#Connect
My writing day begins at the kitchen table.
I’ve been journalling for years. In my study, there are shelves of Moleskine books that catalogue my effort though, these days, my preferred ‘tech’ is an iPad and plastic pen to capture handwritten notes.
The house is quiet in the early morning as I brew coffee and pick up the pen, mining my thoughts and experiences for the moments that still hold energy and charge for me, trying to spot patterns in my responses to events and where deeper questions seem to arise. The psychologist and philosopher Carl Rogers gave us the phrase; “What is most personal is most general” and his words are at the core of my writing. If I can be open to the world, working with what arises and realise that I am not the only one struggling to make sense of the world, then perhaps I can offer something helpful.
Rogers goes on:
“In these instances I have invariably found that the very feeling which has seemed to me most private, most personal, and hence most incomprehensible by others, has turned out to be an expression for which there is resonance in many other people. It has led me to believe that what is the most personal and unique in each one of us is probably the very element which would, if it were shared or expressed, speak most deeply to others.”
As I write, constantly turning over and synthesising ideas and experiences, the scribbled notes become blogs, the blogs become papers and articles, and then integrated into inquiries or workshops… and, over the years, have slowly become a resource of considerations and philosophies to which I often return, sometimes finding delight in the memories, sometimes recalling the pain of the learning.
After a while at the table, I hear the family stirring, the dogs wake and need feeding, I switch the radio on for the morning news and make more coffee.
And so the day begins again…
Popular Blogs
Journal
Newsletter
All those who wander are not lost.
“…I'm finding that 'looking well' is not a matter of deeply focussed, determined seeing. As I strive to look, I paradoxically fail to see. My striving seems to be too agenda-driven and, when I attempt to think my way into 'framing' an image, I fall into a familiar morass of critique: 'No, that's not working....that's just rubbish..... No, that's too much of a cliché....'
(more…)
Recent Articles
#1000Steps: A Visual Inquiry
“What is this life if, full of care, We have no time to stand and stare?”
- William Henry Davies -
(‘Leisure’ in ‘Songs of Joy and Others,’ 1911)
As I think back to start of this inquiry, I recall feeling that the collective frustration of Covid-19 lockdown restrictions were met by a taunting proliferation of social media travel and adventure imagery, all of which seemed to imply that worthwhile experiences could only be found at range, somewhere else. (more…)
Photo-Dialogue: David Tinker
“My sons keep threatening to put on my gravestone, “Here lies a really nice man who had a nice life.” I used to have a jar in our kitchen when they were going to school, when they were younger, and every time you used the word ‘nice’ you put a pound in the jar…” (more…)
The first in a series of articles describing the ‘Seen Differently’ research project at Hult Ashridge Executive Education, investigating leadership, authenticity and presence.
Look
“Don’t look at my finger. Look at the Moon”(Derek Jensen)
See the patterns.
While some obstinately dispute the overwhelming evidence that we face a series of environmental and social ‘tipping points’, advising we should optimistically ‘carry on as normal,’ most of us are wondering what kind of action makes sense in the face of unfolding global catastrophe. (more…)
Book Contributions
It will probably come as no surprise to you that I’m much more interested in digital publishing these days. The digital environment gives us so may options to self-author, to express our own ‘voice’ and to control our output. But every now and then, an opportunity arises and I gladly seize it!
Organisation Development: A Bold Explorer’s Guide
It was great to illustrate Organisational Development; A Bold Explorer’s Guide. When the authors, James Traeger and Rob Warwick offered me the brief, they simply said, “What do you think? Any chance you could do something?” There result was a gallery of curated images and the book is available here.
The Change Doctors
‘The Change Doctors: Re-imagining organisational practice' was produced by Kathleen King and John Higgins and the candidates of the first iteration of ADOC. You can download a copy of my chapter, a dialogue with John Higgins, here...(5Mb) or buy the complete book from Amazon.
Organisation Consulting @ the Edges of Possibility
Another King and Higgins project, 'Organisational Consulting @ the Edges of Possibility' describes some of the more radical Ashridge change interventions undertaken by alumni and participants of the Ashridge Masters In Organisational Change program. The book includes a chapter where I begin to explore the nature of digital/photo methods as a way of working with change in organisations. It’s available on Amazon here.
