CREATIVE GORILLA ARTICLE~ THE POWER OF METAPHOR
Great creative leaders (witness Martin Luther King’s “I have a dream” speech) use metaphor a great deal to
illustrate, persuade and inspire. Metaphors influence how you think and how you act. In this document, we
will explore the use of metaphor and its structure. We will show how metaphors help shape your thinking
and the thinking of others. We will illustrate how you can use them in practical ways in work and workshops.
Metaphorically Driving home afterwards, I mused on what he had
said. It was a great example of how people use
Speaking… metaphors to simplify and describe complex
situations.
It was also an example of how the metaphors
people use can influence how they approach a
situation. From his point of view, it was not worth
doing anything because the budget was finite, an
“insurmountable obstacle” or at least one he
seemed no longer willing to overcome.
Although he
My colleague and I were running an interactive may not have
focus group to gauge people’s reaction to a realised it, he
proposed training course on Flexible Thinking for had explained
Innovation. We had received a positive reaction the issue in
but I was not convinced we were hearing all terms of a
opinion. I asked if anyone had any concerns. conceptual
metaphor (obstacle) and metaphorical
One of the group, an experienced manager,
linguistic expressions (the budget as a wall
emitted an exasperated sigh and exclaimed,
around him); (Concepts from: Zoltan Kovecses ~
“Personally I think this course is a waste of
“Metaphor: A Practical Introduction”)
**###** time.” That perked the group up a bit!
What relevance has this story to creative leaders
“What’s your reason for stating that?” we asked.
and facilitators?
“Well, there’s no money to do anything, even if we
do come up with innovative ideas.” He then used In summary, people use (consciously or
his hands to describe an obstacle in front of him. unconsciously) metaphor to:
“The budget is a huge wall around us, it stops us
• Make sense of complex and confusing situations
doing anything.” We nodded, thanked him and
(for example, their lives)
noted his reaction; we weren’t there to argue the
case. • Communicate their understanding (sense) of
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CREATIVE GORILLA ARTICLE~ THE POWER OF METAPHOR
situations
METAPHOR OR SIMILE?
• Work out how to tackle those situations
There are other linguistic
As a creative leader and facilitator, you can use devices in the English
metaphor to facilitate the above, either by helping language that you can use to
people to recognise and develop their metaphors describe; analogy and
and / or by encouraging them to use other synonym being two. Although
metaphors. Having said that, you might like to the theorists make distinction
explore metaphor a little further before we discuss between these, in practical terms it can be useful if
practical uses. you do not get too concerned with correct usage
as this poem explains:
A DEFINITION OF METAPHOR
Metaphor and simile
The Oxford English Dictionary says a metaphor is: Like peas in a pod, at least to me.
“A figure of speech in which an expression is used We can argue, their similarity,
to refer to something that it does not literally But let’s not stoop to analogy.
denote in order to suggest a similarity.”
Just use them both as tools to see,
Your challenge more creatively.
John Brooker
tree, that object with four wheels, is a car. You
have seen these objects before. However, you
don’t always have a literal reference, so, to
A POT OF GOLD?
reiterate, you may often use metaphor or analogy
Our manager, by referring to the budget as a wall, to help you:
is helping to describe his situation to others.
• Make sense of a situation. “The Cuban missile
However, theorists, perhaps contradicting the OED,
crisis was the rutting of stags” (my metaphor),
consider metaphor is more than a method of
gives a sense of two powerful animals (the USA
expression; it is fundamental to how you think.
and USSR) in a battle over territory or a female
WHY DO YOU USE METAPHOR? (Cuba).
• At other times you may understand the situation
You are bombarded with information every day but need metaphor to help you communicate
that you shape largely in terms of what you the situation in a simple way. “The new
already know. Some of this is simple; you can manager is drowning” is not literally true (unless
categorise literally that the green matter outside perhaps he/she works as a lifeguard), but does
your window is grass, that tall brown object is a help you convey to another person that the
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CREATIVE GORILLA ARTICLE~ THE POWER OF METAPHOR
manager is out of control. This allows the listener And fixed up the syntax, but after a while
to share the image of the manager using your It shed all its needles, and withered, and died.
“filter” (the metaphor) and relate to it.
