Creating and Sustaining Positive Organizations

By Ryan W. Quinn

Last week, during a presentation, a colleague of mine told a story about a company in China where employees who were not making enough money to support their families were jumping out of the factory dorm windows to their death. My colleague turned to me and asked what I, as a co-author of Lift, would recommend that the company should do. It turns out that the company put nets under the windows and brought entertainers onto the factory floor to help the employees be happier. My colleague told this story to illustrate rampant inequality and the inanity of how many companies make decisions about how to manage their people. I think he called on me to answer this question, however—as opposed to other people in the room—, to make a point about Positive Organizational Scholarship (POS) and Positive Psychology. I think his point may have been that POS is not equipped to deal with hard issues like inequality. (more…)

By Ryan W. Quinn

For the past forty days, we have posted a program on this blog about changing our reactions to negative events. This seems like a useful topic to me, if for no other reason than because there are so many negative events in our world to react to. Dad felt inspired to post the program on our blog because he spent so much of his life struggling to recover from the losses of the Red Sox, and now, finally, has learned how to react differently to that disappointment. The past forty days have given us, as a society, many more serious negative events to contemplate, however, than just the loss of the Red Sox. Today, I have a couple of ruminations on this topic that I feel inclined to share.

One of these ruminations is a memory of an event that happened a day or two after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. At the time, I was a doctoral student in what was then the University of Michigan Business School’s Organizational Behavior and Human Resource Management department (now the “Management and Organizations” department of the “Ross School of Business”). I went to the weekly brown bag seminar held for the faculty and doctoral students, and instead of the usual research presentation, there was an open discussion about the terrorist attacks. (more…)

By Robert E. Quinn

In a blog entry on September 30th, I pointed out that I am a devout Red Sox fan.  This means that there have been many negative events in my life.  After each such event, I spend months trying to recover.  Yet, after the awful collapse of the Red Sox, I felt great.  I felt great because I now choose to live positively when bad things happen.  I also indicated that I would offer a daily program on how to learn to do this. Instructions for the fortieth day of this program can be found by following the link to “more.” (more…)

By Robert E. Quinn

In a blog entry on September 30th, I pointed out that I am a devout Red Sox fan.  This means that there have been many negative events in my life.  After each such event, I spend months trying to recover.  Yet, after the awful collapse of the Red Sox, I felt great.  I felt great because I now choose to live positively when bad things happen.  I also indicated that I would offer a daily program on how to learn to do this. Instructions for the thirty-ninth day of this program can be found by following the link to “more.” (more…)

By Robert E. Quinn

In a blog entry on September 30th, I pointed out that I am a devout Red Sox fan.  This means that there have been many negative events in my life.  After each such event, I spend months trying to recover.  Yet, after the awful collapse of the Red Sox, I felt great.  I felt great because I now choose to live positively when bad things happen.  I also indicated that I would offer a daily program on how to learn to do this. Instructions for the thirty-eighth day of this program can be found by following the link to “more.” (more…)

By Robert E. Quinn

In a blog entry on September 30th, I pointed out that I am a devout Red Sox fan.  This means that there have been many negative events in my life.  After each such event, I spend months trying to recover.  Yet, after the awful collapse of the Red Sox, I felt great.  I felt great because I now choose to live positively when bad things happen.  I also indicated that I would offer a daily program on how to learn to do this. Instructions for the thirty-seventh day of this program can be found by following the link to “more.” (more…)

By Robert E. Quinn

In a blog entry on September 30th, I pointed out that I am a devout Red Sox fan.  This means that there have been many negative events in my life.  After each such event, I spend months trying to recover.  Yet, after the awful collapse of the Red Sox, I felt great.  I felt great because I now choose to live positively when bad things happen.  I also indicated that I would offer a daily program on how to learn to do this. Instructions for the thirty-sixth day of this program can be found by following the link to “more.” (more…)

By Robert E. Quinn

In a blog entry on September 30th, I pointed out that I am a devout Red Sox fan.  This means that there have been many negative events in my life.  After each such event, I spend months trying to recover.  Yet, after the awful collapse of the Red Sox, I felt great.  I felt great because I now choose to live positively when bad things happen.  I also indicated that I would offer a daily program on how to learn to do this. Instructions for the thirty-fifth day of this program can be found by following the link to “more.” (more…)

By Robert E. Quinn

In a blog entry on September 30th, I pointed out that I am a devout Red Sox fan.  This means that there have been many negative events in my life.  After each such event, I spend months trying to recover.  Yet, after the awful collapse of the Red Sox, I felt great.  I felt great because I now choose to live positively when bad things happen.  I also indicated that I would offer a daily program on how to learn to do this. Instructions for the thirty-fourth day of this program can be found by following the link to “more.” (more…)