Othello: Lessons on Leadership

Throughout my Shakespeare learning experience I have easily found elements in his writing that can apply in practical business settings.  Each of Shakespeare's plays offers a handful of miniature case studies regarding the universal desires, motives, and inadequacies that human beings have always had.  Othello in particular intrigues me; even knowing the disastrous ending I can't help but watch in amazement as malicious Iago slowly pulls Othello down to his end.  If Othello is taken as a business leader, what insights can we gain regarding communication, emotional intelligence, responsibility, or any other facet of business?

Today I wanted to examine Othello as a leader, with the help of an article by a man named Mark Stein that appeared in the journal Organization Studies.  In this post I will reflect on Stein's thesis, and then do my own close reading of a scene to find textual support for his thesis.  You might wonder why I'm performing a close reading when Stein has obviously already done so.  Since I agree with Stein's thesis, I thought the best way to agree with him would be to go to the text and find my own support for it.  In fact, I haven't read his entire article--I read enough to understand his position, but I ignored his textual evidence so that I could find my own without being influenced by what he had found.

Learning Outcomes Progress Report

1. Learning Outcomes --  I've done a good job of posting regularly and I've stayed pretty close to the "business" theme that I identified at the beginning of the semester.  I've been reading out of Tales of Shakespeare and Shakespeare in Modern Culture regularly, having read each chapter that corresponds to the plays that I've read for class.  I've also seen movie renditions of The Taming of the Shrew and Othello.  So far in the semester I have not done as much critical analysis as I would like, and that will be one of my main emphases for the rest of the semester.  I've had trouble maintaining the "dictionary" that I created (although I started strong), and I haven't completed my performance requirement.
2. Reading and Research -- This far in the semester, I read the complete plays of Hamlet, Henry V, and The Taming of the Shrew.  I also read about half of Othello and The Tempest, and I plan to return to those two plays for further analysis.  I've relied pretty heavily on business resources including Harvard Business Review, Movers and Shakespeares, and Shakespeare in Modern Culture (which contains a lot of practical business application.)  I haven't used as many traditional scholarly sources as I would like to (journals, etc.) but I'll focus on this more with the depth requirement for the second part of the semester. I do feel that I've made an attempt to identify the Shakespearean connections in my own life and research some of their significance.  (See Example 1, Example 2)
3. Links and Connections -- I've relied on several books (mentioned above) that have given me a better perspective of Shakespeare.  I've tried to make connection to my own life, specifically to my current job and future career in business.  I haven't connected with other blogs as well as I could in my posts, but I feel I've made substantial comments and suggestions that contribute to the class dialogue. 
4. Personal Impact -- Because of my job/career path, my personal interests (and blog, too) have focused pretty heavily on personal and organizational change efforts.  Shakespeare has a lot of application in this area because he so adequately portrays character motivations.  I think I could pursue this even further in my blog to really make it specific.  Since this is a topic that I spend so much time dealing with, my readings/interpretations of Shakespeare have been pushed in this direction as well. 
5. Personal Evaluation -- I think I've found creative ways to make my blog interesting and engaging.  I also think I've done a good job keeping up with the class reading/posting and contributing to class discussions and the overall Shakespeare discussion of the blogs.  I feel that my main weakness is in the area of critical analysis, both with traditional literary criticism and my particular theme of business analysis.  I need to make a stronger effort to devote at least one post per week to a strong critical analysis. 
6. Peer Influence -- I think Bryan Mulkern has offered some great feedback and suggestions for my blog, as well as offering great ideas in maintaining his own blog.  We had a great class discussion and he kind of inspired me to take my blog in several positive directions.  I also appreciated the discussions I had early in the semester with Claire and Chris because we were able to generate ideas and get a great start in the right direction.

A Review: Get Thee to a Nunnery

I'll be offering a brief review of Brandon Powell's blog, Get Thee to a Nunnery.  I'm happy to do this review because Brandon and I have sometimes blogged on similar topics during the course of our Shakespeare learning experience. 

1. Number of Posts:  15

2. Quality of Posts:  Brandon has done a great job of regularly posting with at least two posts a week.  He has covered a variety of topics in his posts--in particular, he has successfully incorporated (and critically analyzes) Shakespeare's influence on modern culture.  Some particular posts in this vein include The Simpsons and Julius Caesar, Henry IV Movie Adaptations, and Shakespeare and Rap Music.  His posts are high quality with well-articulated ideas on subjects that he finds interesting and his interests are easily passed on to the reader through his writing.  He has posted frequently and seems to have met a variety of learning outcomes, including critical analysis, sharing with other people, incorporating modern culture, etc.

3. Strengths:  I mentioned some of Brandon's strengths above.  In particular, I think he has a nice balance of critical analysis with fun and interesting modern culture observations.  It's clear that he's having fun with the blog, but also not taking it too lightly.  He has done an excellent job of posting on each of the different plays that he has read throughout the semester and finding different ways to approach each one, from movie reviews to scholarly resources.  He's also done a great job of keeping up with the reading schedule for the first part of the semester and completing his "breadth" requirement.