The gardener weathered the blow to his pride,
• Thirdly, you may use that metaphor as the basis Though he knew ‘twas his editing had, by some
for tackling the situation – e.g. your response quirk,
to our drowning manager metaphor is, “Can we
Constrained the tree’s Author to withdraw his work.
throw them a lifebelt?” Which perhaps, leads you
to offer them coaching. How might you interpret this poem? Perhaps
• One other factor we have found helpful when Winthrop had his work badly edited at some time,
coaching and facilitating is to have people express or you might interpret the gardener as a manager,
themselves through metaphor because easily capable of destroying people’s work through
discussing a situation through metaphor poor skills or bullying. This ability to express
can be less emotive than discussing the alternative conceptualisations is both a strength
literal situation, as if it removes the “you” from and weakness of metaphor use.
the situation.
THE STRUCTURE OF METAPHORS
For a diversion, here are two examples from the
arts of using metaphor to communicate: CONCEPTUAL METAPHOR
Example 1: I joined the British Royal Air Force at sixteen as an
apprentice and left eleven years later as a
Dido’s use of Corporal. In terms of rank, I did not progress very
metaphor in her “White far. Yet when I started civilian work, the pace of
Flag” lyrics expresses my career picked up and after overcoming some
refusal to accept a obstacles, I reached my goal of attaining a certain
relationship is over level within the
metaphorically rather organisation. On
than literally: “I will go reaching my goal, I
down with this ship, and I won't put my hands up felt my life was at a
and surrender. There will be no white flag above crossroads and
my door. I'm in love and always will be.” eventually I took the
path of running my own company.
Example 2:
I use that description of my career as an example
Witness this poem by Winthrop Aldrich (Artificial
of one aspect of the structure of metaphor. “Life as
Poetry ISBN 0 – 934276 – 02 – 1):
a journey” is an example of a CONCEPTUAL METAPHOR
An irreverent gardener once, for a fee, (that is, the internal idea behind the metaphor).
Contracted to edit an evergreen tree;
So he struck off some branches to polish the style,
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CREATIVE GORILLA ARTICLE~ THE POWER OF METAPHOR
Another example is Nelson Mandela’s SOURCE AND TARGET
book “Long Walk To Freedom”,
Examining the metaphors above, you can begin to
which depicts his life as a journey.
identify other aspects of metaphor, that of the
Lakoff and Johnson in “Metaphors SOURCE and the TARGET. In the cases above, “war”
We Live By” identify other classic CONCEPTUAL and “food” are the SOURCE and “argument” and
METAPHORS such as Argument is war; Love is a “ideas” are the TARGETS. We map characteristics of
journey; Theories are buildings; Ideas are food. war to an argument
What conceptual metaphor did the manager use Below, you can relate this concept to business by
when describing his budget? using the example of mapping the characteristics
of a plant to an organisation. You should note
LINGUISTIC EXPRESSIONS. parallels between the characteristics of the plant
and the organisation. Knowing this can help you
We express these conceptual metaphors in
later when you review a tool for using metaphors.
METAPHORICAL LINGUISTIC EXPRESSIONS, how the
internal idea can be externalised in words. For
SOURCE: Plant TARGET: Organisation
examples, refer to the italicised phrases in the
paragraph on my career describing “life as a
The whole plant The organisation
journey.” Or think of “the wall.”
The growth of the The growth of the
plant organisation
Pruning the plant Reducing the
organisation
THE LONG TRACK
Flowering Reaching organisational
Other examples from Lakoff and Johnson are: targets
ARGUMENT IS WAR IDEAS ARE FOOD
Not watering Starving of resources
• He attacked her • The paper has raw
argument facts and half baked
ideas
Fruit or crop The benefits the
• I’ve never won an • I can’t swallow her
argument with her proposals organisation gains
• If you use that • She devoured the
argument, he’ll wipe article
How would you relate the SOURCE “Navigation” to
you out
the TARGET “Organisation”?
