Exploring Leaders’ Mindfulness in Navigating Organizational Paradox

References

• Andriopoulos C, Lewis MW (2009) Exploitation-exploration tensions and organizational ambidexterity: Managing paradoxes of innovation. Organ. Sci. 20(4):696–717.Link, Google Scholar
• Badham R, King E (2021) Mindfulness at work: A critical re-view. Organization 28(4):531–554.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Barge JK (2014) Pivotal leadership and the art of conversation. Leadership 10(1):56–78.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Barrett F (2012) Say Yes to the Mess: Surprising Leadership Lessons from Jazz (Harvard Business Review, Boston).Google Scholar
• Berti M, Cunha MPe (2022) Paradox, dialectics or trade‐offs? A double loop model of paradox. J. Management Stud. 60(4):861–888.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Boden D (1994) The Business of Talk: Organizations in Action (Polity Press, Cambridge, MA).Google Scholar
• Brach T (2017) The RAIN of self-compassion: A simple practice for clients and clinicians. Loizzo J, Neale M, Wolf EJ, eds. Advances in Contemplative Psychotherapy: Accelerating Healing and Transformation (Routledge, New York), 146–154.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Brummans BHJM (2017) Mindful organizing. Scott CR, Lewis LK eds. The International Encyclopedia of Organizational Communication (Wiley Blackwell, Hoboken, NJ), 1612–1620.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Calabretta G, Gemser G, Wijnberg NM (2017) The interplay between intuition and rationality in strategic decision making: A paradox perspective. Organ. Stud. 38(3–4):365–401.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Carlo JL, Lyytinen K, Boland RJ (2012) Dialectics of collective minding: Contradictory appropriations of information technology in a high-risk project. MIS Quart. 36(4):1081–1108.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Chia R, Holt R (2006) Strategy as practical coping: A Heideggerian perspective. Organ. Stud. 27(5):635–655.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Cunha MP, Simpson AV, Rego A, Berti M (2024) Destructive leadership paradoxes. Schyns B, Neves P, Breevaart K, eds. Research Handbook on Destructive Leadership (Edward Elgar, Cheltenham, UK), 372–400.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Dameron S, Torset C (2014) The discursive construction of strategists’ subjectivities: Towards a paradox lens on strategy. J. Management Stud. 51(2):291–319.Crossref, Google Scholar
• De Cock C, Rickards T (1996) Thinking about organizational change: Towards two kinds of process intervention. Internat. J. Organ. Anal. 4(3):233–251.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Dotov DG, Nie L, Chemero A (2010) A demonstration of the transition from ready-to-hand to unready-to-hand. PLoS One 5(3):e9433.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Edwards D (1996) Discourse and Cognition (Sage, Thousand Oaks, CA).Google Scholar
• Fairhurst GT (2019) Return paradox to the wild? Paradox interventions and their implications. J. Change Management 19(1):6–22.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Fairhurst GT, Putnam LL (2024) Performing Organizational Paradoxes, 1st ed. (Routledge, Milton Park, UK).Google Scholar
• Fetters MD, Curry LA, Creswell JW (2013) Achieving integration in mixed methods designs—Principles and practices. Health Services Res. 48(6 Part 2):2134–2156.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Gaertner SL, Mann JA, Dovidio JF, Murrell AJ, Pomare M (1990) How does cooperation reduce intergroup bias? J. Personality Soc. Psych. 59(4):692–704.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Gaim M (2018) On the emergence and management of paradoxical tensions: The case of architectural firms. Eur. Management J. 36(6):497–518.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Garfinkel H (1967) Studies in Ethnomethodology (Prentice Hall, Englewood Cliffs, NJ).Google Scholar
• Gioia DA, Poole PP (1984) Scripts in organizational behavior. Acad. Management Rev. 9(3):449–459.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Gioia DA, Corley KG, Hamilton AL (2013) Seeking qualitative rigor in inductive research: Notes on the Gioia methodology. Organ. Res. Methods 16(1):15–31.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Grant D, Hardy C, Oswick C, Putnam LL, eds. (2004) The Sage Handbook of Organizational Discourse (Sage, London).Crossref, Google Scholar
