The integral holon : A holonomic approach to organisational change and transformation

Purpose – Over the past two decades there has been a growing recognition of the need to develop integrative approaches to understanding and explaining organisational change. One of the barriers to achieving this has been the lack of an integrative theoretical framework that can cope with the multiple demands of researching and explaining organisational change across diverse domains. To meet this challenge a holonomic framework for the study of organisational change is proposed. The purpose of the paper is to demonstrate the suitability of the holon construct as the basis for a multilevel and multi‐paradigm framework for the study of organisational change. Design/methodology/approach – Arthur Koestler's holon construct and the developmental principles of Ken Wilber's AQAL framework are used as foundations for developing the framework. To this end theory building techniques are used to describe how the holon construct can accommodate the essential explanatory characteristics of ten paradigms commonly used in organisational studies. Findings – The holonomic framework described here possesses significant integrative capacity by demonstrating its ability to incorporate multiple concepts from a diversity of organisational fields. Originality/value – It has the potential to contribute significantly to the integrative investigation of change across many levels and domains of organisational activity.