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The purpose of this study is to examine the mediation role of intentional organizational forgetting in the relationship between organizational learning and innovation management according to faculty members’ opinions.

Research was designed as a relational survey model. The population of the study consisted of faculty members who work at X University, Y University and Z University during 2019–2020 academic year. The sample consisted of 524 faculty members who were selected by using stratified sample technique from the population. Data of the study was collected with organizational learning scale, organizational forgetting scale and innovation management scale. In the analysis of the research data, descriptive statistics, correlation analysis, structural equation modeling and bootstrapping method were applied.

According to the results of the study, it was found statistically meaningful and positive relationships between organizational learning, innovation management and intentional forgetting in higher education institutions with respect to faculty members’ opinions. Moreover, according to the results of structural equation modeling, it was found that intentional forgetting had a partial mediating effect in the relationship between organizational learning and innovation management. Finally, according to the results of bootstrapping analysis, indirect effects were found to be significant.

Based on research results, it may be recommended for practitioners that higher education institutions implement both organizational learning processes and intentional forgetting processes effectively at the same time to become a more innovative organization.

While much empirical research has examined how routines are unlearned, little is known about the intentional forgetting of rules in organizations. This paper aims to combine the literature on organizational rules and that on intentional forgetting with the aim of studying the relationship between power types of rule imposition and the process of intentional forgetting.

This study is a single-case analysis carried out in a multinational automotive company that introduced an agile project into the development department. The case was chosen because the introduction of agility was grounded on a dominantly created set of rules. Access to unique data was provided to study processes of intentional forgetting when actors have to apply new rules. In all, 33 interviews and further observations were conducted in a two-year study. Qualitative comparative analysis (QCA) was used for data analysis.

This case study demonstrates the importance of two forms of power, domination and self-organization, when it comes to forgetting rules intentionally. A rule will be intentionally forgotten if it is created by domination, does not originate from conventional working practices and does not determine an organizational unit (development team). Furthermore, the findings point to the importance of self-organization when it comes to intentional forgetting.

This research relies on a single-case study and presents first results on intentionally forgetting rules.

Organizations implementing new forms of working such as agile working in their existing structures should be aware that processes of intentional forgetting can occur. Managers should consider why organizational members stop following dominantly created rules. Ignoring such a phenomenon could be a threat to the organization’s success.

While many studies examined the process of unlearning routines, little is known about the intentional forgetting of rules in organizations. Rules are different from routines because they are imposed and encompass a normative component. The imposition of a rule is based on power. Two forms of power are presented in this article: domination and self-organization. In addition, the QCA was carried out at a micro-level.

This paper aims to evaluate how managers influence accidental and intentional organizational forgetting, i.e. knowledge depreciation, knowledge loss and unlearning.

The literature was reviewed based on predetermined search terms to identify peer-reviewed articles published in English and available in full-text format from the EBSCOhost and Google Scholar databases. Empirical and theoretical contributions were included. Additional articles, books and book chapters were manually selected and included based on recent reviews and syntheses of organizational forgetting work.

Findings revealed that managers contributed to preventing accidental knowledge depreciation and loss and preserving organizational memory. With respect to intentional forgetting, findings revealed contradictory positions: on the one hand, managers contributed to the disbandment of existing beliefs and frames of reference, but on the other hand, they preserved existing knowledge and power structures.

The study was limited by the accessibility of subscribed journals and databases, research scope and time span.

This paper provides useful guidelines to managers who need to reduce the disruptive effects of accidental forgetting or plan intentional forgetting, i.e. managed unlearning.

This paper represents a first attempt to review and define the influence of managers on organizational forgetting.

The purpose of this paper is to determine the impact of organizational forgetting on knowledge‐intensive firms and the circumstances in which the loss of distinctive knowledge takes place.

The empirical research in this paper consists of a qualitative proposal based on two case studies in higher education involving situations of organizational forgetting.

A framework for conceptualizing organizational forgetting. Moreover, the results of the case study analysis include a categorization of organizational forgetting and a set of propositions about their causes.

Scientific research on knowledge management has focused on the processes of knowledge creation, use and transfer, but has devoted little attention to the processes of knowledge degradation and destruction.

Insight has grown that for an organization to learn and change successfully, forgetting and unlearning are required. The purpose of this paper is to summarize the relevant existing body of empirical research on forgetting and unlearning, to encourage research using a greater variety of methods and to contribute to a more complementary body of empirical work by using designs and instruments with a stronger reference to previous studies.

As the number of theoretical papers clearly exceeds the number of empirical papers, the present paper deals with the main insights based on the empirical state of research on unlearning and forgetting. So far, these empirical results have shown relationships between unlearning and other organizational outcomes such as innovation on an organizational level, but many of the other proposed relationships have not been investigated. The authors presents suggestion to apply a larger variety of qualitative, quantitative and mixed methods in organizational research.

