Authors:Ralph Bathurst Pages: 94 - 97 Abstract: Although it is too soon to announce the end of COVID-19 we can discuss the ways we want to live and organize once this pandemic has passed. The commentariat divides into several options: return to the past by reviving familiar processes and structures; or constructing new ways of organizing that reject the rigorous application of neo-liberal ideologies with which we have become all too familiar. The disruptions we have all experienced offer the opportunity for renewal but in the absence of precedents, where might we find guidance for how to proceed' A source of inspiration is in cricket. PubDate: 2022-01-15 Issue No:Vol. 11, No. 1 (2022)
Authors:Cecilie Meltzer Pages: 98 - 119 Abstract: Tomorrow’s schools and workplaces need people with new ideas who are willing to be courageous and who can challenge the status quo. This paper suggests that increased use of art-based learning in schools and workplaces can be a solution. There is, however, a shortage of teachers or facilitators with the required expertise and competence in this field. This paper demonstrates how non-artists may develop the competence required to fill this gap. Four empirical cases will exemplify how arts-based learning interventions can activate processes of change individually and collectively in workplace settings. The cases illustrate how involvement in arts-based processes can enhance the creation of new perspectives and ideas and change practitioners’ views of perceived challenges in their fields of work. The outcome of these projects reveals how arts-based learning approaches used in a workplace or school setting are well suited to activate moves from the present situation towards the emerging future. PubDate: 2022-02-12 Issue No:Vol. 11, No. 1 (2022)
Authors:Cecilie Meltzer, Sebastian Meltzer Pages: 120 - 141 Abstract: This article explores the long-term impact of a one-year, 160-hour, part-time University course, exemplifying how art-based interventions help foster competencies in participants inside working life and participants out of work. The course was ambitious with its threefold goals: “Increased creativity and acquisition of new skills,” “Cultivating personal and leadership character” and “Using arts-based learning approaches when conducting development projects at suited workplaces.” Data for this study is based on a mixed-methods approach, using testimonies and results from 34 students’ exam papers, closure questionnaires, and a long-term follow-up survey 3-6 years later. Most participants, employed or unemployed, returned to working life with renewed motivation and zest. These results, showing lasting improvements, demonstrate the power of art. PubDate: 2022-02-23 Issue No:Vol. 11, No. 1 (2022)
Authors:Antonio Strati Pages: 142 - 158 Abstract: This article raises the doubt as to whether philosophy – as well as epistemology and social theory – are really important for understanding organizational life. This doubt has a provocative value, since my writings are fully immersed in philosophical debates, and is expressed with an ironie serieuse. The provocative value of this article consists primarily in encouraging organizational scholars to “play with” philosophy rather than simply refer to it or to merely resume philosophical research in their studies. What do I mean by “playing with”' I will illustrate and discuss this research choice by intertwining the language of written words with the visual language of photography and by grounding my arguments in the evocative process of knowing. Accordingly, I will translate my doubtful and critical considerations on the relevance of philosophy in the study of organization in the photographic image of the selfie. In this light, in the article I will first expose some considerations regarding the connections in-action between organizational aesthetics research and aesthetic philosophy, social aesthetic theory, criticism and the history of art. That is, on the research areas in organization studies and philosophy and social sciences I am particularly familiar with. Thus, I will slightly move my point of view to focus on whether the theoretical and research paths of organization studies, on the one hand, and philosophy, on the other, intersect and combine, and to consider whether there are crucial similarities between these two different bodies of knowledge that can be grasped. This plurality of points of view shows that my doubt on the importance of philosophy in the construction of the organizational discourse does not have an ideological character because it does not lead towards a univocal experience and a unique vision. On the contrary, according to the neo-phenomenological aesthetics of Vilém Flusser, my interrogative is a phenomenological doubt which poses the issue of freedom and playfulness in doing aesthetic research in organizational contexts. PubDate: 2022-03-30 Issue No:Vol. 11, No. 1 (2022)
Authors:Daniela Aliberti Pages: 1 - 4 Abstract: It would be typical to start the review of a book by summarizing its content, but I think that ‘The Metamorphosis of Cultural and Creative Organizations: exploring change from a spatial perspective’ calls for something different. The book employs various lenses and dimensions from philosophy to management to bring together the work of academics focused on cultural and creative industries from very different theoretical angles. Thus, I have decided to use the tools and hints provided by the book to analyze one of the most interesting experiences I have had after the lockdown, as one experience which truly motivated me to rethink my research focus on the past year. I have picked a recent event because I believe the book helps to connect the dots of how the cultural and creative industries have changed (and are changing) in the present times through the lens of space; consequently, how we – as users of space, as well as researchers of space – perceive the space is crucial. PubDate: 2021-12-25 Issue No:Vol. 11, No. 1 (2021)
Authors:Brigitte Biehl, Johanna Kreft Pages: 5 - 9 Abstract: One thing that united people more than ever is the precariousness of our lives (Butler, 2004) as it becomes very clear that we all are vulnerable. Vulnerability is a very aesthetic, embodied phenomenon. While feminist perspectives today emphasize care across status groups, class and race, podcasts as contemporary media formats also support women, but remain ambivalent. We are going to reflect on Just B with Bethenny Frankel as a show that wants to provide female listeners with a “tool-kit” (Frankel), giving postfeminist advice, and offering an aesthetic experience. PubDate: 2021-12-25 Issue No:Vol. 11, No. 1 (2021)
Authors:Steven Taylor Pages: 10 - 93 Abstract: Being Dean gave me direct experience of being a leader trying to work connection. I learned some things about connection, but I should warn you that that learning largely takes the form of having better questions rather than having answers. My approach is to try to learn from both moments of disconnection, my screw-ups, but also from moments of real, felt connection. A few caveats about my approach are important to mention. The first caveat is that my focus is on me. I have some access to how I felt, what I was thinking, and what I did or didn’t do, much of which I collected in a journal I kept along the way. I have much less access to what others are feeling and thinking, so my focus will always be on me and from my perspective. I feel confident that the other people involved in these interactions could easily remember them differently if they remember them at all. I don’t believe that my memory and even my journal is a good record of events, but rather that it is a good record of my feelings and how I was making sense of events. The second caveat is my purpose is to make a better, clearer story. But it also means this is a work of fiction. PubDate: 2021-12-29 Issue No:Vol. 11, No. 1 (2021)