Abstract
In a career that spanned more than 50 years, Chris Argyris played a unique, pioneering role in the development of our understanding of individuals, organizations, learning, and change. As a teacher and consultant, he was provocative, challenging, polarizing, and memorable. Many prominent scholars and practitioners credit Argyris as one of their most influential mentors. His influence stemmed from his writing as well as his personal impact. He provided the first major statement of the argument that conventional management practices create a fundamental conflict between organizations and people that is harmful to both because they treat employees like children. He developed the first comprehensive theory of organizational intervention, emphasizing core values, action research, and the ways that intervention and research can be mutually supportive. He emphasized the importance of clear values to guide efforts at organizational improvement, underscoring the importance of valid information, free and informed choice, and internal commitment. His work with Donald Schön on theories for action documented the pervasiveness of gaps between what people do and what they think they’re doing. Those gaps impede organizational learning and effectiveness but prevent individuals and groups from seeing their own causality and result in behavior that deepens the problems individuals wish they could solve. Those ideas also led into work on organizational learning which emphasized that self-awareness and willingness to talk about “hot” issues are necessary but rare in organizational life.
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References
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Further Reading
Argyris, C. (1964). Integrating the individual and the organization. Wiley.
Argyris, C. (1965). Organization and innovation. R.D. Irwin.
Argyris, C. (1970). Intervention theory and method: A behavioral science view. Addison-Wesley.
Argyris, C. (1971). Management and organizational development: The path from XA to YB. McGraw-Hill.
Argyris, C. (1974). Behind the front page: Organizational self-renewal in a metropolitan newspaper. Jossey-Bass.
Argyris, C. (1976). Increasing leadership effectiveness. Wiley.
Argyris, C. (1978). Regulating business: The search for an optimum. Institute for Contemporary Studies.
Argyris, C. (1982). Reasoning, learning, and action: Individual and organizational. Jossey-Bass.
Argyris, C. (1990a). Overcoming organizational defenses: Facilitating organizational learning. Pearson.
Argyris, C. (1990b). Overcoming organizational defenses: Facilitating organizational learning. Allyn and Bacon.
Argyris, C. (1993a). Knowledge for action: A guide to overcoming barriers to organizational change. Jossey-Bass.
Argyris, C. (1993b). On organizational learning. Blackwell.
Argyris, C. (1999). On organizational learning (2nd ed.). Blackwell Business.
Argyris, C. (2000). Flawed advice and the management trap: How managers can know when they’re getting good advice and when they’re not. Oxford University Press. https://doi.org/10.1093/acprof%3Aoso/9780195132861.001.0001.
Argyris, C. (2004). Reasons and rationalizations: The limits to organizational knowledge. Oxford University Press. https://doi.org/10.1093/acprof%3Aoso/9780199268078.001.0001.
Argyris, C., Putnam, R., & Smith, D. M. (1985). Action science: Concepts, methods, and skills for research and intervention. Jossey-Bass.
Argyris, C., & Schön, D. A. (1974). Theory in practice: Increasing professional effectiveness. Jossey-Bass.
Argyris, C., & Schön, D. A. (1978). Organizational learning: A theory of action perspective. Addison-Wesley.
Argyris, C., & Schön, D. A. (1996). Organizational learning II: Theory, method and practice. Addison-Wesley.
Bales, F. (1970). Personality and interpersonal behavior. Holt, Rinehart and Winston.
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Readers can obtain a reasonably comprehensive grasp of Argyris’ intellectual contributions with four books.
On the issue of the relationship between individual and organization:
On intervention theory:
On the theory of action perspective, and its implications for organizational learning:
On overcoming organizational defenses:
Senge, P. (1990). The fifth discipline: The art and practice of the learning organization. Currency/Doubleday.
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Bolman, L. (2020). Argyris, Chris: The Iconoclast. In: Szabla, D.B. (eds) The Palgrave Handbook of Organizational Change Thinkers. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-49820-1_29-3
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Argyris, Chris: The Iconoclast- Published:
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