Academia
It feels as though academia crept up on me. It was never my intention to work in a business school; I always felt I was much more into the ‘practice’ of change than the ‘theory’ of it. But I’ve found that my work at Ashridge offers me fascinating way of working with change and bringing new thinking to the field. I consult and inquire directly with our client organisations as they respond to changes in their environments and, as a faculty member on the Executive Doctorate in Organisational Change (EDOC), I work with doctoral students as they transform their worlds. EDOC is an action research doctorate; we research with people (not on them) as we promote ethical, sustainable and consequential change across the globe.
Journal Articles
Towards Everyday Activism(s) - making the eco move. (Gearty, M., & Marshall, S.) (2021) e-O&P, Autumn/Winter 2021, Vol 28, No.3/4 https://storage.ning.com/topology/rest/1.0/file/get/10202937278
Impacts of a Professional Doctorate: a collaborative inquiry. (Boud. D., Costley. C., Marshall S. & Sutton. B.)(2020) In Press: Higher Education Research & Development (CHER) https://doi.org/10.1080/07294360.2020.1765744 .
E-Prints: https://www.tandfonline.com/eprint/WX3WZWDUPBQWJCNWR6VY/full?target=10.1080/07294360.2020.1765744
Doing Research in the Business World (Book Review) Steve Marshall (2018) Doing research in the business world, Action Learning: Research and Practice, 15:2, 200-202, DOI: 10.1080/14767333.2018.1464749
Supervised Doctorates
Cousquer, Stefan (2023) Humanising strategy; how do we disclose what we really care about in the future and bring strategy back to life? PhD thesis, Hult Ashridge Executive Education
Friebel, Annemiek (2023) Walking with change: A first-person inquiry into the development of post-human “frilufts”-Life. DProf Thesis, Middlesex University / Ashridge Business School (Co-supervised with Dr. Margaret Gearty)
Campbell, Craig (2022) Out of the shadows: from forlorn to flourishing; renewed perspectives on duty of care. DProf Thesis, Middlesex University / Ashridge Business School (Co-supervised with Dr. Richard Hale)
Stanley, Paul (2021) Unfolding Imagos: An inquiry into the aesthetics of Action-Phenomenology. DProf Thesis, Middlesex University / Ashridge Business School
Aamli, Paula (2021) Working through climate grief: A poetic inquiry. Doctoral thesis, Hult Ashridge Executive Education
Ralapanawe, Mahinda Vidhura Bandara (2019) Trickster at play: an inquiry into transgression in a colonised world. DProf thesis, Middlesex University / Ashridge Business School. (Restricted to Repository staff and depositor only until 13 June 2024.) Please contact Vidhura via LinkedIn for access.
Riddiford, Jane (2016) Enchantment and the mechanical: an autoethnographic inquiry into leadership framed within a cosmic and ecological story. DProf thesis, Middlesex University / Ashridge Business School.
Examined Doctorates
As external examiner:
Fitzpatrick, Robert (2022) Holding the Vanishing Organisation: Can an agile workplace facilitate emotional containment? DProf thesis, Tavistock Institute/University of East London.
Thompson, Thomas (2023) Embedding participants into healthcare initiatives: Making beds in the NHS. PhD thesis, University of Chichester.
As internal examiner:
Caldwell, C. (2015) Art and Soul: The Imaginative Inquiry of a postmodern nurse: Sustaining compassion through spiritual knowing. DProf thesis, Middlesex University / Ashridge Business School.
Pitts, I. (2022) Art-Based Knowing: First-person inquiry into epistemology, voice and agency from a gendered perspective. DProf thesis, Middlesex University / Ashridge Hult Business School.
Xu, A. (2022) In sincere care, we bond: Exploring “trust from the heart” within hierarchical relationships in an international organization in China as an insider action researcher and practitioner. DProf thesis, Middlesex University / Ashridge Hult Business School.
Doctoral Thesis
My Professional Doctorate at Ashridge led me to produce a thesis that was a 'first person inquiry' into how, after several 'years out,' I was able to recover my sense of creativity and develop a radical professional practice. If you are into academic writing, then you can download a copy here.... Recovering Creative Identity - an Inquiry into Photo-Dialogue (10Mb)