Mindfulness and the Quality of Organizational Attention

Karl E. Weick () and Kathleen M. Sutcliffe ()
Additional contact information
Karl E. Weick: Stephen M. Ross School of Business, University of Michigan, 701 Tappan Street, Ann Arbor, Michigan 48109-1234
Kathleen M. Sutcliffe: Stephen M. Ross School of Business, University of Michigan, 701 Tappan Street, Ann Arbor, Michigan 48109-1234

Organization Science, 2006, vol. 17, issue 4, 514-524

Abstract: Mindfulness as depicted by Levinthal and Rerup (2006) involves encoding ambiguous outcomes in ways that influence learning, and encoding stimuli in ways that match context with a repertoire of routines. We add to Levinthal and Rerup’s conjectures by examining Western and Eastern versions of mindfulness and how they function as a process of knowing an object. In our expanded view, encoding becomes less central. What becomes more central are activities such as altering the codes, differentiating the codes, introspecting the coding process itself, and, most of all, reducing the overall dependence on coding and codes. Consequently, we shift from Levinthal and Rerup’s contrast between mindful and less mindful to a contrast between conceptual and less conceptual. When people move away from conceptuality and encoding, outcomes are affected more by the quality than by the quantity of attention.

Keywords: mindfulness; attention; encoding; conceptualizing; mindful organizing (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2006
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (102)

Downloads: (external link)
http://dx.doi.org/10.1287/orsc.1060.0196 (application/pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:inm:ororsc:v:17:y:2006:i:4:p:514-524

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in Organization Science from INFORMS Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Chris Asher ().