I hear this as a call to look at the aesthetics of organizational action (of
course, I would hear that wouldn't I?) - to inquire into beautiful
interventions for example. I am sure that many organizational members
follow their artistic impulses when they act and sometimes do so with great
beauty, other times with great ugliness, other times - not so much at all.
I am also reminded of Ed Ottensmeyer's (1996) quote of Chester Barnard, who
described the executive management process thusly:
The terms pertinent to it are feeling,¹ judgment,¹ sense,¹ proportion,¹
balance,¹ appropriateness.¹ It is a matter of art rather than science,
and is aesthetic rather than logical (Barnard, 1938 p. 235).
But all of that may just say more about where my head is these days.
Cheers,
- Steve
On 2/17/06 6:06 AM, "Wendelin Küpers" <[log in to unmask]>
wrote:
> From: Wendelin Küpers <[log in to unmask]>
> Date: Fri, 17 Feb 2006 12:04:50 +0100
> To: David Barry <[log in to unmask]>
> Subject: Academics as Artists?
>
>
>
> Dear Acorners
>
> Ed Schein has summarized his life-work by refering to artistic dimensions.
> He wrote an autobiographical essay entitled ?The Academic as Artist,
> describes "artistry" in his work at several levels
> http://web.mit.edu/scheine/www/home.html
>
> More recently he published an article in Organization Studies (27(2):
> 287301) on: From Brainwashing to Organizational Therapy: A Conceptual
> and Empirical Journey in Search of Systemic¹ Health and a General Model
> of Change Dynamics. A Drama in Five Acts.
>
> "As I look back I also realize that I have been as much a practitioner
> as a scholar, or, rather, I found the most productive research to be the
> active practice of trying to help organizations. In reflecting on
> practice, I realize how much of it is artistry
> I have often found myself saying to practitioners in workshops that they
> need three things:
>
> 1 They need to learn to think like an anthropologist, accepting culture
> for what it is, suspending judgment until they see it from the native point
> of view¹ and using the strengths of the culture to change those elements
> that have become dysfunctional;
> 2 They need to develop the skills of a family therapist, accepting the
> fact that human systems are complex and difficult to change; and
> 3 They need to trust their own artistic impulse in deciding what kind of
> intervention to make in a human system. There will always be more data
> than they can absorb, there will always be surprises, and there will
> never be enough predictability to determine a correct¹ course of
> action. Just as the artist interacts with his or her blank canvas, so
> the practitioner must interact with his or her client system and rely on
> artistic instinct to decide how to proceed.
> The artistic impulse provides several final perspectives. Much of what
> we learn from experience remains tacit and can only be expressed
> artistically. It is no accident that when a colleague has said or done
> something that really strikes us, we say that was beautiful¹. We
> underestimate the power of aesthetics to communicate the essential....I
> have found that the best way to reflect is to face the empty canvas and
> think about what to put on it. Finally, artistic license gives us a
> chance to take some intellectual chances. Maybe what we produce is not
> ight, but maybe it is, and maybe it will stimulate someone else more in
> the context of artistic expression than in the context of formal
> scholarship. In any case, it was great fun to write this little play...."
>
> What do you think about this? What implication arise from these insights?
>
>
> with all best regards
>
> Wendelin
--
Steven S. Taylor, PhD
Assistant Professor
Worcester Polytechnic Institute
Department of Management
100 Institute Rd
Worcester, MA 01609
USA
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