Learning wisdom: Embodied and artful approaches to management education Wendelin M. Küpers a , David Pauleen b, * [155_TD$DIFF]a Karlshochschule International University, Karlstraße 36-38, D-76133 Karlsruhe, Germany b Massey University, School of Management, Auckland, New Zealand ARTICLE INFO Article history: Received 24 February 2015 Received in revised form 22 June 2015 Accepted 19 August 2015 Available online xxx Keywords: Embodied wisdom Phrónêsis Phenomenology Habits Improvisation Management education Learning ABSTRACT This paper argues for an explicit acknowledgement of the link between wisdom and learning in management education. Contending that an intellectual understanding of wisdom alone is inadequate, we adopt a phenomenological perspective and present [157_TD$DIFF]reasons for the teaching of embodied wisdom in management education. In particular, we discuss the role of embodied, transformative learning with an emphasis on the critical role of [158_TD$DIFF]habits for cultivating wisdom. Approaches to learning practical wisdom in management education are discussed with a focus on the role of improvisation. ª 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. 1. Introduction The regression of reason in our time has led to societies, economies and corporations dominated by unreason, stupidity and madness. We are situated under the reign of forces and techno- human conditions (Allenby & Sarewitz, 2013) that show a lack of wisdom while facing an ecological, social and economic crisis of global proportions moving with great acceleration towards planetary limits (Steffen et al., 2015). Mainstream education, we argue, with its outdated content and approaches, is complicit. Conventional business education has arguably assisted in perpet- uating a state of crisis in society, enriching some while impoverishing others, and squandering natural resources at a rate that puts future generations at risk (Shrivastava & Statler, 2012). Moreover, these approaches are being broadly institutionalized as education is increasingly standardized with national qualification frameworks emphasizing student learning outcomes and quanti- fiable measures (Bologna Working Group, 2005; OECD, 2009) and metrics including measures of quality (Pettersen, 2015). What we believe is needed in management education is a reconsideration of wisdom and the development and nurturing of wise learning practices or leadership-related wisdom (Yang, 2011) can lead to more effective and embodied management education and more prudent professional practice (Kinsella & Pitman, 2012). In our understanding, wisdom and its learning do not reside only in language and intellect or propositional knowledge, but as bodily, experiential and situational action (Küpers & Pauleen, 2013). Understanding and developing wisdom as embodied practice can serve as an antidote or counterweight to thinking of wisdom as something strictly intellectual or cognitive or even worse, in instrumentalizing it as a faddish technique. In this paper, we extend the case for embodied practice-based wisdom to management education, with a particular emphasis on the place of practice-based learning (Yakhlef, 2010). Management education significantly affects and influences managers’ under- standing of and dealing with organizational phenomena and subsequently team building, leadership, decision making, action taking and other management duties and tasks. However, management concepts and programs have been criticized for destroying good management practices (Ghoshal, 2005) and there have been calls for a critical reappraisal of business education (e.g. Colby, Ehrlich, Sullivan, & Dolle, 2011). Part of the critique of management programs and education concerns a failure to provide what is needed for developing an appropriate management style and practice. This deficit concerns a lack of integral orientation and embodied, artful learning or as * Corresponding author:[156_TD$DIFF] E-mail address: wkuepers@karlshochschule.de (W.M. Küpers). http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.scaman.2015.08.003 0956-5221/ ª 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. Scandinavian Journal of Management 31 (2015) 493–500 Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Scandinavian Journal of Management journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/scaman