Management Training Insights Emerging From Spiritual Concerns

Abstract

Traditional management training stresses what could be called the impersonal aspects of organizational life. Managers come to see people as one part of a greater overall organizational system that they can create, control, and change as needed. People become assets to allocate and control. The more personal aspects of peoples' lives are ignored at best and dismissed at worst. By reshaping or rethinking management training to include the more personal, even spiritual, side of workers, today's managers will see both productivity improvements as well as more engaged employees. Insights emerging from spiritual concerns can help organizations understand the content and intent of their current training programs in new ways. Such insights even suggest new categories of issues that can drive management training efforts. With this new understanding, managers can prepare themselves to help workers be productive and useful while also helping them find meaning and personal fulfillment in the work.