Where Can You Find Resources on Flexibility?

There is a whole world of research and practice around Psychological Flexibility and Organisational Flexibility out there, for improving effectiveness and wellbeing.

For many decades, the focus has been at the individual level - Psychological Flexibility - and to approaches for improving it, in different contexts: Acceptance & Commitment Training (ACT), Acceptance & Commitment Coaching (ACC), and Acceptance & Commitment Therapy (ACT).

If you’re after research papers, try a search on Google Scholar or via the Journal of Contextual Behavioral Science, where you will find some of the many studies investigating Psychological Flexibility/ACT for improving effectiveness and wellbeing in the workplace, building on the hundreds of studies, including randomised control trials (RCTs), in therapeutic contexts.

However, as a layperson, a useful way into learning about this topic of Psychological Flexibility is through the following books:

• The Liberated Mind, by Steven Hayes

• The Happiness Trap, by Russ Harris

• The Confidence Gap, by Russ Harris

When we get into the research and practice at the group and organisational levels, this has been a much more recent focus, though built on the same scientific rigour and philosophical premice. There are two branches of research here: Organisational Flexibility and Prosocial.

My research builds on Professor Frank Bond’s theoretical work, and was the first to explore Organisational Flexibility empirically. What I'm saying is it's new! (Let's call it cutting edge! ;)

• Frank’s model of Organisational Flexibility

• My thesis evaluating Organisational Flexibility

• We're working on an article for peer-reviewed publication. In the meantime, here's a brief business-friendly summary of the research

Organisational Flexibility - PhD research summary.pdf

Download PDF • 150KB

The Prosocial approach has a bigger team behind it and has more accessible information 'out there' for the layperson. I like this approach and believe it offers complementary ideas.

• Book: Prosocial: Using Evolutionary Science to Build Productive, Equitable, and Collaborative Groups, by Paul Atkins, David Sloan Wilson and Steven Hayes

• More Resources: Prosocial World