Dreams and the organization

Citation

Schiavone, F. (2013), "Dreams and the organization", Journal of Organizational Change Management, Vol. 26 No. 4. https://doi.org/10.1108/jocm.2013.02326daa.001

Dreams and the organization

Article Type: Guest editorial From: Journal of Organizational Change Management, Volume 26, Issue 4

The “psychoanalytic view” of organizations is a promising and emerging domain of study within the research about organizational change. Organizational communication is a case in point. Open communication between employees is useful to overcome their psychological barriers and defensive behaviors towards change (Willcocks and Rees, 1995). Models of psychodynamics, introduced through psychoanalytical classics (see Jung’s archetypes), are often perceived as providing a general framework for management and change (Carr, 2002). In every company there is an “unmanaged organization”, a critical terrain governed by subjectivity – in which organizational myths and fantasies emerge (Gabriel, 1995). More recently, just in 2012 a special issue from Organization Studies published a number of articles about the contribution of psychoanalysis to organization and management studies.

The concept of a dream is often used indirectly in many branches of management and organization studies. Freud (1900) defines dreams as forms of “wish fulfillment”, attempts by the unconscious to resolve a conflict of some sort, whether something recent or something from the recesses of the past. Dreams are an uncontrolled, but exploitable in some extent, source of individual creativity promoting organizational change. History of arts and sciences is plenty of anecdotes: the Italian violinist Giuseppe Tartini composed his masterpiece Devil’s Trill Sonata after dreaming he sold his soul to the devil; Robert Louis Stevenson had many ideas for Doctor Jeckyll and Mr Hyde by dreaming. Dreams could enhance problem solving by suggesting creative solutions. For instance, the German chemist Friederich Kekule claimed his Nobel-prize winning realization of the atomic structure of the benzene molecule as hexagonal rather than straight came after dreaming of a snake grasping its tail in its mouth.

Dreams and visions were often cited as critical drivers for individuals managing and organizing companies. For instance, over the first half of the last century the success of Fordism and mass-production are strictly related to the diffusion of the “American Dream” within that society in that historical time. Many organizational and product innovations would not be developed without the dreams and visions of an entrepreneur, a manager or an R&D engineer. Ulrich (2007) suggested that dreams offer mental prescriptions to organizations in order to define their future human resources needs. Freud ideas had a great appeal for those working in the industries of marketing and public relations. Subliminal advertising lies on these conceptions about individual unconscious (Desmond, 2012).

Psychoanalysis literature, however, reports that dreams can have a wider and deeper impact on the theory, analysis and practice about organizations. For instance, the social dreaming methodology by Gordon Lawrence (1998) uses dreams and unconscious as indicators of social phenomena to analyse organizations. This methodology is closely related to the idea of “collective unconscious” by Carl Jung. According to Jung, collective unconscious is an untapped source of positive, adaptive and creative potential. Jung (1959, p. 55) argues that:

[…] in addition to our immediate consciousness, which is of a thoroughly personal nature and which we believe to be the only empirical psyche (even if we tack on the personal unconscious as an appendix), there exists a second psychic system of a collective, universal, and impersonal nature which is identical in all individuals. This collective unconscious does not develop individually but is inherited. It consists of pre-existent forms, the archetypes, which can only become conscious secondarily and which give definite form to certain psychic contents.

Jung’s archetypes are similar to logical categories (e.g. “the good employee”). These collective categories within organizations co-work with individual unconscious pressures and shape the daily life, routines, codes, symbols, activities, planning and evolutionary dynamics of companies.

Based on these uncontestable assumptions, this issue brings together an eclectic range of theoretical and research articles that offer new insights about psychoanalysis, organization and management studies. The main general result of these works is the discovery of a close connection between the unconscious dynamics of people and the management of companies. Such circle is evident in all the most important domains of organizational activity. Drawing on this conclusion, the intent of this issue is to stimulate further interdisciplinary studies and researches about the intriguing link between dreams, management and organization.

