BrandSoul

Be water, my friend

BMW have achieved one of their most succesful brand messages joining taoist simplicity with the corporate idea of adaptation and flow.

You can enjoy their awesome latest ad here. Branding and spirituality joined together?

As to spirituality, Amare Stoudemaire of the Phoenix Suns, who is recovering from serious injury, said last week he does not envision difficulties,

I am too spiritual to be afraid of anything

Metheny / Mehldau

I saw it yesterday for the first time. Pat Metheny and Brad Mehldau have joined forces to record a new album together. The advertising I read reminded the historical pairings of Bill Evans and Jim Hall. The selling story is well designed. Still I keep some doubts regarding the real quality of the recording. I love Pat Metheny and love Brad Mehldau's innovative efforts too. I have seen Mehldau live in San Sebastian, at the Jazz Festival. I loved Brad's Largo. But this recording, isn't it too predictable?

Do they really have chemistry? Have you listened to the recording? If you have, please tell me.

Although I will buy the CD anyway I would like to know if it is not just another attempt for the recording label to earn some easy money.

Imaginary spaces

I like Frank Gehry's works. One of the pleasures I had last summer was to take a rest at work and sit down beside the Guggenheim Bilbao Museum, (100 metres from my office) under the sun rays. I felt a deep sensation of peace and pleasure.

This is another one of his designs.

The consciousness of the poor

I wrote somewhere in this blog about the power of the poor. I took an idea from Victor Turner in order to show that in "Thin Structures", leadership and command are at the same time exposed to the power of the weak. Turner tried to explain somehow that power among humans is a contingent situation and it should be considered as such.

But now I would like to bring the reflections of Raimon Panikkar in an opposite direction. For Panikkar, poorness has not only a contingent character -this would be the reverse of Turner's idea that power is contingent- . According to him, poorness is mainly structural:

One must have lived in contact with the opressed in order to realize that, in becoming "Conscientized", they come to notice that at stake is not only human happiness but also their eternal salvation itself. They realize that misery has destroyed them - That they are no longer capable of human reactions; that they lack the knowledge, virtues, and habits that would be necessary in order to react in a fitting manner; that, really and truly, opppression has demeaned them to the level of brute beasts; and that they no longer even desire their liberation, since they scarcely know what they are - They have lost the taste of life.

Wow.

Systemic vocabulary

I have been very interested in the outline of a dictionary of systemic terms. These can be some of the most basic terms when it comes to describing companies from a systemic point of view.

Structure - It is the complex formal assumptions of a company regarding its goals and rules.

Field - I took this term from the vocabulary used in the cold war by both Marxists and Capitalists. The field is a less formal, more interactional concept. It has a quite clear ideological sense and it has to do with the way a collective life is understood and should be ruled. I wrote a post on the Two fields theory some time ago. It has also a lot to do with the Balance of Forces within an organization.

Group - It is even more interactional than the field. It has to do with with the affinities present in any formal organization. when you have coffee everyday with the same people at the office, you are behaving as a group.

Team - Has a clear purpose , that makes it different from the group, though it is clearly interactional. It is the consequence of being a member of the organization.

Accomplice - It can be the seed of the group or just can be a way of socializing without further implications.

The accomplice is the minimun unit of voluntary adherence. It can clearly be the source of leadership, which will be exercised on the other systemic constellations.