)—have a greater propen-sity to respond to situations of suffering in acompassionate way. In the authors’ view, psy-chological flexibility “provides a way of bridg-ing the apparent tension between distancingand connection—distancing so that one does notbecome absorbed in another’s suffering and onecan place it in context, and connection so thatone cares” (this issue: 539).

In “Challenging the Norm of Self-Interest: Mi-nority Influence and Transitions to HelpingNorms in Work Units,” Adam Grant and ShefaliPatil develop a temporal model of how a singleindividual might successfully challengework unit norms favoring self-interested behav-ior, particularly in low task-interdependentwork units where self-interested norms tend topredominate. Drawing on minority influence


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theories and previous empirical research, theyargue that such a shift requires two types ofproactive behaviors on the part of individualswho would challenge social norms. The first ofthese is repeated behavioral modeling of help-ing behaviors that are perceived as both proso-cial and impactful by others in the group. Thesecond is voice, which consists of two subtac-tics: inquiring about current practices in such away as to destabilize shared understandings,along with (smaller amounts of) advocacy ofhelping behaviors. They argue that the appro-priate temporal pattern for these behaviors in-cludes inquiry, followed by modeling, followedby advocacy. Together, these are hypothesizedto create uncertainty, stimulating new sense-making and norm building. Although theirmodel begins by describing the necessary pro-active behaviors of the individual “challenger,”it also incorporates characteristics of work unitmembers. Several of these characteristics—agreeableness, openness, status, and stage ofunit’s development—are likely to act as moder-ators of whether there will be a sustained shiftfrom self-interested to helping norms as a resultof the individual proactive behaviors.

In “Recovery at Work: Understanding the Re-storative Side of ‘Depleting’ Client Interactions,”Jacoba Lilius focuses on ways to combat theburnout caregivers often experience in responseto the “chronic emotional strain of dealing ex-tensively with other human beings” (Maslach,1982: 3). Until now, most research directed to-ward mitigating this strain has focused on find-ing respite away from work, either through va-cations or holidays (e.g., Westman & Eden, 1997)or through on-site breaks throughout the work-day (Trougakos, Beal, Green, & Weiss, 2008).Drawing on Sonnentag and Fritz (2007), Liliusindicates that this prior focus on nonwork activ-ities for restoration reflects “a core assumptionwithin both the ego depletion literature andwork recovery literature that work activities areeffortful and, thus, regulatory resource deplet-ing” such that “recovery is thought to require en-gagement in nonwork activities that do not furthertax regulatory resources” (this issue: 570).

In contrast, Lilius illuminates how certaincaretaker-client interactions while performingthe work itself may themselves be restorative,depending on two variables: the amount of self-regulatory resources required by the interactionand the amount of personal resources generated

by it. Whereas previous work on caregiving andburnout has generally emphasized the deple-tion of resources, Lilius draws on new researchsuggesting that effortful work can also generateresources through positive feelings of increasedmastery, self-efficacy, or prosocial contribution,particularly when a successful outcome isreached on a difficult case. Using an episodicperformance perspective (Beal, Weiss, Barros, &MacDermid, 2005) and a 2 � 2 typology of per-sonal resources required and resources gener-ated, Lilius proposes four types of caregiver-client interactions: draining, low maintenance,replenishing, and breakthrough. She further de-velops a process model of the dynamics be-lieved to underlie restorative and breakthroughinteractions in the hope that application of themodel might increase the proportion of such in-teractions in caregiving situations and providea useful guide for future research.

