A safe workplace. The subject is in the spotlight these days due to a lot of media attention. To prevent cases of abuse of power, transgressive behaviour and cultures of fear in the workplace, PhD candidate Juri Hoedemakers devised the professional jester, a modern version of the court jester. He tells Dutch broadcaster NOS how he can help organisations in this role.
Hoedemakers won the thesis prize of the Rotterdam School of Management in 2020 with his thesis on the added value of the court jester in modern organisations. Now he is conducting doctoral research on it, as well as working as a professional court jester at organisations.
In days gone by, the court jester was known as a joker and entertainer. And was also the only one allowed to tell the king the unvarnished truth. Juri Hoedemakers brought this phenomenon back in a modern version: in the workplace, he told NOS. The purpose of the professional court jester is to create a nice workplace, where everyone feels safe and dares to speak out, the PhD researcher explains.
Holding up a mirror
As a professional court jester, he helps companies hold up a mirror in a light-hearted manner and look for blind spots within the organisation. He does this by having conversations with employees, often during a walk outside the office walls, by visiting departments and by attending consultations, solicited and unsolicited.
What he uncovers in conversations with employees, he links back to a company's management in an anonymised way. ‘I am the outsider on the inside. I say the nastiest things, raw on you, but brought light-heartedly.’
Critical
Employees are often very critical of the court jester at first, says Hoedemakers. ‘What can such a clown do for us? But because of my scientific background, people soon take it seriously.’ Read the full article at NOS (in Dutch).
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Read the full article at NOS (in Dutch)
Juri Hoedemakers was recently interviewed by Dutch newspaper de Telegraaf about the court jester. Read the article here (in Dutch).
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