Using this story notebook, you sontinue the story making process about the Future of Work. This storytelling process about The Future of Work is a participatory activation process to which many have contributed: the people who submitted their videos for the short movie Computer of the Future and all participants during the ArtOfAgile Experience Event on December 3, 2019. You will find all the (links) to the information to make up your mind: who do I choose to be in my work for the future?

3. THE eARTh OF AGILE
a story notebook
February 2020 by ArtOfAgile

4. (intended blanc)

5. You are a work of art!
inspired by 'arrival of spring'- David Hockney'
In this blog we share the insights we gained from the startup of The Art of Agile. We share the lessons we
learned on how to use different starting points to start an initiative. We also share two workshop
activities that can be seen as an Artist Impression at the start a new project.
You are a work of art!
It was the French philosopher Michel Foucault who raised the question: if a lamp can be a work of art,
why can't human life be? With that question in mind, the first meeting of The Art of Agile started on
2 April 2019. How do you introduce yourself as a work of art? What is the art in your work? How do we
construct the first sketch of the elaboration of the exhibition with the working title "The Color of purpose
and The Future of Work”?
This working title was inspired by the experiences of AgileOnTheFly, the experiment that ran last year
with publication Being Human in Times of Agile and two events as a result. Read more

9. Spinning earth, spinning man
The earth revolved around the sun for years and years, without worrying about
the value of work. She saw people struggle on land and in the sea, on the
mountains and in the lowlands, in the sky and even on the moon and on Mars.
Work. Future.
For those who spin around as a daily recurring activity in a game of attraction
and repulsion, all the tinkering, with or without a computer, could take a long
time without worrying. And time is on her side.
It used to be the peasant familes that plowed and labored and could survive
with a good harvest and build a better future for their children and
grandchildren. Nowadays work had become an instrument to exploit her and to
control her.
She knew she has not been a sweetheart either. Storms, hurricanes, floods,
volcanic eruptions, earthquakes and mudslides, droughts, famines, diseases,
epidemics, insect pests: she had plagued people many times, resulting in many
deaths.
Future. Work.
She acknowledges science as the answer of people to curb her. For centuries
she moved in circles in symbiosis with the sun, the moon and Mars with all
living and dead matter on her body. Now her imbalance was evident. Her seas
polluted, her forests disappeared, her polar caps melted and her temperatures
rose. She had never been so tired before.
Deep inside she knows that she would remain one with the people and that
people would remain one with her, with the plants, the animals, the sky, the sea
and the sun, ....the universe. Do all these people also know?
It was the year 2019 on a third December evening, when there was an initiative
about art and Agile, about the future of work and she saw a picture of herself
hanging in a Big Room, in Utrecht, in the Netherlands.

10. Absolute Beginners: a responsive creative approach
I've nothing much to offer
There's nothing much to take
I'm an absolute beginner
But I'm absolutely sane
Her are some thoughts and insights about what we might call a responsive creative
approach. 2019 was a year in which ArtOfAgile learnend from art and artists about our
work. The combined insights inspired us to name our approach the responsive creative
approach. The discovery of this approach is perhaps the most valuable part of our journey as
ArtOfAgile team, besides all the fun and happiness we found together.
To unfold this discovery, we should tell you a little bit more about a responsive approach first.
Then we can zoom into the experiences during our ArtOfAgile journey to make sense out of
‘creative’ in responsive creative approach. We will end with some reflective remarks about
the infinity element in the perspective we take. readmore

11. Who are you
for your work?

12. Vera Marjolein
a picture of you
your fists clenched
a super woman
flying through the sky
sleeping peacefully
not knowing
but wiser now
Read more
The will to live, the will to make art

13. Preception
and
identity
Willingness
to
contribute
Fear
versus love
Self-
organizing
and
identity
Quality of
thinking
The role of
money
Interbeing
Quality of
realtionships