In “Giving Time, Time After Time: Work De-sign and Sustained Employee Participation inCorporate Volunteering,” Adam Grant exploresthe rapidly growing phenomenon of corporatevolunteering as an important vehicle for deliv-ering care and compassion to worthy causesand communities in need. Integrating work de-sign and volunteering theories, he generates asomewhat counterintuitive model of whatcauses employees to participate in sustained(rather than one-time) volunteering activities as-sociated with their workplaces. Specifically, hismodel suggests that employees whose jobs areweakest in intrinsic task-, social-, or knowledge-related motivators are the ones most likely tofind sustained volunteering activities most en-riching. Grant proposes that, for such employ-ees, volunteer activities are more likely to com-pensate for the deficit of motivational featuresinherent in the work itself, making it more likelythat volunteer activities will be self-reinforcingand become part of the employee’s identity. Hedevelops a work design model of long-term cor-porate volunteering that incorporates workcharacteristics of the employee’s job; the em-ployee’s volunteering motives; the task, social,and knowledge characteristics of the volunteer-ing project; and organizational practices such asvolunteering pressure, matching incentives,managerial support, and whether the organiza-tion’s identity is aligned with the volun-teer cause.


Grant’s model presents a new way of under-standing employees’ involvement in care andcompassion by conceptualizing organizationalcitizenship behavior (OCB) in an alternativeway. Most previous work on OCB has been fo-cused on behaviors that benefit coworkers, su-pervisors, and customers. Doing work that ben-efits organizational members and customers isoften viewed as a role requirement or core as-pect of job performance, thus raising the ques-tion of whether it is actually “true” citizenship(e.g., Bolino, 1999). Because corporate volunteer-ing is directed toward beneficiaries and causesoutside the organization’s main mission, sus-tained participation in corporate volunteering isless likely to reflect perceived obligations andmay therefore reflect a purer form of citizenshipbehavior. If so, examination of corporate volun-teerism may enable researchers to gain adeeper grasp of the forces that motivate employ-ees to offer care and compassion not only topeople inside their place of employment butalso to communities, charities, and disadvan-taged groups.

In “Venturing for Others with Heart and Head:How Compassion Encourages Social Entrepre-neurship,” Toyah Miller, Matthew Grimes, JefferyMcMullen, and Timothy Vogus explore themechanisms through which compassion encour-ages social entrepreneurship among organiza-tional founders. They begin by emphasizing justhow difficult it is to create a social enterprise ofthis type, which seeks to meld two principlesthat are often thought to be incompatible—thatis, an enterprise that seeks “to create socialvalue” but “employ[s] a market-based organiza-tional form to sustain this value creation” (thisissue: 616). Because the underlying assumptionsof traditional market-based logics and compas-sion-based logics are nearly the flip side of oneanother (e.g., while market logics emphasize theprimacy of the self, compassion logics empha-size the connectedness of all things and the pri-macy of others), marrying the two in a singleorganization form makes social entrepreneur-ship “both admirable and theoretically problem-atic” (this issue: 616).

The core of Miller et al.’s article is a modelthat begins with how compassion facilitatesthree emotional and cognitive processes thatincrease the likelihood of engaging in (and per-sisting with the challenges of) social entrepre-neurship. In particular, the authors describe

how compassion increases integrative thinking,spurs prosocial judgments of costs and benefits,and strengthens commitment to alleviating oth-ers’ suffering. The theoretical model explainshow these emotional and cognitive processes,when unleashed amid institutional conditionsthat make social entrepreneurship pragmati-cally thinkable and normatively legitimate, mo-tivate and sustain social entrepreneurship be-havior that would otherwise seem irrational andill advised.

In “Care and Possibility: Enacting an Ethic ofCare Through Narrative Practice,” Thomas Law-rence and Sally Maitlis explore how Carol Gil-ligan’s (1982) notion of an “ethic of care” mightbe realized in teams and workgroups. Theycharacterize an ethic of care as accepting localtruth and evaluating it in terms of its effects,recognizing vulnerability as ubiquitous, andvaluing growth in the cared-for and uncertainfuture.

Based on this ethic, Lawrence and Maitlis de-velop a model of how organizations might moveaway from viewing coworkers primarily as in-dependent, self-sufficient actors toward a wayof thinking and acting that considers them asrelational and interdependent. They focus onwork teams, elaborating the types of narrativepractices—constructing histories of sparklingmoments, contextualizing struggles, and con-structing polyphonic future-oriented stories—among team members that might institutional-ize an ethic of care, even in organizations wherecaregiving is not the primary function (e.g., man-ufacturing). They suggest that the enactment ofan ethic of care through these narrative prac-tices can help foster a belief system that empha-sizes possibility, and they conclude with a dis-cussion of the likely impact of adopting an ethicof care on team resilience.

