Rumbling on performativity_Frits Simon
Rumbling on performativity_Frits Simon
Rumbling on performativity_Frits Simon
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mental with generic implicati<strong>on</strong>s and d<strong>on</strong>e in a relatively open setting. No specified<br />
c<strong>on</strong>tract about time spent, expected results or cooperati<strong>on</strong> is put <strong>on</strong> me. When I got<br />
my positi<strong>on</strong> in 2008 my superior also asked me to be a critical friend and to state<br />
whatever was <strong>on</strong> my mind regarding his policy. Within limits I am allowed or expected<br />
to take a relatively independent view <strong>on</strong> subjects.<br />
In my positi<strong>on</strong> and given my assignments versatility is needed. I must be able to deal<br />
flexibly with different subjects in regard to different stakeholders. This versatility<br />
extends not <strong>on</strong>ly to different c<strong>on</strong>tent and communicative competences, but also<br />
towards my c<strong>on</strong>victi<strong>on</strong>s. The more I would be an ideological fundamentalist, the more<br />
I would be unable to manage the projects I manage.<br />
If I would be a protean or chamele<strong>on</strong>ic adviser then it would be impossible to be a<br />
critical friend because critical friends do have opini<strong>on</strong>s and do have c<strong>on</strong>victi<strong>on</strong>s. Moreover,<br />
as I wrote about my taken for granted assumpti<strong>on</strong>s: I am allergic for unfounded<br />
authority, arguments or c<strong>on</strong>victi<strong>on</strong>s. Protean would imply that I act as a chamele<strong>on</strong><br />
whose colour uncritically adapts to its envir<strong>on</strong>ment.<br />
The joker<br />
Not being a chamele<strong>on</strong> but being more or less an anti-authoritarian co-creativist I<br />
assume that it is worthwhile to examine if I hold a positi<strong>on</strong> of an organizati<strong>on</strong>al joker<br />
or fool. The fool is the <strong>on</strong>e in the organizati<strong>on</strong> who has his role in limiting the overestimating<br />
and putting into perspective of <strong>on</strong>e’s powers, more specific the power of the<br />
people within the network I am working in (Kets de Vries, 1993). In a more practical<br />
sense my efforts lay somewhere between being reflective and critical about the<br />
busyness and glamour of our ambiti<strong>on</strong>s (Raad, 2008) or to see things differently (Firth<br />
and Leigh, 1998). When I told three colleagues - whose careers cross mine in a variable<br />
intensity – apart from each other that in my research being a joker emerged as a<br />
subject of reflecti<strong>on</strong>, they immediately backed it up. They recognized me as some<strong>on</strong>e<br />
who is always busy in c<strong>on</strong>necting people and subjects, who fiddles with people’s<br />
interpretati<strong>on</strong>s of reality, who often has a (slightly) deviating perspective <strong>on</strong> subjects,<br />
who often seeks new challenges and who always seeks the space between the lines.<br />
‘Elusive’ as a former superior would call it. Interesting to know is where throughout<br />
my career I fulfilled the role of the alienator, c<strong>on</strong>fidante, c<strong>on</strong>trarian, truth seeker and<br />
mythologist (Firth and Leigh, 1998).<br />
Narrating about the identity-programme I managed, reflexive efforts in and with my<br />
learning group and reading about advisory work and the potential presence of an<br />
organizati<strong>on</strong>al fool a new perspective <strong>on</strong> my role evolved. In the UAS most projects<br />
are started with quite loose definiti<strong>on</strong>s and purposes. This identity-programme started<br />
in the same way. The people involved – including me of course - in designing and<br />
coordinating the identity programme incorporated the methodology of the c<strong>on</strong>tracted<br />
commercial company, started to discuss with many people our brand-, later core-values,<br />
started to redesign our brand-architecture and organized if needed support for<br />
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