Chris Argyris

Chris Argyris (pronounced AHR-JUR-ris) (July 16, 1923 – November 16, 2013) was an American business theorist and professor at Yale School of Management and Harvard Business School. Argyris, like Richard Beckhard, Edgar Schein and Warren Bennis, is known as a pioneer of organization development, and known for seminal work on learning organizations.

Argyris was born a twin, along with Thomas S. Argyris (1923–2001), into a family of Greek immigrants to the United States in Newark, New Jersey. Argyris grew up in Irvington, New Jersey, and Athens, Greece. In World War II he served in the U.S. Army Signal Corps. After his military service he studied psychology at Clark University, where he met Kurt Lewin. He obtained his MA in 1947, and joined the University of Kansas, where he obtained his MSc in Psychology and Economics in 1949. In 1951 received his PhD from Cornell University, with a thesis under the supervision of William F. Whyte on organizational behavior.

In 1951 Argyris started his academic career at Yale University as part of the Yale Labor and Management Center where he worked under its director and an early influence, E. Wight Bakke. At Yale he subsequently became appointed Professor of Management Science. In 1971 he moved to Harvard University, where he was Professor of Education and Organizational Behavior, until his retirement. Argyris was active as director of the consulting firm Monitor Deloitte in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Argyris received an Honorary Doctor of Laws degree from the University of Toronto in 2006 and a Doctor of Science award from Yale University in 2011.

Argyris died on November 16, 2013, age 90, and is buried at Linwood Cemetery in Weston, Massachusetts.

Argyris' early research explored the impact of formal organizational structures, control systems and management on individuals and how they responded and adapted to them. This research resulted in the books Personality and Organization (1957) and Integrating the Individual and the Organization (1964). He then shifted his focus to organizational change, in particular exploring the behaviour of senior executives in organizations, in Interpersonal Competence and Organizational Effectiveness (1962) and Organization and Innovation (1965).

From there he moved on to an inquiry into the role of the social scientist as both researcher and actor (Intervention Theory and Method (1970); Inner Contradictions of Rigorous Research (1980) and Action Science (1985) – with Robert Putnam and Diana McLain Smith). His fourth major area of research and theorizing – in significant part undertaken with Donald Schön – was in individual and organizational learning and the extent to which human reasoning, not just behavior, can become the basis for diagnosis and action (Theory in Practice (1974); Organizational Learning (1978); Organizational Learning II (1996) – all with Donald Schön). He has also developed this thinking in Overcoming Organizational Defenses (1990) and Knowledge for Action (1993).

Argyris believed that managers who treat people positively and as responsible adults will achieve productivity. Mature workers want additional responsibilities, a variety of tasks, and the ability to participate in decision-making. He also came to the conclusion that problems with employees are the result of mature personalities managed using outdated practices.