• He outflanked her • Let’s put that idea on
opening argument the back burner for
now
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CREATIVE GORILLA ARTICLE~ THE POWER OF METAPHOR
OTHER FEATURES OF METAPHOR THE CONTEXT OF METAPHOR
IMPLICIT AND EXPLICIT METAPHORS Recall my sentence, “His spirits soared every time
they met.” You might interpret this as positive, he
“His spirits soared every time they met.” If this was pleased to see them; but what if his spirit
sentence strikes you as very positive, it is probably soared because the other person was down on
because of the implicit understanding that “good” their luck? this gives a different interpretation and
is “up” and “bad” is “down” in Western culture raises another important facet of metaphor -
(some metaphors apply globally whereas others metaphor can often only be understood correctly if
vary). In brief, many of the metaphors people use those sharing it know the context. Therefore you
are not easy to identify as metaphors. Like “good need to ensure that you have a shared context
is up” they are “implicit”. when using metaphor.
Let’s look at this in more detail. John Martin, in LINGUISTIC AND COGNITIVE
“Practical Thinking”, (Open University course, sadly
no longer in print) highlights the use of “manager” We have said that metaphors form a large part of
in business. A manager is a concept to which we the way we communicate, both consciously and
are all accustomed. We literally manage. There is unconsciously hence Lakoff and Johnson’s
no metaphor there, is there? Why then are so assertion that we should not make the mistake of
many management related phrases to do with thinking that metaphors are merely a linguistic
“hands” e.g. “I’m handing over responsibility”; “I device. Metaphors are fundamental to the way in
can handle that situation”; “We should grasp this which we think and reason.
opportunity”; “We are within reach of a solution”;
Evidence of this can be seen in the work of Lawley
“The team were putty in her hands”?
and Tomkins (based on the work of David Grove)
Perhaps a clue is that the root of the word in which they use Symbolic Modelling model to
“manager” is the Latin word “manus” – a hand – help clients achieve change in their metaphorical
as in manipulating something. Henry Mintzberg, perception of their world. In essence, the client
(management consultant and author) made the describes metaphorical symbols (e.g. a wall) and
implicit metaphor forms a metaphorical landscape which the client
explicit when he subsequently changes through questioning.
compared the skills
As John Martin says, “Metaphor is a point where
of a manager with
psychology, scientific enquiry, literature, the arts
those of a potter
and even religion all meet together. It is literally a
“shaping” the “clay”
(perhaps the) foundation of thinking.”
of an organisation.
So an understanding of how metaphors influence
you and other people is important, especially when
dealing with implicit metaphors that may influence
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CREATIVE GORILLA ARTICLE~ THE POWER OF METAPHOR
thinking in a negative way. How does “up” is good USING METAPHOR IN ORGANISATIONS
and “down” is “bad” influence thinking in
organisations? You might try to find an ORGANISATIONAL CHANGE
organisational chart with senior management
Having reviewed the basic structure of metaphors
positioned at the base, (outside of a customer
and their use, how might you as a creative leader
service book).
or facilitator use them in an organisation?
In terms of your organisation, how might
Gareth Morgan in his work “Imaginization” explains
metaphor influence you and how might you use it?
that the metaphors social scientists used previously
for organisations i.e. the machine and the
UNIDIRECTIONAL
organism, limited how people viewed the
Another concept that Kovecses identifies is that of organisation. Why is this? Metaphors can help
UNIDIRECTIONALITY. What this means is that a TARGET reveal a lot about situations but also limit what we
does not usually work as a SOURCE. Why is this? can discover. Thus, if we see the organisation as
Kovecses says it is because the TARGET is usually an efficient machine, we may overlook that there is
more abstract and the SOURCE more concrete (to a climate of fear because the characteristics of a
use a metaphor). Saying “the Cuban missile crisis machine would not reveal this.
was the rutting of stags” is very different from
Morgan therefore added additional metaphors such
saying “the rutting of stags is a Cuban missile
as the “brain” and “instruments of domination” to
crisis.”
the repertoire, but crucially was “at pains to avoid
Therefore, we might say that metaphors help us to asserting the supremacy of any given
make the abstract more concrete. For example, metaphor…because I want to encourage the
Organisational climate might be an example of an reader to realise that there is no one
abstract concept you might find easier to describe metaphor…that is going to provide all of the
in metaphorical terms. Is your organisation an answers…that we must forge our own
Olympic Village (lots of team spirit and superb understanding and interpretations of the issues we
performers) or a bad night at the BRIT Awards (full face.” In other words, devise a number of your
of prima donnas and mayhem)? own metaphors for your organisation to help
describe it.
