Intentional Forgetting in Organizations: The Importance of Eliminating Retrieval Cues for Implementing New Routines
To cope with the already large, and ever increasing, amount of information stored in organizational memory, “forgetting,” as an important human memory process, might be transferred to the organizational context. Especially in intentionally planned change processes (e.g., change management), forgetti...
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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Frontiers Media S.A.
2018-02-01
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| Series: | Frontiers in Psychology |
| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | http://journal.frontiersin.org/article/10.3389/fpsyg.2018.00051/full |
| _version_ | 1819289782735339520 |
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| author | Annette Kluge Norbert Gronau |
| author_facet | Annette Kluge Norbert Gronau |
| author_sort | Annette Kluge |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | To cope with the already large, and ever increasing, amount of information stored in organizational memory, “forgetting,” as an important human memory process, might be transferred to the organizational context. Especially in intentionally planned change processes (e.g., change management), forgetting is an important precondition to impede the recall of obsolete routines and adapt to new strategic objectives accompanied by new organizational routines. We first comprehensively review the literature on the need for organizational forgetting and particularly on accidental vs. intentional forgetting. We discuss the current state of the art of theory and empirical evidence on forgetting from cognitive psychology in order to infer mechanisms applicable to the organizational context. In this respect, we emphasize retrieval theories and the relevance of retrieval cues important for forgetting. Subsequently, we transfer the empirical evidence that the elimination of retrieval cues leads to faster forgetting to the forgetting of organizational routines, as routines are part of organizational memory. We then propose a classification of cues (context, sensory, business process-related cues) that are relevant in the forgetting of routines, and discuss a meta-cue called the “situational strength” cue, which is relevant if cues of an old and a new routine are present simultaneously. Based on the classification as business process-related cues (information, team, task, object cues), we propose mechanisms to accelerate forgetting by eliminating specific cues based on the empirical and theoretical state of the art. We conclude that in intentional organizational change processes, the elimination of cues to accelerate forgetting should be used in change management practices. |
| first_indexed | 2024-12-24T03:12:19Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-cd2f26a0c4b94b179b1660bbfd191115 |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 1664-1078 |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-12-24T03:12:19Z |
| publishDate | 2018-02-01 |
| publisher | Frontiers Media S.A. |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Frontiers in Psychology |
| spelling | doaj.art-cd2f26a0c4b94b179b1660bbfd1911152022-12-21T17:17:47ZengFrontiers Media S.A.Frontiers in Psychology1664-10782018-02-01910.3389/fpsyg.2018.00051325251Intentional Forgetting in Organizations: The Importance of Eliminating Retrieval Cues for Implementing New RoutinesAnnette Kluge0Norbert Gronau1Industrial, Organisational and Business Psychology, Faculty of Psychology, Ruhr University Bochum, Bochum, GermanyBusiness Informatics, Processes and Systems, University of Potsdam, Potsdam, GermanyTo cope with the already large, and ever increasing, amount of information stored in organizational memory, “forgetting,” as an important human memory process, might be transferred to the organizational context. Especially in intentionally planned change processes (e.g., change management), forgetting is an important precondition to impede the recall of obsolete routines and adapt to new strategic objectives accompanied by new organizational routines. We first comprehensively review the literature on the need for organizational forgetting and particularly on accidental vs. intentional forgetting. We discuss the current state of the art of theory and empirical evidence on forgetting from cognitive psychology in order to infer mechanisms applicable to the organizational context. In this respect, we emphasize retrieval theories and the relevance of retrieval cues important for forgetting. Subsequently, we transfer the empirical evidence that the elimination of retrieval cues leads to faster forgetting to the forgetting of organizational routines, as routines are part of organizational memory. We then propose a classification of cues (context, sensory, business process-related cues) that are relevant in the forgetting of routines, and discuss a meta-cue called the “situational strength” cue, which is relevant if cues of an old and a new routine are present simultaneously. Based on the classification as business process-related cues (information, team, task, object cues), we propose mechanisms to accelerate forgetting by eliminating specific cues based on the empirical and theoretical state of the art. We conclude that in intentional organizational change processes, the elimination of cues to accelerate forgetting should be used in change management practices.http://journal.frontiersin.org/article/10.3389/fpsyg.2018.00051/fullchange managementmulti-actor routinesbusiness processesknowledge managementorganizational memorysituational strength |
| spellingShingle | Annette Kluge Norbert Gronau Intentional Forgetting in Organizations: The Importance of Eliminating Retrieval Cues for Implementing New Routines Frontiers in Psychology change management multi-actor routines business processes knowledge management organizational memory situational strength |
| title | Intentional Forgetting in Organizations: The Importance of Eliminating Retrieval Cues for Implementing New Routines |
| title_full | Intentional Forgetting in Organizations: The Importance of Eliminating Retrieval Cues for Implementing New Routines |
| title_fullStr | Intentional Forgetting in Organizations: The Importance of Eliminating Retrieval Cues for Implementing New Routines |
| title_full_unstemmed | Intentional Forgetting in Organizations: The Importance of Eliminating Retrieval Cues for Implementing New Routines |
| title_short | Intentional Forgetting in Organizations: The Importance of Eliminating Retrieval Cues for Implementing New Routines |
| title_sort | intentional forgetting in organizations the importance of eliminating retrieval cues for implementing new routines |
| topic | change management multi-actor routines business processes knowledge management organizational memory situational strength |
| url | http://journal.frontiersin.org/article/10.3389/fpsyg.2018.00051/full |
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