14. Sensing humans
Prototype of dynamic respons to human sound and movement

18. What is your relative shape and colour now?
What relative shape and colour do you choose to be?

22. 12 guidelines for recognizing ambiguity: BINGO!
1. Alienation effect
This kind of meta-skill is very common individually when we “take a step back and see what is happening”. In
organizations we can feel the need for stepping back making sense of the situation. This need is recognized when some
incidents occur, and you are dealing with a conflict. “What is happening?”
2. Giving space
Giving space often happens when we meet our colleagues in the morning at the office: “What’s up?”, “How are you
doing?” or “How was your week-end?”. In meetings you can notice people who ask strong questions that give way to a
fruitful dialogue. Agile is not agile before we had an open conversation about our interpretations.
3, Noise
Noise in organizations is about ‘the elephant in the room’, it’s beneath the surface, out of our conversations, waiting to
be addressed. And when we speak about it, it’s like the famous speech in the movie Festen.
4. Opposites combined
In organizations, when we envision the future for example, we might say ambiguous things like:
“we need our experience to be innovative” (experience versus innovative)
“people make things better” (people versus things).
5. Metaphoric
. Are good performing employees compared with ‘superheroes’? Is the need for transforming the business as the Titanic?
Are we ‘going Agile’ like a journey? Look and listen around and you will find many metaphors.
6. Spinning dancer
Sometimes the expression in a piece of art can be seen in two different ways. Only a few see directly both images. A
more dynamic example is The spinning dancer. Does she turn clockwise or counterclockwise?
7. New meaning by acting
In our daily work we can find ourselves discussing an issue and the association suddenly leads us to a new area of insight.
Together this line of improvisational thought proceeds and is not stopped.
8. Double listening
In organizations, especially when you’re new or from outside the organization, people use abbreviations and words you
never heard of. A different interpretation is possible.
9. Double entendre
A double entendre is French for a figure of speech or a way of wording that is devised to be understood in two ways, or
having a double meaning. Typically, one of the meanings is obvious, given the context, whereas the other may require
more thought. They often exploit ambiguity and may be used to introduce it deliberately in a text.
10. Contradicting
In organization we find all kinds of contradictions. People who are fired, grow. Departments are split and merged in new
combination to find a new identity.
11. Geneploration
Geneploration is rare at the workplace. Even when we have a ‘brainstorming’ we are not as focused and concentrated as
the state of shaping and sensemaking we refer to. Factors that have a positive impact: shared felt need for getting away
from the current state, creating a holding environment or container, exercises to help the group to get in a state of
focused awareness, create an atmosphere of constant curiosity and questioning. A non-judgmental phase must be
stretched as long as possible.
12. Need for rebels
In organizations we need people who have the courage to speak out en make us see from another perspective. They are
the rebels in our organization who seek for the truth. They give us a new perspective on our work.

23. Ambiguity Bingo - Twelve guidelines for
recognizing transformative situations
Get into the not-knowing
One of the interesting aspects of art is the ability to get into the not-knowing. In every
discipline of art an artist tries to give the audience a new insight, whether this perspective is
driven by esthetical, political, social or philosophical motivation. By means of techniques and
material, the artist shapes an expression with the potential to arouse the audience
emotionally.
You might find a piece of art beautiful or ugly, attractive or disrupting, recognizable or weird;
we all respond to a piece of art in a different way by making sense out of it. Sensemaking and
responding to art looks a lot like the sensemaking process when we respond to the
experiences in our work. When we experience our organization in transformation, we find
ourselves in the same kind of state of ambiguity. Read more

24. Searching for magic through creative observation
Only wanting to share your perspective, no matter how great your talent, how beautiful the technique
and how connected to your heart, does not yet make the art stand out. Art is the creation and result of
interaction with reality. There are fouir dimensions in dealing with reality:
1. The first dimension is autistic (1). This is about the one-dimensional art of pamphlets with strong
opinions.
2. When you start started to discover, there is contact with others. This second dimension is the
collision dimension (2). That dimension is only focused on self-interest. You fulfillthe plan that yoe
were intended to execute.
3. Then you might realize that taking the time for the signals, standing still for a moment, is relevant
for observing and interacting in-depth. When you are able to reach that dimension, you are in the
dimension in which genuine curiosity and real exchange take place. This is the flow dimension (3)..
4. The magic that you sometimes experience during theater or concert visits, when you can almost
feel the connection between everyone present in the room, players and audience. The players then
involve the audience as an extra player. This is fourth dimension, the magic dimension (4)
A key role is set aside for perception. Art arises in the sense making that is made, beyond actual
presentation and acceptance. Multidimensional, multi-perspective offering and observing is necessary
to make a work into art together.
1. to observe,
2. to feel and
3. to create.. Read more.

28. Artists and the fourth dimension
Romantic reflection is reflection from what we experience and appeal to our deeper knowledge.
Art can help us with this. In romantic reflection, the horizontal context time and the vertical
context distance are two dimensions to reflect. We complete the framework for romantic
reflection with art and we add two dimensions: the diagonal context the story and mirror
context the reflection
The film metaphor shows that a reflection can be considered in the context of time and
distance. If we present ourselves as a projection on the film screen - here and now - then we can
now look back, look ahead and at our here and now in the film in which we find ourselves. We
mentioned these variants of the vertical context: flash back, flash forward and flash in. The
horizontal context distance knows the variations: extreme close-up (me), close-up (we), zoomed
out (them), extremely zoomed out (total).
The fourth dimension, the mirror context, is not easy to portray even though it is always present.
In addition to the observable dimensions, we may ask ourselves what cannot be perceived and
felt with our hearing, sight and sense of touch. Just like the openings between the frames in the
film roll. Read more.

