Workshop: Organisational development – Be a penguin and keep your spark alive

Working in the cultural sector has almost always two faces. On the one side, we have great enthusiasm for and identification with our work. On the other side, we often experience disappointment when we face limited resources and realize that in the long run enthusiasm is not enough. As a result, burnout is a big challenge for many organizations in the cultural sector. 

How can cultural workers keep their spark alive? This question has been at the heart of the penguin project and will be the lynchpin of this workshop. We will use some core metaphors of the project – among others the famous penguin metaphor – to inspire introspection, provide you with a new perspective on your relationship with your work in culture, and facilitate group discussion and sense making.

After the workshop you will hopefully be more aware of what charges and what drains you at work and maybe you’ll even have some initial ideas about what to change to make the deal between you and your workplace a bit more fair and sustainable.

We invite workshop participants to bring a specific problem or challenge from their current working experience (and that they find draining). In the workshop we will together find new interpretations and hopefully new problem solving approaches for these challenges. 

Project Background

In the penguin project Shawn Antoni Wright and Florian Cope-Ladstätter have spent the last two to five years exploring ways to address this challenge. Through research and many workshops, we have developed an – as we find – original approach to it.

• On an individual level we provide specially developed metaphors as tools for (self) reflection. Am I more like a penguin on land in my work, or like one in the water? Through these metaphors, people can examine their relationship to work in a new light and find out where and how they will be “charged”, and what costs them energy. Based on these findings, concrete changes can then be initiated.
• On a group level our spark is greatly influenced by the organizational culture. Is self-exploitation expected and rewarded? Or is a culture of (self)care in place? Via the metaphors, the penguin project provides a language that enables people to talk about their experiences in the working context.

Facilitators:

Shawn Antoni Wright. “After 7 years working in the creative industry as an art director and designer I took a dive into the cultural waters and have been swimming around here for the past 9 years, first in Cooltour Ostrava in Czech as head of branding and design then in Die Bäckerei in Austria as a creative consultant, cultural manager and facilitator. No matter if it’s with design, developmental processes or creative socially beneficial projects, I am always looking for ways to harmonize a culture center’s inside ideology with the outside activity. I am a co-creator of the Penguin Project, where my personal development from working in the cultural sector now informs this projects calling, to enable a healthier culture of work in this sector.

Florian Cope-Ladstätter. “I have worked in culture for 8 years now and I’m still loving it. In my culture centre Die Bäckerei I have done everything from finances to construction to organizational development and strategy making. In a former life I did a PhD in Organization Studies on the conditions for productive friction in organizations. Now with the Penguin Project I’m combining the learnings from my former and current life in order to bring out more happy swimming penguins.”