The affective foundations of high‐reliability organizing

• Author: Naomi B. Rothman,Kathleen M. Sutcliffe,Timothy J. Vogus,Karl E. Weick
• Date: 01 May 2014
• Published date: 01 May 2014
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1002/job.1922

The affective foundations of high-reliability

organizing

TIMOTHY J. VOGUS

1

*, NAOMI B. ROTHMAN

2

, KATHLEEN M. SUTCLIFFE

3

AND KARL E. WEICK

3

1

Vanderbilt Owen Graduate School of Management, Nashville, Tennessee, U.S.A.

2

College of Business and Economics, Lehigh University, Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, U.S.A.

3

Stephen M. Ross School of Business, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan, U.S.A.

Summary The factors that compel individuals to exert the extraordinary effort needed to create high reliability—consis-

tent error-free performance under trying conditions—remain unspecified. Here, we propose that when indi-

viduals experience emotional ambivalence and prosocial motivation, it induces the broad thinking and

other-orientation that undergird mindful organizing and high reliability. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley &

Sons, Ltd.

Keywords: high reliability; mindful organizing; prosocial motivation; emotional ambivalence

High-reliability organizations (HROs) such as aircraft-carrier flight decks (Weick & Roberts, 1993) and nuclear

power control rooms (Schulman, 1993) consistently navigate complex, dynamic, and time-pressured conditions

in an error-free manner. Research shows highly reliable performance results from mindful organizing—a collective

behavioral capability to detect and correct errors and adapt to unexpected events (Weick & Sutcliffe, 2007). The

specific behaviors by which members of an organization enact mindful organizing include discussing potential

sources of system failure, questioning assumptions and received wisdom about their work, discussing ways to learn

from errors and near misses, and drawing upon and deferring to each other’sexpertisewhenneeded(Weick&

Sutcliffe, 2007).

Mindful organizing is relevant to organizations of all kinds (Vogus & Welbourne, 2003). For example, its

omission is evident in the recent difficult launch of Healthcare.gov where reports suggest low levels of mindful

organizing such as failing to identify sources of problems, question unrealistic assumptions, and defer to developer

expertise regarding system readiness (Sun & Wilson, 2013). A key challenge for mindful organizing is sustaining

the high levels of discretionary effort (Levinthal & Rerup, 2006) and attentiveness it demands. More specifically,

maintaining highly reliable performance requires frontline employees to engage in effort that is “beyond the levels

attained at psychological and cultural equilibria for human beings”(Schulman, 1993, p. 368). The question that we

examine and that remains poorly understood is how do the individuals comprising HROs sustain the extraordinary

levels of effort and broad thinking needed to mindfully organize?

The answer we propose is that mindful organizing is more likely when individuals are other-oriented, meaning

that they are motivated to work for the benefit of others and are more receptive to others’perspectives and

incorporate those perspectives into their work. Two factors make individuals more receptive to others and fuel

mindful organizing and highly reliable performance: (1) prosocial motivation, the desire to expend effort to benefit

others (Grant, 2008), and (2) emotional ambivalence, the simultaneous experience of positive and negative emotions

such as hope and doubt. By orienting individuals toward others—making them sensitive to the needs of others and

worried about others’potential failures—prosocial motivation (Grant, 2008) strengthens individuals’orientation

*Correspondence to: Timothy J. Vogus, Vanderbilt Owen Graduate School of Management,401 21st Avenue South, Nashville, Tennessee 37203,

U.S.A. E-mail: timothy.vogus@owen.vanderbilt.edu

Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Received 04 January2014, Accepted 06 January 2014

Journal of Organizational Behavior, J. Organiz. Behav. 35, 592–596 (2014)

Published online 8 February 2014 in Wiley Online Library (wileyonlinelibrary.com) DOI: 10.1002/job.1922

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