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Author(s): Philip H. Mirvis
Review by: Philip H. Mirvis
Source:
The Academy of Management Review,
Vol. 16, No. 3 (Jul., 1991), pp. 636-640
Published by: Academy of Management
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636 Academy of Management Review July
FoodCom involve amenities such as adding clocks to the factory floor,
changing the food offered in the cafeteria, and making improvements in the
parking lot. To be successful in accomplishing their fundamental goals,
QWL programs require changes in assumptions about governance and
changes in organizational structures, changes that have been referred to as
second-order changes. Moch and Bartunek argue, therefore, that "an ap-
propriate role for QWL consultants is forceful introduction and fostering of
the types of schemata, structures, and processes (such as joint labor-
management committees with truly shared responsibility) that encourage
members of a client system to present their own opinions, even if these are
not consistent with open collaboration" (p. 242).
Although Moch and Bartunek make a strong case for their argument that
consultants may need to both facilitate and advocate, I was left wondering
about the risks. Might there be circumstances where successful second-
order change efforts are built off of successful first-order change efforts? In
other words, might it sometimes be important for QWL and other change
programs to demonstrate small successes before attempting radical reori-
entations? Perhaps, such small successes build good faith, thereby facilitat-
ing people's willingness to examine their assumptions and share power.
Moch and Bartunek also discuss what they call third-order change, which
involves constant questioning of assumptions and creating the ability to shift
cognitive models of the organization as needed for the organization to adapt
itself to a constantly changing world. They point out that this type of change
is extremely difficult for organizations to achieve; "nevertheless, it seeks a
valuable outcome: freedom from the bondage of any particular point of
view" (p. 254). However, might schemata lose their power as devices for
organizing, interpreting, and simplifying experience if people were con-
stantly changing them?
Overall, this is a thought-provoking and insightful book that gives the
reader a real sense of the people at FoodCom and of their frustrations while
also meaningfully contributing to the development of a theoretical perspec-
tive on organizational change processes. The book should appeal to a wide
audience, including academics who are interested in organizational
change processes and social cognition, consultants who manage these pro-
cesses for organizations, and managers who are engaged in organizational
change efforts or who are contemplating such efforts.
REFERENCES
Mintzberg, H. 1979. The structuring of organizations. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall
Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience, by Michael Csik-
szentmihalyi. New York: Harper & Row, 1990, 303 pp., $19.95,
cloth.
Reviewed by Philip H. Mirvis, independent researcher and consultant, PO
Box 265, Sandy Spring, MD 20860.
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1991 Book Reviews 637
Panic is not the true stimulus of peak performance. Indeed, it was when
the sense of panic washed away, when I lost self-consciousness that time
seemed to slow and my concentration beamed on the task ahead. I had
truly entered what Dr. Michael Csikszentmihalyi calls the flow.
This was at the University of British Columbia's "culture conference,"
where I was to deliver a tightly scheduled 20-minute speech. Trimming the
overlong text proved a mistake. I clipped good ideas; planned jokes lost
their timing; I'd made a hash of it. Suddenly I was in a swirl: The speech had
vanished!
Perhaps this was "protective forgetting"-a phenomenon diagnosed by
Freud in his studies of fortuity and of accidents. As my anxiety eased, the
Zen saying, "Practice the performance, then forget the practice when you
perform," came to mind. Finally, I looked up to see a magnificent carving of
a raven, at sea in a clamshell, transporting neolithic people during the
great flood. The raven had tricked his people, taking them to the Pacific
Northwest rather than back to their Asian homeland. Had he tricked me,
too?
So be it. I had practiced. The force was with me. And the off-the-cuff talk
went great! Afterward, an adrenaline high gave way to peace and easi-
ness. Leaving the auditorium, I saw my scrawled notes on a chair in the last
row. The raven? Perhaps....
Csikszentmihalyi, Professor of Psychology at the University of Chicago,
began his research into flow experiences as a graduate student in the mid-
1960s, studying artists and the creative experience. He found that painters
who immersed themselves in their creations, with the barest conception of
the result, produced finer pieces than those who had programmed their
artistry. Next he interviewed rock climbers, chess masters, top athletes,
dancers, and others who operate at peak performance. In every case, there
were commonalities in the experience: high challenge, clear goals, a fo-
cusing of psychic energy and attention, continuous feedback, and the loss
of self-consciousness. Subjects also reported that in taking great risks,
where they might seemingly lose control, they instead mastered the mo-
ment-through long practice, skill, will, and immersion.
