Title

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

Authors

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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