2010 - Public Relations Society of America

evenings at home working on his poetry (Morgan et al 2010). Despite Gioia’s enthusiasm
for poetry and strategic thinking benefits, most business executives still have a hard time
with soft subjects such as poetry in the workplace. But some are beginning to understand
that facts do not always speak for themselves. Just relying on the facts alone can put a
company in extreme jeopardy that will not only hurt its reputation, but also its bottom
line. Enron and others in recent years have learned this lesson the hard way: they went
out of business.
The work at Oxford and the Boston Consulting Group point to evidence that
learning to read poetry can make one think differently is starting to surface, especially in
matters dealing with ambiguity. Morgan et al (2010) note that if you learn to handle
ambiguity, you will have more options to understand the fine points of a business
problem or text. The ability to think beyond the facts and come up with creative solutions
is often available to people who read and study poetry. In test studies with a controlled
group of literary professionals and students balanced by non-literary trained practitioners,
the literary trained professionals were better able to perceive subtle differences and
variations in poetry text than the non-trained professionals. These non-trained people
lacked a set of skills to detect the subtle differences in the complex text whose meaning
was not obvious (Morgan et al 2010, p 38).
Poetry may not always change the mind of business executives or PR
professionals. Its power lies in the way the poem evokes emotion using its image,
rhythm, and sound pattern to trigger a change in thought. We are moved by poetry. It
helps us think deeply about things that facts by themselves could never do. It may well be
the catalyst for making change in organizational life. More and more organizations are
turning to poetry as a way to help inspire new ways of thinking and generating ideas for
the future.
References
Eliot, T.S. (1957) On Poetry and Poets, New York: The Noonday Press
Hamill, S. (1992) The Infinite Moment: Poems from Ancient Greek, New York: New
Directions Publishing
Morgan, C., Lange, K., & Buswick, T., (2010) What Poetry Brings to Business, Ann
Arbor: University of Michigan Press
Packard, W (1992) The Art of Poetry Writing, New York: St Martin’s Press
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