• Greenslade-Yeats J, Mharapara TL, Ravenswood K, Clemons JH, Staniland NA (2026) Caught in a “triple bind”: How the physical body experiences paradox. Organ. Stud., ePub ahead of print March 4, https://doi.org/10.1177/01708406261432824.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Gümüsay AA, Smets M, Morris T (2020) “God at work”: Engaging central and incompatible institutional logics through elastic hybridity. Acad. Management J. 63(1):124–154.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Hahn T, Preuss L, Pinkse J, Figge F (2014) Cognitive frames in corporate sustainability: Managerial sensemaking with paradoxical and business case frames. Acad. Management Rev. 39(4):463–487.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Hallier J, Forbes T (2004) In search of theory development in grounded investigations: Doctors’ experiences of managing as an example of fitted and prospective theorizing. J. Management Stud. 41(8):1379–1410.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Heidegger M (1962) Being and Time (Harper & Row, New York).Google Scholar
• Hirsch PM, Levin DZ (1999) Umbrella advocates versus validity police: A life-cycle model. Organ. Sci. 10(2):199–212.Link, Google Scholar
• Islam G, Holm M, Karjalainen M (2022) Sign of the times: Workplace mindfulness as an empty signifier. Organization 29(1):3–29.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Jarzabkowski PA, Lê JK (2017) We have to do this and that? You must be joking: Constructing and responding to paradox through humour. Organ. Stud. 38(3–4):433–462.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Jay J (2013) Navigating paradox as a mechanism of change and innovation in hybrid organizations. Acad. Management J. 56(1):137–159.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Jayyusi L (1984) Categorization and the Moral Order (Routledge & Kegan Paul, Boston).Google Scholar
• Jha AP, Stanley EA, Kiyonaga A, Wong L, Gelfand L (2010) Examining the protective effects of mindfulness training on working memory capacity and affective experience. Emotion 10(1):54–64.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Jian G, Fairhurst GT (2024) Phronetic pivoting between compliance and care: Engaging paradoxes and disequilibrium in organizing risk. Organ. Stud. 46(2):215–245.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Kabat-Zinn J (1994) Wherever You Go, There You Are: Mindfulness Meditation in Everyday Life (Hyperion, New York).Google Scholar
• Kabat-Zinn J (2003) Mindfulness-based stress reduction (MBSR). Constructivism Human Sci. 8(2):73–83.Google Scholar
• Karjalainen M, Islam G, Holm M (2021) Scientization, instrumentalization, and commodification of mindfulness in a professional services firm. Organization 28(3):483–509.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Keller J, Chen EW (2017) A road map of the paradoxical mind. Smith WK, Lewis MW, Jarzabkowski P, Langley A, eds. The Oxford Handbook of Organizational Paradox (Oxford University Press, Oxford, UK), 66–86.Google Scholar
• Keller J, Sadler-Smith E (2019) Paradoxes and dual processes: A review and synthesis. Internat. J. Management Rev. 21(2):162–184.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Knight E, Paroutis S (2017) Becoming salient: The TMT leader’s role in shaping the interpretive context of paradoxical tensions. Organ. Stud. 38(3–4):403–432.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Kreiner GE, Hollensbe E, Sheep ML, Smith BR, Kataria N (2015) Elasticity and the dialectic tensions of organizational identity: How can we hold together while we’re pulling apart? Acad. Management J. 58(4):981–1011.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Krippendorff K (2018) Content Analysis: An Introduction to Its Methodology (Sage, Thousand Oaks, CA).Google Scholar
• Kudesia RS (2019) Mindfulness as metacognitive practice. Acad. Management Rev. 44(2):405–423.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Kudesia RS, Lang T (2022) How do mindfulness and routines relate? Metacognitive practice as resolution to the debate. Galavan RJ, Sund KJ, eds. New Horizons in Managerial and Organizational Cognition (Vol. 5): Thinking About Cognition (Emerald Publishing, Bingley, UK), 9–29.Google Scholar
• Kudesia RS, Lau J (2020) Metacognitive practice: Understanding mindfulness as repeated attempts to understand mindfulness. Dhiman SK, ed. The Routledge Companion to Mindfulness at Work (Routledge, London), 45–69.Google Scholar
