Instead of adopting company-wide initiatives to tackle workplace stress, it would be more beneficial for the employee if organisations were to identify and tackle the sources of stress, say Mai Chi Vu and Roger Gill
In recent years, we have witnessed a substantial shift in management and organisational theory reflecting a significant reorientation in the focus of companies from both money-driven and profit maximising agendas to that of corporate social responsibility, mental health awareness, and spirituality. Alongside this shift, corporations and organisations are becoming more complex and intricate in both the way they are organised and the manner in which they function, meaning that their leaders and employees are facing more diverse and challenging dilemmas. Because of this, more contemporary approaches and theories, such as the use of mindfulness techniques, have become widely-utilised within such organisations.
Inspired by Buddhist teachings, mindfulness is a personal technique that people use to increase their wisdom in order to help problem resolution and enhance development. However, in the secular context, corporate or organisational mindfulness is largely recognised as a company’s ability to become aware of threats and respond accordingly. This view of mindfulness exists as a stark contrast to the individual-centred Buddhist perception, and instead acts as little more than an overtly generalised quick-fix approach to workplace stress, which is often caused by the companies themselves. It has little bearing relationship to its Buddhist origins, in fact rejecting most of the teachings of traditional mindfulness, being little more than a universalised stress-release technique open to misuse and exploitation by organisations in the pursuit of greater productivity, profitability and shareholder value.
We therefore carried out a study in which we interviewed 24 leading Buddhist executives in Vietnam – a nation that has a long Buddhist history yet a diverse cultural landscape – from a variety of sectors, to ascertain how, and at what point, mindfulness techniques can and should be introduced in organisations in a way that doesn’t jeopardise the true nature and practice of mindfulness and its potential benefits. We conducted semi-structured, in-depth interviews with the respondents to capture the complex and contextual nature of mindfulness practices. The questions asked were designed to elicit examples and explanations.
We found that the practice of mindfulness is more effective as a personal exercise, in which the Buddhist principles are adhered to – something of which corporate mindfulness approaches fall foul. Many of the Vietnamese business leaders suggested that they were careful in applying Buddhist mindfulness techniques and practices in their organisations and so introduced them as voluntary and optional. This proved to be more beneficial than mindfulness being introduced through managerial diktat. The respondents indicated that they often used various techniques and practices to attain mindfulness, rather than employing a common formula, stressing the importance of factors such as context, personal choice, and conditions prevailing when using mindfulness. Some of the respondents included examples of both the advantages and shortcomings in applying Buddhist mindfulness techniques in the workplace, furthering the notion that they should be used on a contextual and individual basis.
Many respondents noted that a generalised approach – as seen in many secular, organisational approaches – directly contravenes the traditional Buddhist understanding of right mindfulness – a practice based on compassion and wisdom originating from the Buddhist Noble Eightfold Path. Corporate mindfulness, owing to its rejection or ignoring of most of Buddhist principles behind its idiosyncratic practice, doesn’t look to eliminate suffering caused by greed, hatred and ignorance, but instead simply reflects selfishness, greed and inflexibility – a root-cause of suffering, according to Buddhist thinking. Some of the respondents suggested that, without the use of Buddhist teachings and principles, there was little stopping mindfulness from being applied with the sole intention of being a profit and productivity boosting mechanism.
There was consensus among the respondents that a stress-free life is not necessarily a happy life and that a happy life is not always stress-free. One respondent said that we have to experience stress, and suffering, in order to develop the skills needed to become wiser.
Our research has revealed that no proper attention has been paid to exactly how the practice of mindfulness should be effectively and ethically transferred into organizations as forms of individual practice. Organisational mindfulness practices are generalised and universalised as a band aid and even as a universal solution for all types of contemporary problems, including suffering. If there is any hope of remedying these issues, its use must be applied only on a contextual, compassionate and wisdom-focused basis, with employees’ wellbeing in mind.
More importantly, instead of simply adopting company-wide initiatives to tackle workplace stress, it would be more beneficial for the employee if organisations were to identify and tackle the sources of stress. This could be achieved through simple changes, such as looking to improve employees’ work-life balance. Methods such as this could prove more effective to improving morale and productivity than simply applying company-wide stress-reduction techniques in the form of corporate mindfulness to tackle stress that, they often cause in the first place.
Mai Chi Vu was a PhD student at Durham University Business School, where she completed her research entitled ‘Is there corporate mindfulness? An exploratory study of Buddhist-enacted spiritual leaders’ perspectives and practices’. Mai is now a Senior Lecturer in Leadership and Human Resource Management at Newcastle Business School, Northumbria University.
Roger Gill is a visiting professor of leadership at Durham University Business School. He has designed and taught MBA courses and development programmes on leadership for many universities and business schools, including Durham, and has supervised doctoral students for Durham. Roger is also an independent researcher, writer and consultant on leadership and leadership development.
