Negative capability: Managing the confusing uncertainties of change
By R. French. 2001
128 citations recorded by the source corpus.
Explores how psychoanalytic thinking can contribute to the management of the conflicting emotions stimulated by change. Suggests that successful change management depends on a combination of “positive” and “negative” capabilities. The positive capabilities involve the management of the substantive content of any change initiative, the change process itself, and the roles and procedures required by both of these. However, even when these three “technical” aspects are well managed, change always arouses anxiety and uncertainty. As a result, there is a tendency to “disperse” energy; that is, to be deflected from the task into a range of avoidance tactics. Through a particular understanding of such “dispersal” and its opposite, the “capacity to contain”, psychoanalysis can suggest how this counterproductive tendency may be more effectively managed. The British psychoanalyst Wilfred Bion called this capacity to contain “negative capability”.
Subfields: Clinical Psychology, Organizational Behavior and Human Resource Management
View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/9b7137757db2e98d103366930cf4c719f6f806d9
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In Clinical Psychology
In Organizational Behavior and Human Resource Management
Citations in the corpus
- Narrative identity construction in times of career change: Taking note of unconscious desires (2015, background): “By drawing attention to their deep-seated, inner experiences (French, 2001; Kets de Vries and Balazs, 1998), psychoanalysis, perhaps uniquely, appreciates identity as informed and mediated by a thick layer of unconscious desires, emotions and fantasies (Antonacopoulou and Gabriel, 2001).”
- Minds, Hearts and Deeds: Cognitive, Affective and Behavioural Responses to Change (2006, background): “Positive cognitions should lead to positive emotions that could range in intensity from exhilaration and enthusiasm to pleasure and contentment (French, 2001; Antonacopoulou and Gabriel, 2001).”
- Imagination and Creativity in Organizations (2018, background): “…2006; Weick, 1989) as well as a whole host of organisational phenomena, including: leadership (Simpson, French, & Harvey, 2002); organisational change (French, 2001; Morgan, 1997); management education (Saggurthi & Thakur, 2016); framing (Werner & Cornelissen, 2014); and play (Hjorth, 2005).”