The Shadow

I spent a most enjoyable 90 minutes or so on a Skype call yesterday with more Moores than you can shake a stick at (Johnnie from the UK and Matt who is in Australia to be exact.. who depending on whom you speak with are either evil twin brothers or utterly unrelated…). At Johnnie’s invitation we were discussing the Shadow side of organisations. Jung is credited with the term but it was interesting that the day we choose (unbeknownst to ourselves) was the 68th anniversary of the death of Sigmund Freud who had a thing or two to say about the hidden, unconscious and repressed side of ourselves. Johnnie is busy editing the conversation into a bite sized podcast and I’ll post a link as soon as he’s finished.
What I found fascinating about the conversation was that we’re all coming from very different perspectives, working with different kinds of organisations and industries and had myriad examples of how the shadow manifests in organisations. Johnnie’s shadow Mr Rant even had an outing, prompted by the term “Knowledge Manager” (which Matt is) after I shared my fantasy of what they do (putting manners on wayward and out of control files). Yes, it got silly at times but it was a thoroughly enjoyable way to spend a Monday morning and we uncovered lots of topics we’ll return to in future conversations.