Event Details

Dr Emma Jeanes from University of Exeter presents this OWT research seminar.

Abstract

In this paper we seek to offer an alternative view of intuition in organizations that is processually-oriented. Our paper will be concerned with the question of: what does Bergson’s ontology of duration mean for our current understandings of intuition and organising? The theoretical contribution of our work in philosophizing intuition from a process perspective through a direct encounter with Bergson points to a fundamentally different way of understanding intuition in MOS: in short Bergson’s metaphysics affords us a way of knowing intuition ‘differently’ through duration, contrasting with the cognitivist perspective. Intuition research in MOS has been uncritically and un-reflexively substance-based; aligning intuition research with the tenets of process philosophy gives rise to an imperative to rethink intuition based on an ontology of duration. In contrast to current cognitivist ways of thinking about intuition in MOS (Dane and Pratt, 2007), Bergson’s method does not rely simply on what we know quantitatively and statically through ‘recognition’, ‘previous experience’, ‘tacit knowledge’ or ‘awareness’ to make judgments. Instead it situates intuition in experience rather than being about experience (Linstead, 2013) and stresses the way in which we are faced with constant change and novelty which renders as insufficient the habitual ways in which we organise our thoughts. In the paper, as well as being concerned with abstract concepts of metaphysics (i.e. what Bergson’s notion of duration and the absolute say about ‘knowing intuitively’), we will ask what this means for existing conceptions of intuition in MOS and seek to establish theoretical links to relevant areas of management research.