The futurity of decisions as a facilitator of organizational creativity and change

    Authors

    C. M. Ford

    Abbreviated Journal Title

    J. Organ. Chang. Manage.

    Keywords

    creativity; innovation; change; organizational change; decision making; TIME; SCIENCE; SEARCH; Management

    Abstract

    Behavior in organizations is predominantly driven by expectations and routines derived from past experience rather than by envisioned scenarios reflecting future potentialities. The disproportionate weight placed on expectations derived from past experience has been blamed for a variety of problems associated with individual and organizational creativity and change. Drucker addressed this long-standing problem by arguing that decision makers must address the degree of `futurity" they need to factor into their present thinking and action. Specifically, decision makers must consider the relative weight or ratio given to ideas derived from two temporally distinct sources of knowledge - expectations constructed from remembering past experiences, and visions derived from imagining the future. In this paper I seek to describe how varying the priority given to remembering and imagining during enactment (action-perception-sensemaking) episodes affects organizational creativity and change.

    Journal Title

    Journal of Organizational Change Management

    Volume

    15

    Issue/Number

    6

    Publication Date

    1-1-2002

    Document Type

    Article

    Language

    English

    First Page

    635

    Last Page

    646

    WOS Identifier

    WOS:000179862500006

    ISSN

    0953-4814

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