Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

The Multi-dimensional Character of Wisdom

  • Chapter
Wise Management in Organisational Complexity

Abstract

Human life is most meaningful and happy when we create the conditions of our happiness by living the virtuous life. This Aristotelian notion of eudaimonia, or to use Nussbaum’s (1994) term, ‘human flourishing’ or ‘wellbeing’, lies at the core of my theoretical approach to wisdom. It is also the foundation of the ongoing wisdom research project in which I and my colleagues are involved. This project took as its starting point, and continues to be driven by, my conviction that wisdom should underlie the management of people and the organisations in which they work and/or live (McKenna, Rooney and Boal, 2009; Rooney, McKenna and Liesch, 2010). This chapter is in five parts: (1) The characteristics of wisdom; (2) Wisdom within a tri-level framework; (3) Can or should wisdom be measured?; (4) Core elements of wisdom; and (5) Wisdom in the face of dealing with paradox, complexity and incommensurability.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Log in via an institution
eBook
USD 16.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Softcover Book
USD 16.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Compact, lightweight edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info
Hardcover Book
USD 54.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Durable hardcover edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Institutional subscriptions

Preview

Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.

Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  • Ardelt, M. (2003). ‘Empirical Assessment of a Three-dimensional Wisdom Scale’. Research on Aging, 25 (3): 275–324.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Ardelt, M. (2004). ‘Wisdom as Expert Knowledge System: A Critical Review of a Contemporary Operationalization of an Ancient Concept’. Human Development, 47(5): 257–85.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Aristotle (1960). Posterior Analytics. Harvard University Press, London.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Aristotle (1984). Nicomachean Ethics, trans. H.G. Apostle. The Peripatetic Press, Grinnell, IO.

    Google Scholar 

  • Australian Medical Association (2011). ‘2010–11 AMA Indigenous health report card — Best practice in primary health care for Aboriginal peoples and Torres Strait Islanders’ (May). Available at http://ama.com.au/node/6629#anchorthree.

    Google Scholar 

  • Australian Public Service Commission (2007). ‘Tackling wicked problems: A public policy perspective’. APSC, Canberra.

    Google Scholar 

  • Avolio, B.J., F.O. Walumbwa and T.J. Weber (2009). ‘Leadership: Current Theories, Research, and Future Directions’. Annual Review of Psychology, 60: 421–49.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Axelrod, R. (1997). The Complexity of Cooperation: Agent-based Models of Cooperation and Collaboration. Princeton University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Baltes, P.B. (1993). ‘The Aging Mind: Potential and Limits’. The Gerontologist, 33(5): 580–94.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Baltes, P.B., and U. Kunzmann (2004). ‘The Two Faces of Wisdom: Wisdom as a Gneral Theory of Knowledge and Judgment about Excellence in Mind and Virtue vs. Wisdom as Everyday Realization in People and Products’. Human Development, 47(5): 290–9.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Baltes, P.B., and U.M. Staudinger (2000). ‘A Metaheuristic (Pragmatic) to Orchestrate Mind and Virtue toward Excellence’. American Psychologist, 55(1): 122–36.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Barker, E.M. (2005). ‘Aristotle’s Reform of Paideia’. Available at www.bu.edu/wcp/Papers/Anci/AnciBark.htm.

    Google Scholar 

  • Benedict, B.M. (2001). Curiosity: A Cultural History of Early Modern Inquiry. University of Chicago Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bergsma, A., and M. Ardelt (2012). ‘Self-reported Wisdom and Happiness: n Empirical Investigation’. Journal of Happiness Studies, 13(3): 481–99.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Berlin, I. (2000). The Power of Ideas. Princeton University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bigelow, J. (1992). ‘Developing Managerial Wisdom’. Journal of Management Inquiry, 1(2): 143–53.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Biggart, N.W., and T.D. Beamish (2003). ‘The Economic Sociology of Conventions: Habit, Custom, Practice, and Routine in Market Order’. Annual Review of Sociology, 29: 443–64.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bligh, M.C., C.L. Pearce and J.C. Kohles (2006). ‘The Importance of Self- and Shared Leadership in Team-based Knowledge Work: A Meso-level Model of Leadership Dynamics’. Journal of Managerial Psychology, 21(4): 296–318.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bourdieu, P., and T. Eagleton (1992). ‘Doxa and Common Life: In Conversation’. New Left Review, 191: 111–21.

    Google Scholar 

  • Brown, S.C. (2004). ‘Learning across the Campus: How College Facilitates the Development of Wisdom’. Journal of College Student Development, 45(2): 134–48.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Clayton, V.P., and J.E. Birren (1980). ‘The Development of Wisdom across the Life-span: A Reexamination of an Ancient Topic’. In P.B. Baltes and O.G. Grim Jr (eds), Life-span Development and Behavior, vol. 3, pp. 103–35. Academic Press, New York.

