Whirling in between the personal and the impersonal: The quest for the marrow of organizational goals, and the lessons to be drawn thence

Abstract

Purpose

The paper aims to present a systematic conceptual analysis of the problem of organizational goal and to reduce the insights into it provided by the main conceptions taken in their development from one to another, to break out of the ruling paradigm and outline a new solution.

Design/methodology/approach

The study has been carried out from the historical and critical perspective.

Findings

The paper discovers the logic of the evolution the approaches to organizational goals have undergone and portrays it in a matrix form in the heart of which is the “zigzag effect”: each posterior stage returns to the essential elements rejected by those preceding it, and the last stage, being diametrically opposite to the first, is, at that, as well as the latter, akin to the intermediate stages. The opportunities afforded by the current paradigm have been exhausted and it seems to run to an impasse. Instead, the author suggests a new frame of orientation: organizational goals are closely interknit with personal, but not reducible to them and bear fundamentally transpersonal character, while the mechanism of involving the preferences of individuals and groups in goal-setting is based on the self-contained interests of the organization they pertain to.

Research limitations/implications

The findings, conclusions and generalizations obtained can serve for a necessary ground to researchers getting deeper into the essence of what bonds organizational life and activity.

Practical implications

The material empowers practitioners to comprehend the difficulties of framing cohesive goal and find efficient ways to overcome them. It is of value also to the teachers seeking to present a more exact and elaborate view of teleological foundations of management and organization theory.

Originality/value

Both the conceptual analysis of the evolution of the approaches to organizational goals and the author’s exposition of its logic and vision of their nature are provided for the first time.

Citation

Petrosyan, A.E. (2019), "Whirling in between the personal and the impersonal: The quest for the marrow of organizational goals, and the lessons to be drawn thence", Journal of Management History, Vol. 25 No. 2, pp. 257-284. https://doi.org/10.1108/JMH-10-2018-0056