These early studies led Csikszentmihalyi to meet yogis and Zen masters,
to explore the teachings of Jewish and Christian mystics, and to examine the
discipline of Jesuits and cultivated tastes of connoisseurs. By the 1980s, the
line of research had attracted many adherents. Csikszentmihalyi, his
spouse, students at Chicago, and colleagues around the globe began to use
an event-sampling procedure to assess flow during everyday experience
in the family, in leisure and recreation, at work, and during sex. The results,
summarized in his new book called Flow, delineate the conditions associ-
ated with "optimal experience" and offer counsel on taking "steps to en-
hance the quality of life."
Flow is an easy, straightforward book on the harnessing of conscious-
ness. Chapters address flow in the body and mind, at work and in social
life, with quotations from peak performers under study as well as everyday
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638 Academy of Management Review July
people taking pleasure in exercise, reading, eating, working, togetherness,
and solitude. There are forays into ancient thoughts on enjoyment and right
living, some citations of anthropological and cross-cultural studies on flow,
and crisp commentaries on the martial arts, the making of music, discovery
in science, and such along the way. A well-crafted set of notes at the end
of the text provides heartier fare for those interested in more background
and further reading on these subjects.
So what is to recommend flow to students of work and human behavior in
organizations? First, the book provides a light but authoritative review of
current concepts of consciousness and its role in human performance. The
discussion, as framed, allows readers to step back from the mechanics of
risky shifts, probability judgments, and the like, to consider the movement of
psychic energy and its ordering in experience. The phenomenological ap-
proach favored by Csikszentmihalyi seems to capture certain subjective
experiences, regarding the transformation of time and merging of action
and awareness, that are known to all of us but are not central to theories of
information processing, motivation, and performance, at least in the orga-
nizational disciplines.
Second, readers will see several organizational behavior (OB) theories
addressed and validated, albeit with different concepts and methods. Csik-
szentmihalyi's description of the "conditions of flow," for example, parallel
concepts advanced in models of optimal job design. His models of flow in
orchestras and among sports teams match our understanding about
"groups that work (and those that don't)." Furthermore, his event-sampling
method shows the ebb and flow of stimulation in individual and group work.
Third, the volume adds to a growing research literature about the power
of positive thinking. Scholarly books concerning the habits of highly suc-
cessful people, the quest for spirituality, and the functions of a more appre-
ciative managerial mindset, are attracting serious attention in the organi-
zational sciences. Here a fine chapter on the making of meaning-
involving purpose, resolve, and harmony in the author's formulation
should be of interest to cultural researchers trying to connect content and
context in the psyche. Commentary on Eastern versus Western approaches
to optimal experience, speculative and debatable, has special relevance for
students of work and task "enactment" in, say, the United States versus
Japan.
Finally, Csikszentmihalyi's methods and commentaries on flow in art and
scientific discovery prompt introspection and invite inquiry into what is be-
hind paradigmatic shifts in our approach to organizational research and its
results. On a personal note, I have found flow concepts particularly relevant
to assessments of meaning in organizational life where a more holistic and
subjective "artistic" approach yields a different picture of experience than
the reductionist methods and detached stance of the stereotypical scientist.
I did, however, have some problems with the book. The author, for in-
stance, is not conversant with OB's many contributions to the task design
and group dynamics literature. This is particularly apparent in his chapter
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1991 Book Reviews 639
on flow at work. Much is made in this chapter of "auto-telic" jobs-those
that are self-reinforcing. But Csikszentmihalyi talks about the flow found in
hunting, weaving, cooking, and other nonindustrial tasks and then jumps to
flow in brain surgery, a highly complex, professional one. Lamenting both
the industrial mechanization and postindustrial computerization of work, he
makes no mention of job enrichment, work modules, self-managing work
teams, and other innovations designed to reduce the tedium of jobs and
enhance flow-like experiences. The book suffers from its ivory-towerish con-
ception of what is happening in the working world today.