29. Next step
What's next? What is emerging which can not yet
be expressed in words and concepts and is still
not obvious and ordered. How can Art help us to
express, investigate and probe the coming future?

30. many ways to st ARTup

31. Roleofmoney
•Howbigisderoleofmoneyonyour
decisons?
•Doesmoneymotivatesyouandthepeople
aroundyou?
•Whatistheweightbetweenmoneyen
service(toserve)?

34. On the Threshold of Agility
Examples of workshop activities to move to the threshold of Chaos:
• Make Poetry with Change In 1920, one of the founding members of Dada, Tristan Tzara, wrote
instructions for making a Dada poem, and the communicating ideas up to chance.
• Postcards from paintings Write "postcards" from each of the three locations represented by three
paintings. The postcards should include a description of the places that is created by each location.
• Social PresencingTheatre: Stuck exercise It is a process by which one experiences going through
the whole (Sculpture 2) (emerging future). We do not know what the movements will be where
they will stop, but we can follow the movement and then reflect on our experience. Surprising
insights can arise.
Examples of workshop activities to move to the threshold of Complicated:
• Write your own manifesto Read André Breton's First Manifesto or Surrealism (1924) and write your
own.
• Tools as solutions Design a tool that can help to alleviate a frustrating problem
• Impress - Express Consider and compare, being an impressionist and an expressionist with the
inspiration of paintings.
• Make a Soap Put ideas to live and improvise a soap in three chapters.
These and many more activities can be found on Social Presencing and the MOMA. I wish you a
fruitful journey to a new status unfolding new insights and new identities. Read more

39. Reflect on Art
What can we learn from the multiple
perspective taking by art? How can art
guide us in taking a more agile
perspective on our complex work? And
what is an agile-art perspective?

40. Lessons for dealing with gender diversity
Berthe Morisot is a good example of a ignored
talented woman. Morisot was the only woman
who, together with Godin, Pissaro, Monet and
others, belonged to the founders of Impressionism
at the end of the nineteenth century. It’s obvious
that everyone knows the names Monet, Pissaro,
Manet, Degas and Renoir. But who knows the name
Morisot?
A film was made of her life The Rebel is a Heart,
This extremely fascinating documentary can be seen
on a “uitzending gemist” from a Dutch broadcast by
“Uur van de wolf”..
If Berthe’s courage is an example for women, then perhaps the Manet brothers can be an
example for men:
• Do not trivialize and ignore seemingly impossible wishes just because ‘it would not be
appropriate for a woman’.
• Offer space and safety to allow talent to grow and mature. After all, nobody gets far without
encouragement.
• Acknowledge that women are different in art (and work) than men. Or rather: we are all
different one way or another. If we do not acknowledge these differences, we cannot recognize
equality either.
• Open the way to communities where the passion for your profession is central.
Read more

41. Can you name five famous female artists?
I expect you needed a moment to think about that one.
Let’s try this question: can you name ten famous male artists?
I suspect that you found this question much easier to answer.
Why would you think that is?
Are men more creative or more artistic than women? Read more

42. explotion
of colours
in peaceful mauve
for the saek of
joy

43. regen
mooie dag
snel op weg
waar is de baas
blij

44. Experiential Learning Scale
What does art have to do with experiential learning? When we want to give language to that
experience, it get’s tricky. Words give meaning and at the same time limit meaning. When you
first read the explanation of a painting in a museum and only then start looking, you limit your
experience. You see what the title and the explanation describe you see.
The are three elements considerimg experiential learning:
1. (evels of awareness.
2. range of experience and
3. action categories.
The three elemenst can be brought together in a sort of scale; the Experiential Learning Scale. As
a facilitator of a workshop you can set out the activities in time and indicate how a work form In
time order) can be presented to prepare. Read more.
Below the example of the scales of the Atelier Session on 9 October

45. tijd
tijd dringt
neem de tijd
nog niet te laat
nu

46. The Partnership for 21st Century Skills [link] posits that The 4Cs:
Communication, Collaboration, Critical Thinking, and Creativity are the
central skills and dispositions that must be mastered to be successful in our
increasingly complex world. They identify the habits that artists— and arts
teachers—tend to employ as:
1. Develop Craft: Learning tools, materials, and artist’s practices.
2. Engage and Persist: Learning to pursue topics of personal interest;
develop focus, ways of thinking to persevere.
3. Envision: Picturing, imagining what cannot be observed.
4. Express: Creating works that convey ideas, meaning, or emotions.
5. Observe: Learning to view visual, audio, and written resources more
critically.
6. Reflect: Learning to think and converse about one’s work and processes of
making.
7. Stretch and Explore: Learning to stretch beyond perceived limitations,
explore, and learning from errors or accidents.
8. Understand Art World: Learning about art history and artistic practices
and engaging the arts community.
The 4Cs: Communication, Collaboration,
Critical Thinking, and Creativity

47. structures
premeate all
fire of colours
trees remain grounded strong
forever

49. you
so far
and also close
on waves of missing
love!