Unlearning and forgetting research can benefit both from more diverse theoretical questions addressed in research and from a more complementary body of empirical work that applies methods, designs and instruments that refer to previous research designs and results. To understand and manage unlearning and forgetting, empirical work should relate to and expand upon previous empirical work to form a more coherent understanding of empirical results.

The paper presents a variety of research designs and methods that can be applied within the research context of understanding the nature of organizational forgetting and unlearning. Additionally, it illustrates the potential for different methods, such as experience sampling methods, which capture the temporal aspects of forgetting and unlearning.

The aim of this paper is to develop a theory of organizational forgetting in the context of local governments from the paradigmatic lens of existing research orchestrated in management literature. The paper empirically explores how and why local governments forget and discusses the role of local politics in promoting memory loss in organizations.

The authors do an ethnographic study in a Village Panchayat, the lowest tier of the local government in rural India, in West Bengal, a state in eastern India. Data are collected through participant observation and informal interviews.

The paper argues that the existing framework on modes of organizational forgetting developed in the management literature is not sufficient in understanding the types of knowledge loss that occur in local governments. It shows that as a consequence of “memory decay” and “failure to capture,” local governments involuntary lose past knowledge and critical sources of expertise. The study also acknowledges the role of politics in deliberately endorsing organizational forgetting in local governments to eliminate failure and ethical lapses of elected representatives.

By exploring the phenomenon of organizational forgetting in local governments in the context of grassroots politics, this paper contributes to the ongoing discussion of organizational forgetting in a hitherto understudied area of how, and under what circumstances, public organizations such as local governments undergo forgetting, unlearning or loss of knowledge.

This paper aims to provide a synthesis of the contributions to this special issue focusing on organizational unlearning.

The papers were examined in depth to identify the key contributions and areas of ongoing concern for those researching unlearning.

Each paper was noted as making a unique contribution to the unlearning debate, and the authors’ understanding of this critical issue, however, areas of divergence or contradiction remain. Although the special issue called for a range of disciplines to engage with the topic, it is clear that some disciplines and contexts have embraced the concept of unlearning more than others, and that there are some key issues that remain problematic for advancing research of this phenomenon. Two key imperatives include clarifying and aligning terminology and advancing stronger underpinning empirical research of unlearning.

The paper identifies the current contradictions and questions relating to organizational unlearning and argues that it is time for clarity and more empirical research about this critical topic.

This paper aims to review the latest management developments across the globe and pinpoint practical implications from cutting-edge research and case studies.

This briefing is prepared by an independent writer who adds their own impartial comments and places the articles in context.

The study produced five thematic summaries – managers could prevent accidental knowledge depreciation through targeted interventions. Managers can prevent accidental knowledge loss with “purposeful interventions,” such as developing employee networks and implementing technological solutions. Managers can preserve organizational memory through control, management and maintenance of its usage and structure. Managers could help the process of intentional forgetting by developing a supportive environment. Managers could have a damaging effect on organizations if they prevented organizational change. The conclusions could be of great practical use for managers. They provide useful guidelines and strategies on how to reduce the disruptive effects of accidental forgetting and also how to plan intentional forgetting, a process known as “managed unlearning”.

The paper provides strategic insights and practical thinking that have influenced some of the world’s leading organizations.

The briefing saves busy executives and researchers hours of reading time by selecting only the very best, most pertinent information and presenting it in a condensed and easy-to-digest format.

The purposes of this paper are to determine the role of organizational forgetting in different type of coaching companies and to determine organizational survival based on both knowledge structure of coaching companies and organizational forgetting with core features of organizations.

Within the context of this research, two worldwide and well-known coaching companies were examined as case study, and analyses of case studies which included company background and testimonial analysis was used as inputs for the semi-structured interviews of 12 PhD students in the UK who took seminars and training from the coaching companies. Based on the interviews, the authors concluded the research as describing knowledge structure, core features and organizational forgetting type. Thus, organizational survival based on organizational forgetting could be interpreted.

Based on the case studies and interview results, there were two findings. First, it was indicated that the type of organization (knowledge structure) had a different type of organizational forgetting. Second, core features of organizations based on the interviews and types of organizational forgetting were linked to each other. According to these results, organizational survival for coaching companies was discussed.

This study also has some limitations. First, this paper just focuses on coaching organizations to find new perspective for the organizational forgetting literature. Second, because of the scope of this research, interviewees are limited to individuals who have knowledge or take any seminars related to field of coaching. Other sectors also must be considered to attain detailed knowledge related to organizational forgetting because case-specific studies will bring new dimensions to the literature of organizational forgetting.

First, this study makes a research contribution to the field of organizational forgetting because studies related to organizational forgetting mostly consist of conceptual papers, and, second, we have introduced two new perspective to the concept of organizational forgetting through this research paper.