4. Suggestions:  My main suggestion for Brandon is to identify a theme that has begun to establish itself in his blog, and really emphasize that theme for the rest of the semester.  He didn't identify a particular theme with his learning outcomes, but I think it would be a great way to narrow in on his own Shakespeare "niche" and make his posts and blog stand out.  I also think this could help drive the blog for the rest of the semester and present opportunities for depth.  

Overall, I think he's maintained a great blog thus far and I'm excited to see where he takes it for the remainder of the semester.

Shakespeare Behind Bars

Today I was reading a book I got from the library, Shakespeare and Modern Culture, and it mentioned a documentary called, "Shakespeare Behind Bars."  Since 1995, Hank Rogerson has been visiting the Luther Luckett Correctional Complex in Kentucky to direct Shakespeare plays with the roles acted by inmates.  The documentary tells the story of how Rogerson has directed various plays over the years and generally chooses ones that have strong themes of crime, grief, and repentance.  The documentary specifically follows the production of The Tempest, which is the play I am reading this week, so I've decided that I will watch it this weekend.  Check out the trailer for the documentary--it looks interesting and seems to be well done.

Origins

A few days ago, while playing the game Origin with some friends, I learned the meaning of the phrase "to wing it."  The purpose of the game is to guess the origin of commonly used expressions.  Similar to balderdash, each player makes up what they think would be the origin of the phrase, and the group guesses which explanation is correct.  Nobody knew the origin of the phrase "to wing it," so we all made up ridiculous scenarios--from chicken wings to the Wright brothers--about where the phrase came from.  The actual phrase comes from (you guessed it) Shakespeare's time.  To wing it referred to an actor that was playing a role without knowing the part.  During the scene, a prompter in the wing would help with the lines; between scenes, the actor would cram for the lines of the upcoming scene. 

Since "winging it" during a play meant improvisation on short notice, the phrase still has a similar meaning today.

An Interview with 13-year-old Abe Ogles

For part of my study of Othello, I thought it would be fun to do an interview with my younger brother, Abe.  I wanted to see what Abe knew and thought about Shakespeare, and also get his impression of Othello.  I also thought it might be a good opportunity to share some of my knowledge of Shakespeare and get someone else excited about his plays.  To help Abe prepare, I asked him to watch a brief summary video of Othello (I couldn't bring myself to ask him to read the whole thing.)  He watched the video and then we had the following conversation.

To begin, I wanted to see how much Abe knew about Shakespeare, and what his impression was.

Who is William Shakespeare?

Abe: He’s a writer/director.  He made plays that are really famous. 

Why do you think his plays are so famous?

Abe: Because they were acted out well, and probably because they were popular during his time.

Why do you think we pay so much attention to Shakespeare now? 

Abe: Because of so much attention that the plays got then. 

At this point I interrupted Abe to explain one of the reasons I think we still read/watch Shakespeare today, and that is because he treats feelings and behaviors that are timeless.  I explained to Abe that many of the emotions in the plays were relevant then, are relevant now, and will be forever, because they're part of the human experience.

The "Shrew," in Review

Just wanted to do a quick wrap-up of some of the things I accomplished last week during my reading of "The Taming of the Shrew."  Here's what I did:

• I read the play and watched a BBC theatrical rendition on DVD
• I read the short story version of the play in the Lambs' "Tales of Shakespeare"
• I analyzed the play using a business "Change Management" lens

I don't think I'm done with this play--I'd like to return to it for some more in-depth analysis later in the semester--but last week I was able to familiarize myself with the characters and plot and beginning thinking about the critical possibilities.

Using Shakespeare to Make Change Stick

In a recent post, I mentioned a company that uses Shakespeare plays for management training in business settings.  The name of the company is Movers and Shakespeares, and they've done very well consulting large organizations such as Pfizer, the U.S. military, JP Morgan Chase, The Boeing Company, and other big-name corporations. Browsing through their site, I was able to see that they use "The Taming of the Shrew" (which I am reading this week) for their training on Change Management. Unfortunately, I don't have access to the private content of their training--but maybe it's not so unfortunate after all.  I actually have a decent amount of exposure to Change Management because I work for a company, Change Anything, that helps organizations and individuals overcome tough problems and change for good.

Since I don't have access to the Movers and Shakespeares training, I'm going to create my own training, or at least identify a few important change concepts that I've learned from the play.  And rather than focusing on a business setting, I'm going to list a few ways concepts from the play that will help us sustain personal change.  To be fair, I'm borrowing some ideas from Change Anything; the application of these concepts to "Taming of the Shrew" is my original thinking, but the concepts themselves come from Change Anything.