The last three papers address the organiza-tional level of analysis. In “The Forgiving Orga-nization: A Multilevel Model of Forgiveness atWork,” Ryan Fehr and Michele Gelfand examinethe concept of forgiveness at the organizationallevel of analysis and develop a cross-levelmodel that reveals how individuals’ prosocialresponses to conflict can emerge from and besupported by organizational-level features. Tothis end, they introduce the “construct of forgive-ness climate—the shared perception that em-pathic, benevolent responses to conflict fromvictims and offenders are rewarded, supported,


and expected in the organization” (this issue:665), and they develop a multilevel model of howsuch a climate is created and sustained inorganizations.

Their three-phase model begins with a discus-sion of the values—restorative justice, compas-sion, and temperance—that “provide the bed-rock” (this issue: 667) of a forgiveness climate inthe climate construction stage. In this phasethey also discuss characteristics of the organi-zational environment (national culture, stake-holder culture, and geographic dispersion) andthe organizational leader (justice orientation,servant leadership, and self-control) that fosterand support organizational practices such asrestorative dispute resolution procedures, em-ployee support programs, and mindfulnesstraining and feedback. In the sensemakingphase the authors focus on how a forgivenessclimate triggers empathy, produces emotionalshifts in both victims and offenders, and facili-tates restorative changes such as offers of apol-ogy and forgiveness. In the action phase theauthors focus on the relational consequences offorgiveness climates—in particular, relationalcommitment and interpersonal citizenship.

In “Emergent Organizational Capacity forCompassion,” Laura Madden, Dennis Duchon,Timothy Madden, and Donde Ashmos Plowmanpropose that organizations can develop an en-during capacity for compassion without direc-tion from the formal organization. Drawing oncomplexity theory (e.g., Anderson, 1999; Chiles,Meyer, & Hench, 2004), as well as previous em-pirical research by Dutton, Worline, Frost, andLilius (2006) and Plowman et al. (2007), they ex-plicate how an initially painful triggering eventcan set off a series of processes that, particu-larly in the presence of facilitating conditions,can lead to self-organizing compassion that iscapable of enduring long past the triggeringevent. Specifically, they propose that complexadaptive systems (Axelrod & Cohen, 1999) “com-posed of highly interactive, interdependentagents who learn and adapt in order to producebehaviors that would not be predicted by ob-serving the system’s past” (this issue: 693) resultin new structures, norms, scanning mecha-nisms, and cultures. In addition, they elaboratespecific system conditions that enhance thelikelihood of self-organizing compassion, inwhich agents modify roles and norms to includecompassionate responding.

Finally, in “Relational Bureaucracy: Structur-ing Reciprocal Relationships into Roles,” JodyHoffer Gittell and Anne Douglass theorize abouthow two organizational forms that are typicallyregarded as oppositional can be melded into asustainable relational bureaucratic form. Thisform combines the strengths of relational or net-work organizations with the strengths of bu-reaucracies. This hybrid form is “not a hodge-podge of misaligned characteristics but, rather,a logically coherent higher synthesis of the twoorganizational forms from which it emerges”(this issue: 709).

In relational bureaucracies (like SouthwestAirlines) formal structures support three criticalprocesses of reciprocal interrelating. The firstprocess is manifest in the way workers and cus-tomers interrelate, which involves ongoing co-production between organizational participantsand the outside parties for whose benefit thework is done. The second process, relational co-ordination, highlights reciprocal interrelatingthat happens between workers in the horizontaldivision of labor. The third type of critical recip-rocal interrelating process, relational leader-ship, takes place between workers and manag-ers. All three interrelating processes arecharacterized by shared goals, shared knowl-edge, and mutual respect. The authors’ model ofrelational bureaucracy specifies how severalstructures and practices (e.g., hiring and train-ing, cross-role protocols) foster embedding re-ciprocal interrelating into these different roles.Propositions link the three forms of reciprocalinterrelating in roles to caring, timely, andknowledgeable responses that are simultane-ously scalable, replicable, and sustainable.

