Creating Positive Organisations Conference

Positive Organisational Scholarship has become a major focus for organisations and empowers leaders to create positive work environments, improving the culture of their workplace and helping them discover what is possible with their employees and within their organisations.

CPD Points: 10 CEUs

Positive Organisational Scholarship has become a major focus for organisations and empowers leaders to create positive work environments, improving the culture of their workplace and helping them discover what is possible with their employees and within their organisations. By bringing empathy, compassion, and energy into the workplace, leaders are able to enhance engagement and performance, and inspire their employees to innovate, find opportunity, and strive for excellence. Positive Organisational Scholarship principles create a generative business setting and act as a catalyst in the discovery of human potential.

The Center for Positive Organisations is a community dedicated to positively energizing and transforming organisations and the people who lead them through Positive Organisational Scholarship. The study and perspective of Positive Organisational Scholarship is committed to revealing and nurturing the highest level of human potential, and it strives to answer questions like:

What makes employees feel like they're thriving?
How can I bring my organisation through difficult times stronger than before?
What creates the positive energy a team needs to be successful?

Prof Kim Cameron, Global Pioneer of Positive Organisational Scholarship and Associate Dean for Executive Education at Ross School of Business at the University of Michigan, will be delivering a keynote and half-day workshop (from 08:30 to 12:00 on both days) on the effects of positive practices on organisational performance and the effects of positive leadership.

Research has shown that high performing companies have more positive employees than their negative poor performing counterparts. (Cameron, Dutton and Quinn, 2003). It is generally accepted that organisations in South Africa tend to be more negative than positive. Positive Organisation Scholarship (POS) is a new lens to view organisational life and appreciate those positive employees will contribute to being more productive and therefore results in being more profitable. POS provides the roadmap to a more positive work environment.

"Imagine a world in which almost all organisations are typified by greed, selfishness, manipulation, secrecy, and a single-minded focus winning. Wealth creation is the key indicator of success. Imagine that members of such organisations are characterized by distrust, anxiety, depression, fear, burnout, and feelings of abuse. Conflict, lawsuits (CCMA), contract breaking, retribution and disrespect characterise many interactions and social relationships. Imagine also that scholarly researchers investigating these organisations emphasise theories of problem solving, reciprocity and justice, managing uncertainty, overcoming resistance, achieving profitability, and competing successfully against others.

Now imagine another world in which almost all organisations are typified by appreciation, collaboration, virtuousness, vitality and meaningfulness. Creating abundance and human well-being are key indicators of success. Imagine that members of such organisations are characterised by trustworthiness, resilience, wisdom, humility and high levels of positive energy. Social relationships and interactions are characterised by compassion, loyalty, honesty, respect and forgiveness. Significant attention is given to what makes life worth living. Imagine that scholarly researchers emphasise theories of excellence, transcendence, positive deviance, extra-ordinary performance and positive spirals of flourishing.

Positive organisational scholarship (POS) does not reject the value and significance of the phenomena in the first world view. Rather, it emphasises the phenomena represented in the second world view. This view merely calls for attention to phenomena that represent positive deviance. These phenomena have received limited scholarly attention in organisational studies. In essence, POS views organisations through a 'new positive lens.' Most organisational theories and empirical research have up to now adopted assumptions and variables that are more typical of the first worldview than the second. (Cameron, Dutton and Quinn, 2003)

Date: 20 May 2014 to 21 May 2014
Venue: Ballywoods Office Park • Bryanston, Johannesburg