Management: alternative realities

Abstract

Both managerial academic research and the management of the enterprise are based upon and are manifestations of underlying social paradigms. A social paradigm is a subjectively shared cognitive structure, a set of initial assumptions delineating the nature of social reality and determining how that reality is to be analyzed. Insofar as such paradigms may be in error, research anomalies and dysfunctional organization operations may result. This analysis will review the nature and significance of social paradigms and indicate how paradigmatic errors may be analyzed and corrected. Problems relating to paradigmatic transformation will also be briefly reviewed.