Weick’s Poetics
Weick uses three poems in critical positions in his book The Social Psychology of Risk (https://archive.org/details/socialpsychology0000weic_2nded), including his opening grook (https://safetyrisk.net/weicks-grook-and-the-authority-power-myth/).
Understanding Poetics (all that is un-measurable) is critical for tackling the ambiguities, uncertainties, paradox and wickedity of this world (https://www.humandymensions.com/product/poetics-and-risk-feeling-into-being/).
Thinking poetically enables thinking beyond the confines of the limits of measures, metrics and the delusions of certainty. The reality is, we live in a VUCA BANI world (https://safetyrisk.net/safety-investigations-are-they-vuca-bani-or-wicked/).
Weick’s book concludes with a poem to understand what Ithaca means. The poem is written by Cavafy. It is based on the journey of Odysseus in Homer’s Odyssey and you can read it here:
As you set out for Ithaka
hope your road is a long one,
full of adventure, full of discovery.
Laistrygonians, Cyclops,
angry Poseidon—don’t be afraid of them:
you’ll never find things like that on your way
as long as you keep your thoughts raised high,
as long as a rare excitement
stirs your spirit and your body.
Laistrygonians, Cyclops,
wild Poseidon—you won’t encounter them
unless you bring them along inside your soul,
unless your soul sets them up in front of you.
Hope your road is a long one.
May there be many summer mornings when,
with what pleasure, what joy,
you enter harbors you’re seeing for the first time;
may you stop at Phoenician trading stations
to buy fine things,
mother of pearl and coral, amber and ebony,
sensual perfume of every kind—
as many sensual perfumes as you can;
and may you visit many Egyptian cities
to learn and go on learning from their scholars.
Keep Ithaka always in your mind.
Arriving there is what you’re destined for.
But don’t hurry the journey at all.
Better if it lasts for years,
so you’re old by the time you reach the island,
wealthy with all you’ve gained on the way,
not expecting Ithaka to make you rich.
Ithaka gave you the marvelous journey.
Without her you wouldn’t have set out.
She has nothing left to give you now.
And if you find her poor, Ithaka won’t have fooled you.
Wise as you will have become, so full of experience,
you’ll have understood by then what these Ithakas mean.
What an interesting way to end a book on organising – with a story and a poem.
So, when we approach the nature of organsing we need to go well beyond the confines of the measurable, the linear and discourse of ‘controls’.
Weick concludes:
Organizations keep people busy, occasionally entertain them, give them a variety of experiences, keep them off the streets, provide pretexts for story-telling, and allow socializing. They haven’t anything else to give.
Prof. Robert Long
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