EXAMPLE USE
How can this help creative leaders and facilitators?
Imagine you run a function within an organisation.
The CEO has requested a review of that function to
understand what value it adds and how it might
PAUL AT THE BRITS
progress.
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CREATIVE GORILLA ARTICLE~ THE POWER OF METAPHOR
As a first step, you would like to know what your Again, you have them explain the CONCEPT of the
peers think about it and the way it might develop. metaphors, the associated characteristics and how
You hold a workshop and you ask individuals to they relate to your situation.
think of metaphors [SOURCE] that represent the
Let us post a health warning here. Metaphors are
function [TARGET] as it is today1.
not in themselves going to make the changes you
Next, you ask them to work with others and and the organisation desire but they will provide
represent these metaphors in some way as a small you with a number of different perspectives and
group, perhaps by drawing, perhaps by telling a may help remove some of the emotional blocks to
story or by acting them out. change that exist.
In this step, you have the group explain the TACKLING CHALLENGES
CONCEPT of their metaphors (there may be more
than one), the associated characteristics of the
concept and how these relate to your function.
(Please see Page 11 for an example).
TACKLING THE CHALLENGE
Metaphor can be used for organisational change
YOUR BABY?
but also in narrower areas of change. I developed
We should note here that asking your peers to
a model (please see Page 11) for use with MBA
discuss “your baby” (your function) might be
students and have adapted it with experience.
painful, especially if they see it as a “whingeing
brat”, but we need to understand what others truly It takes the familiar concepts of metaphorical
think. The use of metaphor can be helpful in characteristics and applies them to our situation,
enabling people to express themselves freely. but also asks, “How might we counter or enhance
them?”
Next, ask your peers to represent metaphorically
the function working at the peak of its You can use the model on your own perfectly well,
performance in the future and truly adding value. although using it with others tends to stimulate
more ideas, builds involvement in the challenge
and is often more fun. It has been used by scores
of people on work challenges and usually works
1 To provide some practical advice, we raise points successfully, much to the surprise of the sceptical.
about the workshop process in the blue boxes.
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CREATIVE GORILLA ARTICLE~ THE POWER OF METAPHOR
EXAMPLE USE themselves methodical and “uncreative” (however
irrational that belief) to conceptualise, but in a
The following shortened example of the model in
style with which they are comfortable.
action (please see Page 11) uses a real situation.
In a previous role, my team had to transfer the How might you use this model to explore the
operation of a telephone call centre to the US from “wall” metaphor encountered earlier?
the UK. We wanted to ensure the thirty staff in the
UK found new jobs. As mentioned earlier, there is no right metaphor
(or simile!). The more metaphors you use, the
We set up a workshop with HR, team
more perspectives you will gain on the situation
representatives, the team manager and me, using
and the greater your chance of finding novel ideas.
this model as a tool in the workshop on the
One way to use this model in teams is to select
challenge: “How can management and staff make
different metaphors for the same challenge and
it easier to find jobs for staff when the centre
have different teams work on them.
closes?”
CRITICISM OF THE MODEL
The model is self explanatory though P/N
represents a Positive or a Negative characteristic. One criticism of using the model (and metaphors)
(You should balance negative & positive is that you may not find truly novel ideas. This is
characteristics to ensure a balanced view). valid. No technique or tool can guarantee that, but
the model does enable you to develop a lot of
You will note that the model works on similar
ideas from different perspectives very efficiently.
principles to those discussed in the section on
organisations. In this case, the CONCEPTUAL CONCLUSION
METAPHOR was “search” and we chose “finding a job
is like a treasure hunt” (driving round the country 1. In Morgan’s words “metaphor is not just a
in cars literary or linguistic device for embellishing or
searching for decorating discourse. It is a primal means
“treasure”) as through which we forge our relationships
our LINGUISTIC with the world. Metaphor has a formative
METAPHORICAL impact on language, on the construction and
EXPRESSION. embellishment of meaning and on the
development of theory and knowledge of all
It is better to use the model by working through kind… The challenge is to become skilled in
column by column as this encourages divergent the art of seeing, understanding, interpreting
(creative) and convergent (judgement) thinking at and reading the situations we face.”
appropriate times.
