Our last set meeting felt like a lovely break, sitting around a picnic table at Roffey for the day, debating and giving feedback in the rather stunning recent sunshine.

Now, with the ever-approaching deadline of 24^th September for our next 10,000 word piece looming over us, I have been enjoying some of the recent sunshine from under the shade of some shiny new books from Roffey’s ever-helpful Learning Resource Centre. Back at work, I’m sure my team must think I’m a total saddo, as going to Starbucks to read academic books and papers is currently my idea of a good evening.

It’s about four and a half months in now, and I notice that I am starting to speak the language a bit more.  I wouldn’t say I’m fluent yet, but I recognise more and more of the names and terms as I read through different books and papers. I re-read a 100 page review of the field that a Roffey MSc alumni (and now staff member) kindly sent through to us at the start of the course, and it makes a lot more sense now than it did when I first flicked through it. Hopefully some of this will translate into my critical review draft before that September deadline.

I’ve been reading about metaphors this week – there is a lot of work out there about language and the impact it has on both organisational and people development. Some of the more commonly used ones are the organisation as machine, as a living organism, or as a drama. The machine metaphor sees the organisation as a predictable, controllable thing – pull one lever to cause another reaction. The organism metaphor tends to emphasise the importance of tending to the health of the whole system, and avoiding it becoming ‘unwell’. The drama metaphor puts more focus on the different ‘scripts’ that the individuals inside the organisation act out. My take so far is there’s probably a bit of the truth in all of them, but not the whole of the truth in any of them (it reminds me of the bit in physics at school where you learnt that light is both waves and particles at the same time). It’s not one I’ve read yet, but for those interested in reading further, Morgan’s Images of Organisation seems to come highly recommended.

A quick ask around my network brings back a few different metaphors too, some more repeatable than others. I get one for a public service organisation as a necessary castle, having to pull up its drawbridge and put a bit of a maze of forms and procedures in front of it, in order to keep out the otherwise potentially limitless requests for help. Another for journalism as a move from a relaxed ‘old boys’ club (with legendary – and real - Fleet Street liquid lunches) to – in these new media, budget-squeaking times - an Army ‘crack team’, who need to be quick and focused and in and out of the mission asap, ready to move on to the next one.