50. time
for space
to other countries
to visit other climates
escape

51. Observing Art
What can we learn from The Art of
Observing? When we look at paintings,
watch movies, theatre and dance, or read
literature and poets or listen to music:
what makes us a good observer?
tech enhanced leadership

52. A r t o f o b s e r v i n g

54. 1949
1984
2019
2055
2090
2125
35years

55. Experience
Experiental learning helps us to
embody knowledge. What tools and techniques
help us to be creative expresional human beings
to fulfill our dreams and beliefs?

56. Why this urge for an art perspective?
If you google 'art 'and 'agile' and sort by images, the one painting you will find is Át the Lapin
Agile by Pablo Picasso. The relationship between Art and Agile is not obvious. Unless of
course you think about the ART (Agile Release Train) in a Scaled Agile Framework. When you
are preoccupied with that kind of agility, you might find it difficult to follow the organizational
dexterity perspective we are refering to.
So, what is the relationship between Agile and Art and what's the point to pay attention to
this now? read more
The need for Art when dealing with
organizational agility
Át the Lapin Agile by Pablo Picasso

57. autotranslate system 2.3
contains all worldwide languages
and will instantly translate into
a universal for every one
understandable language

59. Quality of relationships
Fearversuslove
Qualtity of thinking
Theroleofmoney
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
Talk by Margaret Wheatley on Islands of Sanity

60. Draw how you dress yourself in the future?

65. Spinning man, spinning earth
It was the year 2019 on a third December evening, when there was an initiative
about art and Agile, about the future of work and she saw a picture of herself
hanging in a Big Room, in Utrecht, in the Netherlands.
Deep inside she knows that she would remain one with the people and that
people would remain one with her, with the plants, the animals, the sky, the sea
and the sun, ....the universe. Do all these people also know?
She acknowledges science as the answer of people to curb her. For centuries
she moved in circles in symbiosis with the sun, the moon and Mars with all
living and dead matter on her body. Now her imbalance was evident. Her seas
polluted, her forests disappeared, her polar caps melted and her temperatures
rose. She had never been so tired before.
The earth revolved around the sun for years and years, without worrying about
the value of work. She saw people struggle on land and in the sea, on the
mountains and in the lowlands, in the sky and even on the moon and on Mars.
Future. Work.
She knew she has not been a sweetheart either. Storms, hurricanes, floods,
volcanic eruptions, earthquakes and mudslides, droughts, famines, diseases,
epidemics, insect pests: she had plagued people many times, resulting in many
deaths.
It used to be the peasant familes that plowed and labored and could survive
with a good harvest and build a better future for their children and
grandchildren. Nowadays work had become an instrument to exploit her and to
control her.
Work. Future.
For those who spin around as a daily recurring activity in a game of attraction
and repulsion, all the tinkering, with or without a computer, could take a long
time without worrying. And time is on her side.

66. Talk no more
Of thee and me, the future and the past…
Earth and ocean,
Space, and the isles of life or light that gem
The sapphire floods of interstellar air,
This firmament pavilioned upon chaos…
This whole
Of suns and worlds, and men and beasts, and flowers
With all the violent and tempestuous workings
By which they have been, are, or cease to be,
Is but a vision: all that it inherits
Are motes of a sick eye, bubbles and dreams;
Thought is its cradle and its grave, nor less
The future and the past are idle shadows
Of thought’s eternal flight — they have no being.
Nought is but that it feels itself to be.
Percy Bysshe Shelley
T A K E O F F

69. This story notebook is a result of a year of
imagination about the relationship between Art and
Agile. The story notebook is intended as a starter for
creative reading (read-reflect-act) to find your own
story about the Future of Work: who do you choose
to be?
ArtOfAgile was the name of the group of people
who contributed so wholeheartedly: Agaath
Heemskerk, Chantal van Melle, Fina Piazza, Grazyna
Frackiewicz, Hans.Broeks, Ikram Mataich, Martin
Volders, Mohamed Bellali, Nienke Alma, Norbert
Minten, Pieter Stroobach, Ronald Teeuw (redactie),
Simon Koolwijk, Suzanne Mijnheer, Thereza
Herodkova, Twan Nijssen, Vera Hofmann, Xander
Ladage.
The storytelling process about The Future of Work is
a participatory activation process to which many
have contributed: the people who submitted their
videos for the short movie Computer of the Future
and all participants during the ArtOfAgile Experience
Event on December 3, 2019.
The story making process continuous as you start
using this story notebook.