    Google Scholar 

  • Dunne, J. (1997). Back to the Rough Ground: Practical Judgement and the Lure of Technique. University of Notre Dame Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Eccles, J.S., and A. Wigfield (2002). ‘Motivational Beliefs, Values, and Goals’. Annual Review of Psychology, 53: 109–33.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Edwards, M.G. (2010). Organisational Transformation for Sustainability: An Integral Metatheory. Routledge, London.

    Google Scholar 

  • Eflin, J. (2003). ‘Epistemic Presuppositions and Their Consequences’. Metaphilosophy, 34(1/2): 48–67.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Flyvbjerg, B. (2004). ‘Phronetic Planning Research: Theoretical and Methodological Reflections’. Planning Theory and Practice, 5(3): 283–306.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Foucault, M. (1967). Madness and Civilization: A History of Insanity in the Age of Reason. Tavistock Publications, London.

    Google Scholar 

  • Foucault, M. (1978). ‘Politics and the Study of Discourse’. Ideology and Consciousness, 3: 7–26.

    Google Scholar 

  • Foucault, M. (1980). ‘Truth and Power’. In C. Gordon (ed.), Power/knowledge: Selected Interviews and Other Writings, 1972–1977, pp. 107–33. Pantheon Books, New York.

    Google Scholar 

  • Frank, R.H. (1988). Passions without Reason. Norton, New York.

    Google Scholar 

  • Giddens, A. (1984). The Constitution of Society: Outline of a Theory of Structuration. Polity Press, Cambridge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Greene, J.A., and S.C. Brown (2009). ‘The Wisdom Development Scale: Further Validity Investigations’. International Journal of Aging and Human Development, 68(4): 289–320.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Hannah, S.T., B.J. Avolio and D.R. May (2011). ‘Moral Maturation and Moral Conation: A Capacity Approach to Explaining Moral Thought and Action’. Academy of Management Review 36(4): 663–85.

    Google Scholar 

  • Head, B. (2008). ‘Wicked Problems in Public Policy’. Public Policy, 3(2): 101–18.

    Google Scholar 

  • Horn, J.L., and R.B. Cattell (1967). ‘Age Differences in Fluid and Crystallized Intelligence’. Acta Psychologica, 26: 107–29.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • House, R., D.M. Rousseau and M. Thomas-Hunt (1995). ‘The Meso Paradigm: A Framework for the Integration of Micro and Macro Organizational Behavior’. Research in Organizational Behavior, 17(1): 71–114.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hughes, G.J. (2001). Aristotle on Ethics. Routledge, London.

    Google Scholar 

  • Indick, W. (2002). ‘Fight the Power: The Limits of Empiricism and the Costs of Positivistic Rigor’. Journal of Psychology, 136(1): 21–36.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Kekes, J. (1995). Moral Wisdom and Good Lives. Cornell University Press, Ithaca and London.

    Google Scholar 

  • Keyes, C.L., D. Shmotkin and C.D. Ryff (2002). ‘Optimizing Well-being: The Empirical Encounter of Two Traditions’. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 82(6): 1007–22.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Korff, J. (2012). ‘Aboriginal Prison Rates’. Sydney, Australia: Creative Spirits. Available at www.creativespirits.info/aboriginalculture/law.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kozlowski, S.W.J., and K.J. Klein (2000). ‘A Multi-level Approach to Theory and Research in Organizations: Contextual, Temporal, and Emergent Processes’. In idem (eds), Multilevel Theory, Research, and Methods in Organizations, pp. 3–90. Jossey-Bass, San Francisco.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kriger, M.P., and L.-C. Malan (1993). ‘Shifting Paradigms: The Valuing of Personal Knowledge, Wisdom, and Other Invisible Processes in Organizations’. Journal of Management Inquiry, 2(4): 391–8.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Lansing, J.S. (2003). ‘Complex Adaptive Systems’. Annual Review of Anthropology, 32: 183–204.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Limas, M.J., and R.O. Hansson (2004). ‘Organizational Wisdom’. International Journal of Aging and Human Development, 59(2): 85–103.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Long, C.P. (2002). ‘The Ontological Reappropriation of Phronèsis’. Continental Philosophy, 35(1): 35–60.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Malan, L.-C., and M.P. Kriger (1998). ‘Making Sense of Managerial Wisdom’. Journal of Management Inquiry, 7(3): 242–51.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Mathieu, J.E., and G. Chen (2011). ‘The Etiology of the Multilevel Paradigm in Management Research’. Journal of Management, 37(2): 610–41.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • McKenna, B., and D. Rooney (2008). ‘Wise Leadership and the Capacity for Ontological Acuity’. Management Communication Quarterly, 21(4): 537–46.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • McKenna, B., D. Rooney and K.B. Boal (2009). ‘Wisdom Principles as a Metatheoretical Basis for Evaluating Leadership’. Leadership Quarterly, 20(2): 177–90.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Mickler, C., and U.M. Staudinger (2008). ‘Personal Wisdom: Validation and Age-related Differences of a Performance Measure’. Psychology and Aging, 23(4): 787–99.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Miner, R.C. (1998). ‘Verum-Factum and Practical Pisdom in the Early Writings of Giambattista Vico’. Journal of the History of Ideas, 59(1): 53–73.