GOING FORWARD

While recent scholarly contributions to careand compassion have been made in many so-cial science fields, a number of managementscholars (e.g., Ferraro et al., 2005; Ghoshal, 1996,2005; Khurana, 2007; Mintzberg, 2005) havetraced the processes by which the academicfield of management, following trends in eco-nomics and finance, has increasingly movedaway from humanistic, multistakeholder modelsof management to models centered on self-interest, the primacy of owners and sharehold-ers over other constituents, and the “need” toprovide financial incentives for effort-averse ex-


ecutives who would otherwise “shirk” while pur-suing “self-interest with guile” (Williamson,1981: 554).

For example, Walsh, Weber, and Margolis(2003) showed that management researchers’concern about stakeholders other than share-holders has been dropping over time. Based on aforty-two-year analysis of articles appearing inthe Academy of Management Journal (AMJ), theyfound a large shift over time in terms of thedependent variables studied—in particular,whether the dependent variables were perfor-mance related, welfare related, or both. Overall,they found 383 articles that examined perfor-mance (and not human welfare), 227 that exam-ined human welfare (and not performance), and115 that examined both. However, they foundthat the relative emphasis placed on perfor-mance versus welfare largely reversed itself be-tween 1978 and 1999. Specifically, in 1978, 32 per-cent of articles focused on human welfare ascompared with only 19 percent in 1999. In con-trast, 17 percent of articles examined perfor-mance in 1978 as compared with 35 percent in1999. Walsh and colleagues concluded that “re-searchers’ increasing fascination with organiza-tion-level performance has not been matched bya parallel fascination with organizational or so-cietal-level welfare” (2003: 862).

In contrast to this trend, in his Academy ofManagement presidential address given in 2010,Walsh asked, “What can we do as an Academyto embrace the sacred and inspire and en-able . . . [a] better world?” (2011: 225). Thus, thisspecial topic forum comes at a potentially piv-otal time in management scholarship, whenthere is considerable social science scholarshipon care and compassion to draw from and muchgreater awareness that management researchhas not made as many contributions as it mightto these very important issues.

Implications for Future Theory and Research

As indicated in Table 1, each of the articlessuggests possibilities and implications for fu-ture empirical research. The suggestions theymake all reflect ways of carrying the presenttheorizing forward. Further, there are now a lim-ited number of studies in diverse areas of man-agement that at least touch on notions of com-passion, including negotiation (Galinsky, Gilin,& Maddux, 2011), emotional labor (Hsieh, Yang,

& Fu, 2012), negative emotional reactions (Shep-herd & Cardon, 2009), corporate image and rep-utation (Bennett & Gabriel, 2003), sexual harass-ment (Serri, 2006), and leadership (Boyatzis,Smith, & Blaize, 2006). The articles in this specialtopic forum may serve as intellectual stimuli forareas such as these, suggesting ways that careand compassion can be more fully incorporatedboth conceptually and empirically in organiza-tional research.

Taken as a whole, the canvas of articles inthis issue suggests three ways in which futuretheory and research on care and compassionmight relate to more traditional lenses on orga-nizational phenomena. First, care and compas-sion can contend with or replace what are takento be competing perspectives, providing an al-ternative rendering of what is going on insideorganizations and, through that conceptual di-chotomy, bringing to light otherwise diminishedaspects of organizational life. Care is contrastedwith justice, or compassionate relationships arejuxtaposed with economic exchange or con-tracts, or other-regarding motives are set oppo-site self-interested ones. Lawrence and Maitlis,for example, contrast an interdependent, rela-tional model of action in organizations—inspired by a focus on care and compassion—with the taken-for-granted model of independent,self-sufficient action that undergirds so many as-sumptions within existing theories.