2. As a creative leader and facilitator, you can
The advantage of using such a model is that it is use metaphors and similar devices to:
systematic. It helps people who consider
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CREATIVE GORILLA ARTICLE~ THE POWER OF METAPHOR
• Make sense of a situation BIBLIOGRAPHY
• Communicate the situation in a simple way
Metaphor: A Practical Introduction
• Tackle situations
(Paperback) by Zoltan Kovecses
• Discuss situations less emotively
3. Metaphors are fundamental to the way in Metaphors in Mind: Transformation Through
which we think and reason. Symbolic Modelling by James Derek Lawley and
4. The structure of metaphors is: Penny Lee Tompkins (Paperback - 9 Nov 2006)
• CONCEPTUAL METAPHOR - The internal idea behind
Metaphors We Live By by George and Johnson,
the metaphor
Mark Lakoff (Paperback - 2003)
• METAPHORICAL LINGUISTIC EXPRESSIONS – How you
express these conceptual metaphors Imaginization: New Mindsets for Seeing,
• They have a source and a target. A target does Organizing, and Managing: Art of Creative
not usually work as a source, this is the principle Management by Gareth Morgan (Paperback -
of unidirectionality 29 Jul 1997)
5. They can help you describe a situation and so
“I Have a Dream” Martin Luther King, text:
make the abstract more concrete.
http://www.usconstitution.net/dream.html
6. You may not always realise that you are
using metaphors, because metaphors can be
implicit and explicit
7. To understand metaphors, people must have
a shared context
8. To use them more powerfully, you must use
several metaphors to analyse a situation
We trust this article will help you develop your
organisations and your people in creative and
interesting ways so that, perhaps, you can help
them put the ball over the competition’s wall and
into the net!
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CREATIVE GORILLA ARTICLE~ THE POWER OF METAPHOR
ABOUT THE AUTHOR ABOUT YES! AND…
John Brooker started his career Yes! And… is a creative facilitation company
in the RAF and went on to working internationally with leaders in medium to
become a Senior Vice President large organisations who must tackle an important
with Visa. Since 2001 he has challenge, opportunity or project, creatively. The
run his own company, Yes! company facilitates people to:
And…
• Explore situations, create ideas and plan action
in outstanding meetings
John is a Solutions Focus Professional, a Kaizen
Training Black Belt Facilitator, a Basadur Simplex • Think flexibly, communicate powerfully and act
Process Facilitator, qualified in Group Mastery and with agility
a NLP Business Practitioner. • Innovate in a structured and creative way
He has an MBA from the Open University and To find out more, please:
tutors on the OU “Creativity, Innovation and Read: www.yesand.biz
Change” MBA Course. Speak: +44 208 8699990
Write: hi@yesand.co.uk
His regular clients include major organisations
such as Visa Inc, EADS and BT Openreach, as well
as Government departments.
As well as the UK, John frequently works
internationally in Europe, Sub Saharan Africa and
the Middle East.
John writes the “Creative Gorilla” articles on
creative leadership and flexible thinking,
distributing it internationally twice a month. To
sign up, send an e‐mail with “Subscribe” in the
subject line, your first and surname and country of
residence.
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CREATIVE GORILLA ARTICLE~ THE POWER OF METAPHOR
CHALLENGE: How can management and staff make it easier to find jobs for staff when the centre closes?
Conceptual metaphor: Search Linguistic metaphor: Finding a job is a treasure hunt
CHARACTERISTICS ASSOCIATED WITH LINGUISTIC P/N WHAT DOES THIS REVEAL ABOUT THE SITUATION? HOW CAN WE COUNTER OR ENHANCE THIS?
METAPHOR
Some people don’t arrive at the end until too N Some people may not find jobs by the time of Be positive but honest about reality. Inject the need for
late transfer action.
Some people like to mislead other seekers N This may get competitive Emphasise helping each other. Share successful job
finding strategies.
People argue as well as have fun N This is a stressful time for staff Be around. Make the environment better. Celebrate
people finding jobs.
There are lots of clues to enable you to finish P Staff may need information Provide info packs. Find other call centres needing staff.
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