    Google Scholar 

  • Nussbaum, M. (1994). The Therapy of Desire: Theory and Practice in Hellenistic Ethics. Princeton University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Pearson, Noel (2011a). ‘Individualism versus communalism’. The Australian (6 August). Available at www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs.

    Google Scholar 

  • Pearson, Noel (2011b). ‘Job-service parasites get rich living off the unemployed’. The Australian (3 September). Available at www.theaustralian.com.au/news/opinion.

    Google Scholar 

  • Podsakoff, P.M., S.B. MacKenzie, J.-Y. Lee and N.P. Podsakoff (2003). ‘Common Method Biases in Behavioral Research: A Critical Review of the Literature and Recommended Remedies’. Journal of Applied Psychology, 88(5): 879–903.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Polanyi, M. (1967). The Tacit Dimension. Doubleday, Garden City.

    Google Scholar 

  • Rooney, D., B. McKenna and P. Liesch (2010). Wisdom and Management in the Knowledge Economy. Routledge, New York.

    Google Scholar 

  • Rousseau, D.M., and R.J. House (1994). ‘Meso Organizational Behavior: Avoiding Three Fundamental Biases’. In C.L. Cooper and D.M. Rousseau (eds), Trends in Organizational Behavior, pp. 13–30. Wiley, Chichester, UK.

    Google Scholar 

  • Ryff, C.D., and C.L.M. Keyes (1995). ‘The Structure of Psychological Wellbeing Revisited’. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 69(1): 719–27.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Ryff, C.D., and B.H. Singer (2000). ‘Interpersonal Flourishing: A Positive Health Agenda for the New Millenium’. Personality and Social Psychology Review, 4: 30–44.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Ryff, C.D., and B.H. Singer (2008). ‘Know Thyself and Become What You Are: A Eudaimonic Approach to Psychological Well-being’. Journal of Happiness Studies, 9(1): 13–39.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Sherman, N. (1997). Making a Necessity of Virtue: Aristotle and Kant on Virtue. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge and New York.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Snowden, D.J., and M. Boone (2007). ‘A Leader’s Framework for Decision Making’. Harvard Business Review (November): 69–76.

    Google Scholar 

  • Staudinger, U.M., and L. Glück (2011). ‘Psychological Wisdom Research: Commonalities and Differences in a Growing Field’. Annual Review of Psychology, 62: 215–41.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Sternberg, R.J. (1990). Wisdom: Its Nature, Origins and Development. Cambridge University Press.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Sternberg, R.J. (1996). ‘Styles of Thinking’. In P.B. Baltes and U.M. Staudinger (eds), Interactive Minds: Life-span Perspectives on the Social Foundation of Cognition, pp. 347–65. Cambridge University Press, New York.

    Google Scholar 

  • Sternberg, R.J. (1998). ‘A Balance Theory of Wisdom’. Review of General Psychology, 2(4): 347–65.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Sternberg, R.J. (2003). ‘WICS: A Model of Leadership in Organizations’. Academy of Management Learning and Education, 2(4): 386–401.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Sternberg, R.J. (2004a). ‘What Is Wisdom and How Can We Develop It?’ Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, 591(1): 164–74.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Sternberg, R.J. (2004b). ‘Words to the Wise about Wisdom? A Commentary on Ardelt’s Critique of Baltes’. Human Development, 47(5): 286–89.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Sternberg, R.J. (2005). ‘Foolishness’. In R.J. Sternberg and J. Jordan (eds), A Handbook of Wisdom: Psychological Perspectives, pp. 331–52. Cambridge University Press, New York.

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  • Webster, J.D. (2003). ‘An Exploratory Analysis of a Self-assessed Wisdom Scale’. Journal of Adult Development, 10(1): 13–22.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Webster, J.D. (2007). ‘Measuring the Character Strength of Wisdom’. International Journal of Aging and Human Development, 65(2): 163–83.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Webster, J.D. (2010). ‘Wisdom and Positive Psychosocial Values in Young Adulthood’. Journal of Adult Development, 17(2): 70–80.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Whittaker, J. (2011). ‘The massive indigenous employment gap stagnates’. Melbourne, Australia: Crikey.dot.com. Available at www.crikey.com.au/2011/07/01.

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Authors
  1. Bernard McKenna
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. China Europe International Business School, China

    Mike J. Thompson  & David Bevan  & 

Copyright information

© 2013 Bernard McKenna

About this chapter

Cite this chapter

McKenna, B. (2013). The Multi-dimensional Character of Wisdom. In: Thompson, M.J., Bevan, D. (eds) Wise Management in Organisational Complexity. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137002655_2

Download citation

Publish with us

Policies and ethics

Search

Navigation