Second, care and compassion can be cast notas substitutes for alternative perspectives butas complements, unearthing what other theoret-ical approaches do not or cannot explain aboutthe management of organizations. Where otheraccounts leave off, care and compassion pickup. Miller et al., for example, suggest that tradi-tional theories of entrepreneurship cannot anddo not explain what drives entrepreneurs to pur-sue for-profit social enterprises. Rationality andself-serving motives might explain traditionalentrepreneurial behavior, but they simply can-not account for the motivation and persistenceof social entrepreneurs. However, as Miller et al.argue, compassion can serve as a missing in-gredient that explains the cognition and emo-tion that spark and sustain such socialentrepreneurship.

Third, care and compassion can work symbi-otically with other theoretical accounts to ex-plain what neither could explain adequately onits own. Whereas a conceptual relationship of


contention replaces other accounts with one thatemerges from an eye on care and compassion,and conceptual complementarity explains whatwould otherwise be overlooked or go unex-plained, symbiotic integration pairs traditionaltheoretical accounts with findings and theoriesabout care and compassion to provide a fuller,more extensive explanation of certain phenom-ena in organizations. For example, Grant inte-grates the motivational power of both work de-sign and compassion to explain how peopleremain motivated across work designs that varyin their motivational power. Care and compas-sion work alongside work design, his modelsuggests, thereby sustaining motivation at workby driving people to pursue volunteer opportu-nities. It is not that care and compassion dis-place work design in explaining motivation, andGrant’s point is not simply that care and com-passion drive volunteerism whereas work de-sign does not; rather, job design and compas-sion work in tandem to provide a fuller portraitof how motivation is sustained across the broadspectrum of people and jobs that characterizemost organizations. In sum, whether it is by con-tending with, complementing, or symbioticallyintegrating with more conventional and ac-cepted accounts of organizational behavior,care and compassion fundamentally broadenand enrich what it is we see and understandabout organizations.

Implications for Practice

The principal intent of the articles in this spe-cial topic forum is to make a conceptual contri-bution; theoretical contributions are, after all,the primary purpose of AMR. However, all of thearticles, most of them explicitly, suggest impli-cations for practice as well. Reviewing their im-plications for practice offers another way to ap-preciate the contributions of the articles andsuggests the potentially frame-breaking natureof their visions of organizing.

Bartunek and Rynes (2010) suggest that impli-cations for practice can be characterized interms of three features: primary audience(s) forthe recommendations, types of actions sug-gested, and kinds of outcomes hoped for fromthose actions. In a special topic forum like thisone, it is possible to get an “overall” sense ofwhat the articles contribute to practice—whatkind of picture they jointly portray of what car-

ing and compassion look like in organizations.Comparison of the types of recommendationsmade in the articles in this special issue to thosethat most stood out in the Bartunek and Rynesstudy suggests that there are truly some differ-ent perspectives being offered in this spe-cial forum.

In Table 1 we have included a brief overviewof some characteristics of the implications forpractice in the different articles published in theforum. Here, drawing from the complete articles,we suggest their common audiences, actions,and hoped-for outcomes.

Target audience. Similar to Bartunek andRynes’ (2010) findings, recommendations for ac-tion are often addressed to the organization as awhole (Atkins & Parker; Fehr & Gelfand; Law-rence & Maitlis), as well as to managers or lead-ers (including social entrepreneurs; Atkins &Parker; Fehr & Gelfand; Grant; Grant & Patil;Miller et al.). In contrast to Bartunek and Rynes,however, a large number of the implications arealso addressed to individuals and/or work-groups who are not in formal leadership posi-tions (Grant; Grant & Patil; Lawrence & Maitlis;Lilius; Madden et al.). In other words, there is abroader expectation in these articles that theimpetus for action (in this case, with respect tocompassion and caring) does not need to comefrom “above” in an organization. Rather, it maycome from individuals who are trying, for exam-ple, to change group norms away from self-interest (Grant & Patil) or to improve the qualityof caregiving while simultaneously achievinggreater self-restoration at work (Lilius).

