Rethinking and Refreshing the 'Positive' in Organizational Communication Scholarship: Inspiration from an Eastern Spiritual Philosophy

• In Event: Cultural Lessons for Organizational Scholarship

Abstract

Positive organizational scholarship (POS) has been heavily critiqued for its label of being “positive”. This paper places POS critiques in the historical context of Western philosophical thought. It then turns to eastern spiritual philosophy for inspiration to rethink the definition of “positive”. Finally, building on the work of Cheney et al (2008), this paper advocates that Communication scholars can play an important role in reconceptualizing the definition of “positive” via the study of meaningful work.

Author

• Terrie Siang-Ting Wong, Arizona State University