Metaphors and the language of leadership

Metaphors saturate the language of leadership. Metaphor is not just a mere ornament; it is a common, frequent, and pervasive phenomenon.

They are often used to understand evasive concepts that we would like to communicate with others. Morgan wrote that metaphor is “a primal, generative process that is fundamental to the creation of human understanding and meaning in all aspects of life”[1]. According to Black, metaphors help us sort reality from illusion[2].

We instinctively graft abstract and complex concepts such as ‘time’, ‘life, and ‘organization’ onto more concrete concepts that are easier to visualize. Even theories get visualized, often as structures (we may talk about ‘supporting’ evidence or the ‘foundations’ of a theory).

What’s a metaphor?

“Metaphors are omnipresent in science. Astrophysicists describe the distribution of mass in the universe as being foam-like, and chemists still ascribe orbitals to atoms as if electrons were planets spinning around a nuclear sun”[3].

Phrases such as ‘life is a game’ or ‘business is war’ clearly represent expressions using which the speaker aims to draw the recipient’s attention to the fact that in life or business, you can either win or lose.

Metaphors have remained an important subject of interest through the centuries.

Theory, analysis, research, and study have been dedicated to them from Aristotle until now. Contrary to common thought, our conceptualization and thinking are pervaded by metaphors rather than simply serving as rhetorical and poetic devices.

To be more precise, in the field of linguistics and communication, it is believed that our cognitive processes and thoughts are highly metaphorical—that human thought is constructed and constituted of metaphors[4]. Language is certainly barely metaphor-free, meaning that people reason in metaphors and develop familiarity with new domains as a result of metaphorical thinking[5]. This is because analogical thinking leads to a fresh understanding of either familiar or new concepts[6].

Metaphors are implied comparisons that bring together two concepts. “Metaphor occurs when a unit of discourse is used to refer unconventionally to an object, process, or concept, or collides unconventionally.

And when this unconventional act of reference or collation is understood based on similarity, matching, or analogy involving the conventional referent or colligates of the unit and the actual unconventional referent or colligates”[7].

Dickins, for instance, defines metaphors as “A figure of speech in which a word or phrase is used in a non-basic sense, this non-basic sense suggesting a likeness or analogy [...] with another more basic sense of the same word or phrase”[8].

According to Deignan, “A metaphor is a word or expression that is used to talk about an entity or quality other than that referred to by its core, or most basic, meaning. This non-core use expresses a perceived relationship with the core meaning of the word and, in many cases, between two semantic fields”[9].

Do metaphors evolve?

We must also stress that metaphors evolve. For instance, until very recently, the information superhighway was a metaphor for the internet. But the word ‘cyberspace’ has now taken over[10]. The question is whether they are the same. Alternatively, will a new word replace the term ‘cyberspace’ as wearable computers cross over from the realm of the exotic to that of a mass-produced commodity?

Among the various types of metaphors emerging from professional literature, several that are used more frequently in management can be identified.

Since George Lakoff and Mark Johnson published their famous book, metaphors have been published and have since taken the place of research into cognition and human language.

Metaphors have become the perfect tool for defining the role of Cognitive Linguistics and discovering how language reflects our perception of the world. Even though metaphors go unnoticed by most language users, they claim that the language they speak is literal. To most, it comes as a surprise that metaphorical speech is part of  everyday language and will always be there, whether we know it or not, when we speak about our experiences, emotions, etc. Metaphors do not belong only in the realm of language. Important researchers such as Andrew Goatly, Zoltan Kövecses, George Lakoff, and others have argued that Cognitive Linguistics underlines how we perceive the world. Metaphors are used to make us understand abstract domains such as time, social institutions, and emotions.

The use of metaphors can be a useful tool for reading, understanding, and leading organizations.

In everyday language, metaphors comprise essential elements at a practical level[1], so why shouldn’t they be in management or management consulting? We strongly believe that a metaphoric approach to management can be applied both in academia and in managerial and consulting practice all over the world.

Metaphors literature and bibliography

[1] Cornelissen J.P., On the organizational identity metaphor, „British Journal of Management”, No. 13, 2002; Cornelissen J.P., Beyond compare: Metaphor in organization theory, „Academy of Management Review”, Vol. 30, 2005; Morgan G., Images of Organization, updated edition, Berrett-Koehler Publishers, San Francisco 2006; Oswick C., Keenoy T., Grant D. 2002., Metaphor and analogical reasoning in organization theory: Beyond orthodoxy, „Academy of Management Review”, No. 27(2), pp. 294-303; Tsoukas H., The Missing Link: A Transformational View of Metaphors in Organizational Science, „The Academy of Management Review”, No. 16(3), 1991; Tsoukas H., Analogical Reasoning and Knowledge Generation in Organization, „Theory Organization Studies”, No. 14(3), 1993; Morgan G., An afterword: Is there anything more to be said about metaphor?, [In] Grant D. and Oswick C. (eds), Metaphor and Organizations, Sage, London, 1996, p. 228.

[2] Black M., Models and Metaphors, Cornell University Press, Ithaca, 1962.

[3] Brown T.L., Making Truth: Metaphor in Science, University of Illinois Press 2003, xiv + 215 pp.

[4] Deignan A., Metaphor and Corpus Linguistics, J. Benjamins Pub. 2005, p. 18.

[5] Gentner D., Jeziorski M., The shift from metaphor to analogy in western science, [In] Ortony A. (Ed.), Metaphor and Thought, 2nd ed., Cambridge University Press 1993, pp. 447–480; Lakoff G., Johnson M., Metaphors we live by, Chicago University Press, Chicago 1980.

[6] Walsh J.P., Managerial and organizational cognition: Notes from a trip down memory lane, „Organization Science”, No. 6, 1995, Schön D.A., Generative metaphor: A perspective on problem-setting in social policy [In] Ortony A. (Ed.), Metaphor and Thought, 2nd ed., Cambridge University Press, 1993.

[7] Goatly A., The Language of Metaphors, Routledge, London, 1997, p. 8.

[8] Dickins J., Two models for metaphor translation, John Benjamins Publishing Company, 2005, p. 228.

[9] Deignan A., Metaphor and Corpus Linguistics, John Benjamins Publishing Company, 2005, p. 34.

[10] Barta-Smith N., Hathaway J., Cyberspaces into Cyberplaces, „Journal of Geography”, No. 99(6), 1999, pp. 253-265.