Still, Csikszentmihalyi does offer some interesting tidbits worthy of con-
sideration by students of the workplace. For example, he cites the case of a
factory worker whose auto-telic (self-stimulating) personality allows him to
turn the monotony of the assembly line into a set of challenges that enhance
his job know-how and skills. To my knowledge, work on person-job fit in our
field has been limited to comparisons of urban and rural workers, and those
with higher and lower order needs on the Maslow scale. Perhaps further
inquiry into the auto-telic personality might enliven this area of research.
Furthermore, Csikszentmihalyi finds an interesting paradox in his studies
comparing flow at work and leisure. Subjects report having many and
varied flow experiences on their jobs when measured through the event-
sampling technique. By comparison, they report fewer flow experiences
when at leisure. Yet when queried, "Did you wish you had been doing
something else?" at the time of sampling, those at work wished they were
otherwise occupied while those in leisure preferred what they were doing.
The author's conclusion: "when at work, people do not heed the evidence of
their senses."
He speculates that people may feel "overchallenged" at their work or,
alternatively, that flow experiences are counterbalanced by people's sense
of coercion on the job. Here is an area where investigations into peer and
supervisory relations and company culture might shed further light. Per-
haps there are conditions that cancel the effects of auto-telic work experi-
ences and inhibit quality of work life. Seymour Sarason, among others, has
commented on how existential doubts and limited resources prevent human
service providers from taking full satisfaction from their challenging work.
Do we know of other flow-canceling conditions?
On a larger scale, Csikszentmihalyi seems to urge workers to control their
consciousness and to try to experience flow while performing otherwise
mundane tasks. This self-help prescription may be valuable, but it damp-
ened my enthusiasm. Readers should note that the book addresses itself to
internal intervention to improve the quality of life. Csikszentmihalyi does not
address broader based structural change save for counsel to turn off the
flow-dampening television and engage in conversation or pick up a good
book.
To be pickier: I was put off by the many "familiar quotations" in the text
used to convey erudition and timelessness. Still, as Cervantes writes, "The
pot calls the kettle black," or, more colloquially, "it takes one to know one."
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640 Academy of Management Review July
I was also bothered by frequent self-references in the notes that lacked
annotation. The author has compiled an impressive body of research,
which is worthy of more detailed exposure.
Crabbing aside, the book is a useful introduction to Csikszentmihalyi's
work and a welcome primer on the psychology of optimal experience. It also
has a self-help quality that is stimulating, thought-provoking, and, for me at
least, genuinely helpful.
Technology and Organizations, by Paul S. Goodman, Lee S.
Sproull, and Associates. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1990, 281
pp., $27.95, cloth.
Organizations and Communication Technology, edited by
Janet Fulk and Charles Steinfield. Newbury Park, CA: Sage
Publications, 1990, 328 pp., $18.95, paper; $38.00, cloth.
Reviewed by Mariann Jelinek, Graduate School of Business Administration,
College of William and Mary, Williamsburg, VA 23185.
At first blush, the notion of reviewing two such apparently different books
as these together seems daunting. Technology and Organizations by Paul
S. Goodman, Lee S. Sproull, and Associates is forthright organization the-
ory, aimed squarely at reconsidering what organizations are today, in light
of the new technologies within them. By contrast, Organizations and Com-
munication Technology, edited by Janet Fulk and Charles Steinfield, un-
dertakes an apparently more limited task, to consider how communications
technology affects such organizational behaviors as media choice, decision
processes (which might be aided by decision support systems), and the like.
These two collections of essays reflect an increasing interest in technology,
and in the broad ramifications of technological change that has become so
pervasive.
A closer look at the essays presented in the two collections suggests some-
thing at once obvious and only just emerging into our theoretical conscious-
ness: not only are computers ubiquitous and their effects pervasive within
organizations but also computers and their pervasive impact have utterly
transformed organizations. What computers have not done, however, is to
render organizations mechanically rational: on the contrary, both collec-
tions make the central point that technology adoption and use are quintes-
sentially human and emotionally charged, continually interpreted acts.
With technology, as with every other facet of human interaction, human
beings understand, act, and make meaning as they go; no technology,
even computer technology replete with algorithms and artificial intelli-
gence, displaces this human fact.
Technology and Organizations is organized, say its authors, by level of
analysis. The essays it contains run the gamut from individual effects and
interaction with technology (Weick's essay, for instance), through work
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