Darwinism—a new paradigm for organizational behavior?

Abstract

SummaryThe Special Issue reflects a growing interest in Darwinian ideas and their increasing application to work and organizational issues, analyzes factors that have impeded its adoption as a paradigm and considers the prospects for future growth. After a brief introduction to key concepts in the new Darwinism, some histories, and controversies are traced. Causes for the particularly slow uptake of the paradigm in Organizational Behavior (OB) are discussed, as well as some of the common misconceptions and incorrect attributions that have been leveled at evolutionary theory. The paper then overviews the scope and contents of the Special Issue (SI) papers, and concludes by considering future prospects for the field. The authors argue that the paradigm has compelling significance and wide applicability to the full range of OB topics and interests.

The bright and dark sides of leader traits: A review and theoretical extension of the leader trait paradigm

“…Recent advances in personality research, however, including the development of comprehensive and valid trait frameworks, have inspired a reassessment of previously held assumptions about the role of individual differences in leadership, and sparked renewed interest in trait approaches to understanding leader emergence and leadership effectiveness. So too have advances in evolutionary thinking in organizational behavior research (see Ilies et al, 2004Ilies et al, , 2006, and behavioral genetics (see Nicholson, 2005;Nicholson & White, 2006) inspired our thinking in general, and our model in particular.…”

Blood in the boardroom: Family relationships influencing the functions of the board

“…It has been found in evolutionary psychology (Nicholson, 2008;Nicholson & White, 2006) that there are marked differences in how humans act toward genetically close other humans, i.e., kin relatives, and how they act toward genetically unrelated individuals. It is easy to find situations where the condition is U i < C i , yet the act is performed.…”

Immigrant Indian Professional‟s Experiences with Perceived Discrimination in the Australian Workpl

“…In this research the interpretative approach gives voice to those who experience subtle forms of exclusion and live it on a day-to-day basis at work [23]. Researchers who concur with this paradigm are concerned with the social construction of meaning [24]. People should be studied as active agents as they have free will, purposes, goals, and intentions [25].…”