Rumbling on performativity_Frits Simon

(statement 2: environmental tensions) was concluded. In the midst of April the deadline
worked as a time-trap in which avoiding or postponing political manoeuvres
regarding a binding profile were no longer possible (statement 3: new way of working).
The breakthroughs elucidate very clearly what the implications of transformative
causality are in a process of drafting performance agreements. As stated before this
kind of causality explains that “... entities are forming patterns of interaction and at the
same time, they are being formed by these patterns of interaction.” (Stacey, 2010: 57; italics
Stacey). If I replace ‘entities’ by ‘involved human beings’ then it becomes explainable
that after the meeting in which the profile was agreed upon, the members of the
board felt as if they had received an unexpected gift.
From a complexity perspective my motto functioned as an attractor, stabilizing perturbations
which could produce sideways away from attainable performance agreements
(Zuijderhoudt, 2007). Sometimes literally the motto was quoted to end discussions,
cultivating a discursive practice in which a possible introduction of a rigid
change programme was forestalled. “Words have an ominous power: they take the
place of things.” (Ten Bos, 2011: 20). An ambitious reform-discourse was deprived of its
manifestation before it even came to mind.
Send your boss with sick leave?
If two elements can be seen as breakthroughs one has to realize that these
breakthroughs are specific for this process of self-organization. Generalizations like
“send your boss with sick leave” are unwise because one can never predict how this
kind of actions affects real interactions among people, even in a situation in which a
boss might have a delaying influence. Generalizations like this would lead to a narrative
fallacy because of “... our vulnerability to over-interpretation and our predilection
for compact stories over raw truths.” (Taleb, 2008: 63). A basic proposition of a complex
responsive process-approach is that every situation is different (Groot, 2010b).
One cannot plan auto-catalytic or co-evolutionary processes (Homan, 2005), developments
go from ‘here to somewhere’ (Homan, 2006). History or passed experiences
that are used for predictions will prevent us from seeing what is new or peculiar.
A complexity and complex responsive process-perspective elucidate the mentioned
before tension between creative and innovative non linearity, with longed for precision
of the performance agreements. Assuming that the speech of Paul Broersen might
have initiated the way the performance agreements are discussed and in some way
realized during the next years, one could say that he aimed at promoting a way of
working “... in which the informal feedback networks are sustained away from the
equilibrium in a state of bounded instability. The disorderly dynamics of contradiction,
conflict, tension, and dialog provide the force for changeability.” (Stacey, 1995: 24). In
that case other than instrumental tools and techniques are needed (Stacey, 2012b).
Therefore it will be necessary - and the intentions are there - that there will be many
networks and connections between people throughout the UAS. Self-organization
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