Recommended actions. Bartunek and Rynesfound that the general types of actions mostfrequently recommended in implications forpractice sections include increasing awarenessof particular phenomena, getting training or ac-quiring more knowledge in an area, makingstructural changes, and altering hiring and re-tention practices. Those same types of actionsare suggested in the present articles.

For example, with respect to awareness, At-kins and Parker discuss the importance of indi-viduals’ recognizing that caring is part of theirrole, Lilius advises individuals in caregivingroles to pay attention to the variability in andsequencing of life-giving versus -draining clientinteractions, and Miller et al. focus on the ben-efits of being aware of compassion as a proso-cial motivator when taking on the difficult tasks


associated with social entrepreneurship. In thearticles in this special topic forum, then, in-creasing awareness is a meaningful and impor-tant activity.

The articles also discuss the fact that, to fostercare and compassion, it is often necessary forindividuals or groups to receive training and/orincrease learning of some kind. For example,Atkins and Parker and Fehr and Gelfand sug-gest the usefulness of mindfulness training,while Lawrence and Maitlis discuss the impor-tance of training in using narrative practicesconsistent with an ethic of care.

Some of the articles also address structuralfeatures. For example, Gittell and Douglass talkabout embedding relational bureaucracy intoroles, and Fehr and Gelfand discuss the impor-tance of organizational practices, such as restor-ative dispute resolution and employee supportprograms, in creating a forgiveness climate.And hiring is not ignored, either: Madden et al.focus on the importance of a diverse workforcefor care and compassion to flourish, and Gittelland Douglass discuss how reciprocity can beembedded into roles through hiring andtraining.

In addition to these types of initiatives (previ-ously outlined by Bartunek & Rynes), several ofthe articles also emphasize the importance ofinteractions that model care and compassion.Such initiatives are not at all prominent in otherliterature. For example, Grant and Patil discussmodeling prosocial behaviors, accompanied byinquiry and advocacy. Madden et al. discusshow, during self-organizing compassion, agentsmodify their roles to include compassionate be-havior and then spread these role modificationsthroughout the organization via their interac-tions with other employees, customers, andmanagers. Lawrence and Maitlis describe andcall for caring narrative practices, while Gittelland Douglas discuss treating each other as sub-jects rather than objects.

Expected outcomes. Bartunek and Rynes (2010)found that by far the most frequent outcomelisted in most implications for practice sectionsis some sort of enhanced productivity or success.However, that is not by any means a prominentoutcome in the present articles.

Some of the articles focus particularly on out-comes for individuals: a higher level of well-being (Atkins & Parker), an enhanced quality ofcaring and more self-restorative interactions

with clients (Lilius), or an internalized volunteer-ing identity (Grant). Others focus more on group-or organization-level outcomes, such as creatingclimates and cultures that embody an ethic ofcare (Lawrence & Maitlis) and forgiveness (Fehr& Gelfand), or formalized structures that enablecare and compassion (Madden et al.), such asrelational bureaucracies (Gittell & Douglass) ormarket-based ventures with social missions(Miller et al.).

Care and Compassion As Radical Practice

Taken together, the articles in this special topicforum present somewhat diverse but complemen-tary views of what organizing might be like if careand compassion were to move to the forefront:care and compassion would be the responsibilityof everyone in the organization, there would bemuch to be learned to carry out this responsibilitybut also available practices that could help, andthe outcomes would be beneficial for individualsand organizations alike. Thus, in addition to theirconceptual contributions, as a set the articlespresent initial blueprints for what compassionateorganizing might look like in practice.

