Chop wood, carry water

Processing the process of processual becoming

Oh to soar… No explicit relation to this post ;)

About a week ago, I was sitting at a birthday party for one of my daughter’s friends speaking to another parent. They shared with me one of the core tensions of their day, namely the fact they never feel like they can ‘take a breather’ until ‘everything is done’. Inevitably they find themself falling into bed at about midnight thinking, “Where did the day go?”

I listened deeply for a while, ensuring they knew I was really there with them. Then I asked, have you heard the Zen Kōan, "Before enlightenment, chop wood, carry water; after enlightenment, chop wood, carry water"?

I didn’t need to say anything else. They really got it.

From there the conversation shifted towards how they might change their relationship to certain tasks, along with how they might deliberately create space in between tasks, in explicit recognition of the fact that ‘life tasks will never be done’ (I didn’t say a word the entire time).

At some level, everyone gets this. They really do. But, it’s rarely reflected in how our days pan out (perhaps largely because of the historicity we belong to i.e. various cultural, economic, political patterns etc. that have played out over time that give us what might be termed a ‘birth view’. Thanks

Paul Musso, PhD

for this one. This birth view is often reinforced and strengthened in various ways, which is exactly why Paul, myself and so many others are such staunch advocates of more explicitly deconstructing, re-constructing, living and refining ‘your philosophy’, not as a task per se, but more as a ‘way of being’).

This, in my experience, is also true of the implicit philosophy within most organisations.

Stage gates, gantt charts, critical paths, quarterly budgets, quarterly earnings, machine analogies and / or metaphors, org charts, incentives and discincentives.

All of these ‘constraints’ reflect what I believe to be a rather odd organisational ontology (meaning, the reality of the organisation itself, not the way in which certain relations are mapped etc.). This (implicit, but often shared) sense of what the organisation really is, as far as I’m concerned, poorly maps to anything close to what the organisation is most likely to be (in my most humble of opinions lol).

It’s for this reason (and so many others!)

Jessica Böhme

and I are recording the series, Philosophy & Organisations.

In this series, we will explore questions such as:

• What do we actually mean by philosophy?

• What’s the value of philosophy in organisations?

• How is philosophy compared / contrasted (equivalency), relative to other organisational functions?

• How can philosophy help organisations interface with genuine uncertainty and complex challenges no organisation has ever faced?

• How can diverse ethical theories or lenses help inform decision making within organisations?

• How can philosophy help organisations more responsibly and effectively design, develop, and use AI (or not)?

• How can philosophy help us better understand the role of trust, and its importance, within organisations (and beyond)?

• Beyond profit, how can philosophy help an organisation define its telos? And how can defining this inform strategy and support culture?

• How can philosophy enhance an organisations’ capacity to identify and mitigate ‘consequential uncertainty’ (i.e. risk)?

• How can philosophy inform authentic progress in boardrooms (how they are comprised, how they collaborate, the ways in which they communicate etc.)?

• How can existentialist ideas about meaning, freedom and authenticity apply to ‘employee engagement’, motivation and combatting workplace alienation?

• How can a deeper understanding of epistemology improve an organisations approach to data and ‘evidence based’ decision making?

• How does one’s philosophy influence their leadership style, and how might this impact (or be impacted by) organisational culture?

• What philosophical questions should organisations be asking about the future of work and their role in ‘shaping it’?

• Plus so much more (ideally with your contribution, so please let us know what questions you’d like us to explore)

Through such a processing of the process of organisational becoming, I’m hoping that we might contribute to some positive shifts within certain organisations.

That may well be a stretch, but, I’m all for shooting for the stars on this one.

With love as always.

P.S. Please add questions you’d like us to explore in the comments.