Mind full or mindful: Raising the bar of management research in mindfulness

Mindfulness research within business and management has grown exponentially in recent years. The high profile and populism of the field with mainstream press and celebrities often sees mindfulness as the panacea for modern ills such as stress and mental health issues. In this workshop we will highlight how the two main approaches, reflective mindfulness and mindful learning, can be applied to business and management disciplines to develop the field. Criticisms from academia are made as to the quality and rigor of research into the benefits of mindfulness interventions. The purpose of this workshop is to bring together delegates with an interest in researching mindfulness within organisations, not only as an intervention to wellbeing but also other domains of management such as training, leadership, change management and decision making. We will provide practical activities guiding participants through mindfulness intervention techniques from both wellbeing and mindful learning perspectives. An exploration of ways to raise the bar of management research into mindfulness will help ameliorate the critique over methods employed, and unpack the active ingredients of interventions. The ultimate aim for the future is to push good quality mindfulness research into higher ranking journals as well as have practical implications on organisations.