Authentic Functioning: Being True to the Self in the Organization.

This article develops a conceptual framework of authentic functioning as ‘being true to yourself ’ in organizations. In a first step, the concept of authenticity is defined from a lay-, philosophical- and psychological perspective. Here we acknowledge that authenticity can be assessed from the self (I am authentic), the other (you are authentic) as well as an ideal, collective point of view (he/she behaves authentic). These complementary perspectives relate authenticity to concepts as sincerity, spirituality and identity. In a second step, the antecedents of authenticity are identified within relevant theoretical- and empirical research. Differing perceptions of authenticity are driven by a dynamic process of self-awareness and-regulation. We denote this process as authentic functioning and conceptualize it as a cycle of feeling, thinking and behaving authentically. In a third step, we apply authenticity to an organizational context. We propose that different perceptions of authenticity are related to respectively motivated individuals (self), trusted colleagues (other) and identified employees (ideal). Furthermore we propose that the process of authenti