• Landis JR, Koch GG (1977) The measurement of observer agreement for categorical data. Biometrics 33(1):159–174.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Langer EJ (1989) Minding matters: The consequences of mindlessness–mindfulness. Berkowitz L, ed. Advances in Experimental Social Psychology, vol. 22 (Academic Press, San Diego), 137–173.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Langer EJ (2000) Mindful learning. Current Directions Psych. Sci. 9(6):220–223.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Lee S, Adair WL, Mannix EA, Kim J (2012) The relational versus collective “We” and intergroup allocation: The role of nested group categorization. J. Experiment. Soc. Psych. 48(5):1132–1138.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Lewis MW (2000) Exploring paradox: Toward a more comprehensive guide. Acad. Management Rev. 25(4):760–776.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Lewis MW, Smith WK (2014) Paradox as a metatheoretical perspective: Sharpening the focus and widening the scope. J. Appl. Behav. Sci. 50(2):127–149.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Lindlof TR, Taylor BC (2017) Qualitative Communication Research Methods (Sage, Thousand Oaks, CA).Google Scholar
• Liu Y, Xu S, Zhang B (2020) Thriving at work: How a paradox mindset influences innovative work behavior. J. Appl. Behav. Sci. 56(3):347–366.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Louis MR, Sutton RI (1991) Switching cognitive gears: From habits of mind to active thinking. Human Relations 44(1):55–76.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Lüscher LS, Lewis MW (2008) Organizational change and managerial sensemaking: Working through paradox. Acad. Management J. 51(2):221–240.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Miron-Spektor E, Ingram A, Keller J, Smith WK, Lewis MW (2018) Microfoundations of organizational paradox: The problem is how we think about the problem. Acad. Management J. 61(1):26–45.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Mitchell JR, Israelsen TL, Mitchell RK, Hua W (2024) Ordinary language and dialogue in entrepreneurship. Acad. Management Rev. 49(2):462–466.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Orton JD (1997) From inductive to iterative grounded theory: Zipping the gap between process theory and process data. Scandinavian J. Management 13(4):419–438.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Potter J, Wetherell M (1987) Discourse and Social Psychology (Sage, London).Google Scholar
• Pradies C (2023) With head and heart: How emotions shape paradox navigation in veterinary work. Acad. Management J. 66(2):521–552.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Putnam LL, Fairhurst GT, Banghart S (2016) Contradictions, dialectics, and paradoxes in organizations: A constitutive approach. Acad. Management Ann. 10(1):65–171.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Qu YE, Todorova G, Dasborough MT, Shi Y (2023) A mindfulness perspective on the link between abusive supervision climate and team conflict. Internat. J. Conflict Management 34(5):907–930.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Reina CS, Kudesia RS (2020) Wherever you go, there you become: How mindfulness arises in everyday situations. Organ. Behav. Human Decision Processes 159(1):78–96.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Rothman NB (2011) Steering sheep: How expressed emotional ambivalence elicits dominance in interdependent decision-making contexts. Organ. Behav. Human Decision Processes 116(1):66–82.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Rothman NB, Northcraft GB (2015) Unlocking integrative potential: Expressed emotional ambivalence and negotiation outcomes. Organ. Behav. Human Decision Processes 126(1):65–76.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Rowlands M (2010) The New Science of the Mind: From Extended Mind to Embodied Phenomenology (Boston Review, Boston).Crossref, Google Scholar
• Saldaña J (2016) The Coding Manual for Qualitative Research (Sage, Los Angeles).Google Scholar
• Sandberg J, Tsoukas H (2020) Sensemaking reconsidered: Towards a broader understanding through phenomenology. Organ. Theory 1(1):263178771987993.Google Scholar
• Schank R, Abelson RP (1977) Scripts, Plans, Goals and Understanding: An Inquiry into Human Knowledge Structures (Erlbaum, Mahwah, NJ).Google Scholar
• Scott M, Lyman S (1968) Accounts. Amer. Sociol. Rev. 33(1):46–62.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Shapiro SL, Siegel RD, Neff KD (2018) Paradoxes of mindfulness. Mindfulness 9(6):1693–1701.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Sheep ML, Fairhurst GT, Khazanchi S (2017) Knots in the discourse of innovation: Investigating multiple tensions in a reacquired spin-off. Organ. Stud. 38(3–4):463–488.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Smith KK, Berg DN (1987) Paradoxes of Group Life: Understanding Conflict, Paralysis, and Movement in Group Dynamics (Jossey-Bass, San Francisco).Google Scholar