Professor Paul Moxnes, in his invited article, explores effects of archetypes on collective fantasies and covert ideations and argues that archetypal fantasies, dreams and emotions impact organizational performance all the way down to the bottom line. The author maintains that role-figures in fairy tales and mythology can teach us significant lessons about the management of organizations. The impact of the Hero archetype is elaborated in particular. In order to manage hidden, yet important, dimensions of organizational life, the study of managerial behavior should focus more upon archetypal dimensions of human interaction.

The second (invited) article, by John Desmond, first discusses the organization of dreams, proper to the neurotic subject. Freud’s Dream of Irma, illustrates the operation of unconscious repression and the limits of introspection to understanding the latent meaning of the dream. Relations between psychic and social organization are addressed next by drawing upon the argument that the former changes its character in response to changes in the latter. Discussion of character in relation to organization usefully illustrates the different fantasies constructed by each character type. However, the construction of a rather hard-edged difference between organization and character, distracts attention from the inter-individual level of organization, illustrated by the dream of La Belle Bouchère. Dreams of organization are discussed in relation to The Dream of the Burning Child. Freud’s interpretation is contrasted with that of Lacan, to illustrate the latter’s paradoxical assertion that dreams are phantasms which are more real than the everyday reality we take for granted. In this understanding, what is taken as quotidian organizational life is itself a fantasy that can be unsettled by dreams.

The third article, by Mary Louise Brown, Seonaidh McDonald and Fiona Smith, considers organizational identity and the way in which cultural change involves repercussions at an unconscious, psychodynamic level. It considers, in Jungian terms, the nature of the relationship between individuals and their organization, and archetypal themes influencing both. Social enterprises in Britain face many challenges in retaining their aims to address issues of social deprivation, whilst at the same time being urged to become more commercially oriented, thus experiencing tension between the need for both philanthropy and commercial pragmatism. The authors investigated a purposive sample of social enterprises and their leaders, to discover the archetypal themes influencing their strategies for change. Respondents appeared driven either by the archetype of entrepreneur or social reformer. It is suggested that engaging with the individuation process may assist organizations and their leaders to make better sense of the ambiguities of the change process.

The question of whether the words “American Dream” point to something of substance is at the heart of the article by Alexis Downs and Tracy Stetson. The authors analyse the Dream and the construction of an American identity by examining the accounts of men who represent the American Dream: US Presidential candidates. Downs and Stetson view the tax returns and speeches of Presidential candidates Barack Obama and Mitt Romney through the lens of the psychoanalytic theories of Jacques Lacan. American Dream is treated a construct of the imaginary and symbolic orders. The authors find that the candidates’ efforts to be transparent advertise an ideal: the ideal of a “perfect-able” American who lives the Dream. It is an ideal against which the candidates fail because it is the discourse of the other.

Manlio Del Giudice, Maria Rosaria Della Peruta, and Vincenzo Maggioni explore, in the fifth article of this issue, the pivotal nature of symbolic/unconscious cognitive processes in creating and maintaining systems of shared meaning that facilitate organized action in family firms. One predominant aspect of high intentionality for business owning families is the commitment to the transfer of the “business dream”. The authors argue that succession to a nonfamily professional manager instead of to another family member implies the need for socio-emotional sensitivity in the governance of family firms. Based on a review of selected literature on agency and stewardship theory and with insights from psychoanalytic view of organizations, the authors draw on multi-method research designs to strengthen the empirical integrity and practical usefulness of governance and psychoanalytic views in realistic assumptions about behavioral schemas.

I thank all the colleagues who contributed as reviewers to the development of this issue. A special acknowledgment goes to Professor Slawek Magala, Editor in Chief of the Journal of Organizational Change Management, for his insightful suggestions and guidance on my activity of Guest Editor. I thank also Professor Monika Kostera for her valuable and appreciated support.

Francesco SchiavoneGuest Editor