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The concepts of “mindfulness” and “transformational learning” arise from several domains (i.e., traditional and positive psychology, organizational and social sciences, human and organizational learning and development) and are researched within numerous contexts. Given the need to be sensitive to the complexities of multiple levels for analyses (Hitt, Beamish, Jackson, & Mathieu, 2007), our discussion of individual mindfulness in organizations is centered on the micro level of analysis. This construct of individual mindfulness differs from two constructs at the macro, or organizational, level of analysis: “collective mindfulness” – the practices and processes high-reliability organizations employ to increase organizational reliability – and “mindful organizing” (Langer, 2000; Weick & Putman, 2006; Weick & Roberts, 1993; Weick & Sutcliffe, 2007; Weick, Sutcliffe, & Obstfeld, 2002).

The study emphasizes the role of an individual's mindfulness and temperance in making employees fit their organizations by comparing the direct effect of mindfulness and its indirect effect through temperance on the employees' person–organization fit (P-O fit). Data were collected from 185 Indian employees working at managerial positions in manufacturing and service industries through an online questionnaire in a cross-sectional research design. Structure equation modelling (SEM) was used to test the associations, and it was observed that mindfulness among employees is positively related to their P-O fit. Similarly, employees' temperance is also positively associated with their P-O fit. Furthermore, it is observed that temperance acts as a partial mediator between mindfulness and P-O fit. Mindful employees would be more aware of their surroundings, making them aware of the values that the workplace demands. The same awareness would compel the employees to have temperance (self-control) to keep their values in line with organizational values. The study contributes to the virtue theory and the value congruence theory in the organizational context. This study recommends that the management promotes mindfulness and temperance among the employees through various interventions and new technological aids to promote the P-O fit of the employees. To the best of our knowledge, this original work has novelty to investigate the relationship of mindfulness with P-O fit, taking into account the role of temperance of the employee.

Library administration is a balancing act: leading and managing the library and its employees while simultaneously responding to initiatives and demands of institutional leaders and/or trustees. This chapter provides an overview of emotional self-regulation, its importance to library administrators, and the roles that intentional reflective practice and mindfulness play in adaptive emotional self-regulation. There were few articles exploring the impact of intentional reflective practice or mindfulness in libraries, particularly with respect to emotional self-regulation. Much of the reviewed literature was from other disciplines; however, there was much to be applied to library administrators. There are a variety of techniques for intentional reflective practice that library administrators can use to improve emotional self-regulation (as well as improve other aspects of performance). There are fewer techniques to increase mindfulness, though there is stronger evidence of the benefits of mindfulness meditation on emotional self-regulation. This chapter is the first review applying intentional reflective practice and mindfulness on the emotional self-regulation of library administrators.

Business schools need to prepare students for effective, ethical decision-making. When faced with stressful life events that negatively affect wellbeing, making decisions can become more challenging. As future managers, students will need to learn how to make decisions when they are at the same time faced with stress and cognitive overload. In such situations, the brain looks for mental shortcuts in making choices to make things faster and easier, which leads to less optimal decision-making. Research shows that mindfulness meditation can effectively decrease stress and anxiety. Mindfulness meditation increases metacognition and, in the process, reduces the effects of biases, ethical blind spots, and psychological traps. Therefore, introducing students to these techniques has significant pedagogical potential for business education as students learn mindfulness meditation and show a need to include such practices in the curriculum. This chapter sheds light on two mindfulness technique cases with business school students in Lebanon and Switzerland. In these cases, the authors explore the impact of mindfulness practices on students by applying the emotional intelligence mood metre and mindfulness meditation. The authors also apply the ‘response time testing’ (RTT) methodology in the Swiss case to measure students’ attitudes. As a result, the authors provide simple confirmations from their classrooms that engaging in mindfulness activities and meditation is a simple and productive exercise that is essential for student wellbeing, learning, and decision-making. Therefore, the authors’ purpose is to encourage and give mindfulness practices a viable place in business education.

Mindfulness helps improve effectiveness by facilitating the use of emotion as information, which improves learning, adaptation, and performance. When mindful we observe emotions and are curious about them rather than controlled by them, freeing us to explore what the emotion is telling us.

I discuss three forms of mindfulness that combine to create a pattern of behavior called mindful organizing. Mindful organizing has numerous benefits but there are also costs that must be balanced against the benefits. Bringing mindfulness into organizations must be done in a way that reduces costs and increases benefits; practical mindfulness is introduced as a means to do this.

Practical mindfulness begins with what is achievable at the present time and reduces the social and emotional barriers to behaving mindfully through the use of tools. Practical mindfulness recognizes the importance of interaction to task accomplishment by focusing attention on all three phases of interaction: before, during, and after.

In this chapter, we argue that state and trait mindfulness and mindfulness-based practices in the workplace should enhance employee outcomes. First, we review the existing literature on mindfulness, provide a brief history and definition of the construct, and discuss its beneficial effects on physical and psychological health. Second, we delineate a model of the mental and neurobiological processes by which mindfulness and mindfulness-based practices improve self-regulation of thoughts, emotions, and behaviors, linking them to both performance and employee well-being in the workplace. We especially focus on the power of mindfulness, via improved self-regulation, to enhance social relationships in the workplace, make employees more resilient in the face of challenges, and increase task performance. Third, we outline controversies, questions, and challenges that surround the study of mindfulness, paying special attention to the implications of unresolved issues for understanding the effects of mindfulness at work. We conclude with a discussion of the implications of our propositions for organizations and employees and offer some recommendations for future research on mindfulness in the workplace.

Managing differences is a difficult undertaking, especially considering the difficulties arising from the unconscious functions of our brains. Organisations should strive to counteract the potentially harmful effects of unconscious bias by implementing policies that support bias-aware management and decision-making. Although it is obvious that bias cannot be completely eliminated, there is enough data, as discussed in this work, to demonstrate that unconscious bias and stereotypes can be addressed and decreased with mindfulness-based interventions (MBIs) to some extent. Mindfulness involves the process of bringing non-judgemental awareness to experience by striving for full attention in the present moment. In this context, including mindfulness practises into training programmes for equality, diversity, and inclusion may serve as an accelerator for recognising hidden biases, reducing stereotypes, eliminating discrimination, and encouraging cognitive changes. This chapter explains the ways in which MBIs can be used to promote cognitive changes and comprehend the automatic and unconscious nature of emotions and thoughts in order to remove barriers between all differences in the workplace.