Reviewing the differences between the audi-ences for, practices, and ultimate objectives ofthe articles in this issue and those of the moretraditional management literature reviewed byBartunek and Rynes (2010) and Walsh et al.(2003), one is left with the thought that if careand compassion were to move to the forefront oforganizational scholarship, the results might betruly radical. Rather than targeting researchand theory primarily at managers and produc-tivity, organizational scholarship would be ad-dressed to people at all levels of the organiza-tion. Rather than assuming that revenues,profits, and wages or salaries are the ultimate(and, often, sole) objectives of organizations andorganizing, attention would be focused addi-tionally or instead on the health, happiness,well-being, and sustainability of organizations,their members, and those they serve. Althoughsome of the processes for attaining these out-comes would be similar for multiple types oforganizations (e.g., embedding norms in roles,creating new structures, providing training),others might differ considerably (e.g., changingnorms through narrative practices or prosocialbehaviors, inquiry, and advocacy).


CONCLUDING REFLECTIONS

Even as we embrace the need for greater sen-sitivity and attention to care and compassion inand of organizations, we also believe that weourselves are not exempt from that call. Thatsame concern applies to our own organizationsand profession. For example, there is nothinglike the journal review process to both awakenand deaden compassion (Day, 2011). Noticingthe efforts of authors, empathically graspingtheir struggle and stakes, and responding withcare to their ideas is met—at the very sametime—with the cold reality of deadlines and asense of responsibility to the profession to de-liver intellectual contributions worthy of read-ers’ time and effort. Loyalty to both sets of de-mands takes work and support.

More broadly, working on this special issueraised for us probing questions about how we doour academic and educational work. Do we ad-equately consider the potential toxicity and suf-fering that are an inevitable part of our workwith others (Gallos, 2008)? Do we care deeplyenough about our phenomena, our subjects, andour students (Adler & Hanson, 2012)? Or do werun the risk of treating them as mere means toour own ends? Do the dynamics of power anddistress increase our insensitivity to the pain ofothers (Van Kleef et al., 2008)? If fifteen-minuteconference presentations, relentless productiv-ity measures, tenure letters, and faceless jour-nal reviews create conditions inhospitable tofostering care and compassion—even as theyfoster other virtues of utmost importance to ourprofession—what complementary institutionsand practices do we need if we are to infuse ourscholarly community with care and compas-sion? How can we foster self-compassion (Neff,Kirkpatrick, & Rude, 2007) as we suffer the inev-itable setbacks and disappointments that arepart of our work lives?

Other professions have looked critically in-ward and created the resolve to infuse care andcompassion more fully into their values, beliefs,and practices. For example, in education, Nod-dings (2003) has been a strong proponent of theinfusion of ethics based on caring as core to theeducational enterprise. In professions as di-verse as policing (e.g., DeValve & Adkinson,2008), law (Gerdy, 2008), and engineering(Fleischmann, 2001), there have been recentcalls to embrace and infuse compassion and

care into how one becomes a practitioner inthese various fields. We are left to wonder andspeculate what it would mean to infuse care andcompassion into the practice of management aswell the practice of management research andteaching. This special topic forum stands as oneeffort to begin asking these kinds of questionsand inviting new forms of answers.

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Sara L. Rynes ([email protected]) is the John F. Murray Professor of Managementand Organizations at the University of Iowa. She received her Ph.D. from the Univer-


sity of Wisconsin. Her research focuses on organizational staffing, compensation,academic-practitioner relations, and management education.

Jean M. Bartunek ([email protected]) is the Robert A. and Evelyn J. Ferris Chair andProfessor of Management and Organization at Boston College. She received her Ph.D.from the University of Illinois at Chicago and is a past president of the Academy ofManagement. Her research interests focus on organizational change and academic-practitioner relationships.

Jane E. Dutton ([email protected]) is the Robert L. Kahn Distinguished UniversityProfessor of Business Administration and Psychology at the University of Michigan.She received her Ph.D. from Northwestern University. Her research focuses on com-passion and organizations, positive identity processes, high-quality connections, andjob crafting. She cares deeply about positive organizational scholarship.

Joshua D. Margolis ([email protected]) is the James Dinan and Elizabeth MillerProfessor of Business Administration in the Organizational Behavior Unit at HarvardBusiness School. He received his Ph.D. from Harvard University. His research focuseson the ethical challenges that companies and managers encounter and how peoplecan meet those challenges with practical effectiveness and moral integrity.


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