• Smith WK (2014) Dynamic decision making: A model of senior leaders managing strategic paradoxes. Acad. Management J. 57(6):1592–1623.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Smith WK, Besharov ML (2019) Bowing before dual gods: How structured flexibility sustains organizational hybridity. Admin. Sci. Quart. 64(1):1–44.Google Scholar
• Smith WK, Lewis MW (2011) Toward a theory of paradox: A dynamic equilibrium model of organizing. Acad. Management Rev. 36(2):381–403.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Smith WK, Lewis MW (2022) Both/and Thinking: Embracing Creative Tensions to Solve Your Toughest Problems (Harvard Business School Press, Boston).Google Scholar
• Smith WK, Besharov ML, Wessels AK, Chertok M (2012) A paradoxical leadership model for social entrepreneurs: Challenges, leadership skills, and pedagogical tools for managing social and commercial demands. Acad. Management Learn. Ed. 11(3):463–478.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Song H-C (2025) A Buddhist mindfulness view of paradox: Silence and skepticism of language to dismantle paradoxes. Organ. Sci. 36(1):361–386.Link, Google Scholar
• Town S, Reina CS, Brummans BHJM, Pirson M (2024) Humanistic organizing: The transformative force of mindful organizational communication. Acad. Management Rev. 49(4):824–847.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Tracy SJ (2025) Qualitative Research Methods: Collecting Evidence, Crafting Analysis, Communicating Impact, 3rd ed. (John Wiley and Sons, Hoboken, NJ).Google Scholar
• Trethewey A, Ashcraft KL (2004) Practicing disorganization: The development of applied perspectives on living with tension. J. Appl. Comm. Res. 32(1):81–88.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Undheim TA (2003) Getting connected: How sociologists can access the high-tech elite. Qualitative Rep. 8(1):104–128.Google Scholar
• Vince R, Broussine M (1996) Paradox, defense and attachment: Accessing and working with emotions and relations underlying organizational change. Organ. Stud. 17(1):1–21.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Vince R, Mohamed M (2025) Emotion and paradox: Engaging with emotional dynamics that underpin organizational paradox. Acad. Management Learn. Ed. 24(3):397–411.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Weick K (1979) The Social Psychology of Organizing, 2nd ed. (McGraw-Hill, New York).Google Scholar
• Weick K, Roberts K (1993) Collective mind in organizations: Heedful interrelating on flight decks. Admin. Sci. Quart. 38(3):357–381.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Weick KE, Sutcliffe KM (2006) Mindfulness and the quality of organizational attention. Organ. Sci. 17(4):514–524.Link, Google Scholar
• Weick KE, Sutcliffe KM, Obstfeld D (1999) Organizing for high reliability: Processes of collective mindfulness. Res. Organ. Behav. 21(1):81–123.Google Scholar
• Weick KE, Sutcliffe KM, Obstfeld D (2005) Organizing and the process of sensemaking. Organ. Sci. 16(4):409–421.Link, Google Scholar
• Weiser AK, Laamanen T (2022) Extending the dynamic equilibrium model of paradox: Unveiling the dissipative dynamics in organizations. Organ. Theory 3(3):26317877221090317.Google Scholar
• Wells A, Matthews G (2014) Attention and Emotion: A Clinical Perspective, classic edition (Psychology Press, New York).Google Scholar
• Wetherell M (1998) Positioning and interpretative repertoires: Conversation analysis and post-structuralism in dialogue. Discourse Soc. 9(3):387–412.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Wheeler M (2005) Reconstructing the Cognitive World: The Next Step (MIT Press, Cambridge, MA).Crossref, Google Scholar
• Wright R (2017) Why Buddhism Is True: The Science and Philosophy of Meditation and Enlightenment (Simon and Schuster, New York).Google Scholar
• Yanow D, Tsoukas H (2009) What is reflection-in-action? A phenomenological account. J. Management Stud. 46(8):1339–1364.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Zellweger T (2014) Toward a paradox perspective of family firms: The moderating role of collective mindfulness of controlling families. Melin L, Nordqvist M, Sharma P, eds. The SAGE Handbook of Family Business (Sage, London), 648–656.Crossref, Google Scholar
• Zhang Y, Waldman DA, Han YL, Li XB (2015) Paradoxical leader behaviors in people management: Antecedents and consequences. Acad. Management J. 58(2):538–566.Crossref, Google Scholar