Staying sane

Continuing with my recently published reflections about profilicity in this blog, I would like now to delve into what this so-called identity technology by Moeller and D'Ambrosio (2021), or better, its lessons, can do to help us keep our sanity.

Sanity?  Yes, in particular when winter comes...Rumours of Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD). 

The above authors have a final section about sanity in their book "You and Your Profile" which is worth reading and reflecting upon.  The reflections on this section could help us better navigate our experienced complexities (for me it is winter!).  

Let me first explain sanity in relation to authenticity and then to sincerity.  

Authenticity

The rise of profilicity seems to be parallel to recent debates about another identity technology: that of authenticity.  In a nutshell, authenticity means pursuing the best version of our selves, that which best reflects our 'inner' identities, values and aspirations.  Authenticity, showing our 'true' inner selves is seen as a set of phenomena in modern societies by the sociologist Giles Lipovetsky (2024) and by the philosopher Byung Chul Han (2021).  To these, authenticity has become a right on its own that is vindicated in our societies by a continuous 'selfie' validation.  But it is not a free right to exercise.  It requires us to continuosly 'perform' in front of our digital cameras or platforms, to show that we work in ourselves towards our best versions.  The paradox emerges as becoming authentic results in being like everyone else (Moeller and D'Ambrosio, 2021).  

For Moeller and D'Ambrosio (2021), in its various manifestations, authenticity is being replaced by profilicity.  The striving for authentic self-performance, coupled with the of digital technologies, contributes to shape our behaviours and ways of thinking.  

We are continuously seduced to invest and curate our profiles, seeking validation with general peers or public audiences which do the same. This means that we increasingly work in second-order observations,  observing and being observed as being observed.  

In other words, we become somehow addicted to enter and maintain communication loops with people (profiles) that communicate back.  It could be that if we are lucky, one of these influential people notice our signals and signals back.  And then everyone else sees it.  

In my academic world, we get rewarded by being authentic (i.e. pursuing our own interests, being against the establishment, thinking originally, influencing policy or impact), but more importantly, we get rewarded by being noticed as being noticed.  Our 'rankings', for instance our h-index, or being cited by important authors in our domain (many which we will never know in person) reinforces this sense of being someone, in other words having an identity.  

Authenticity and profilicity as technologies are not free of consequences.  Striving always to 'perform' and impress (positively), being profiled in ways we do not expect (negatively) can arise our anxiety and sense of loss, inadequacy or an imposter syndrome.  Not getting the 'likes' we think we deserve can become an obsession or a trigger for more anxiety or depression.  

Sincerity

Moeller and D'Ambrosio also highlight another identity technology: That of sincerity.  This value becomes a technology when it is used to evaluate ones' conforming to expected social roles (for instance being a father or a mother).  Social roles are also expected to be assumed in other parts of life, for instance being a good educator or worker.  

In our modern world, we are expected not only to perform certain roles like the above mentioned, but also to signal such performance. Sincerity technology use could also have negative consequences.  Not fulfilling a social role to what is 'expected' can bring us shame or guilt.  

Having too many balls to juggle can then lead, if we are not careful, to insanity.

This is where sincerity can become profilicity for good.  Otherwise, our lives are transformed into threadmills where we run incessantly, in my case, fatherhood, being a son or relative, being a 'good' educator, citizen or even a volunteer (the reader can check previous blog posts about this).  

Sanity

In their book section, Moeller and D'Ambrosio (2021) show both the dynamics and consequences of all these three technologies (authenticity, sincerity, profilicity).  For them, sanity is about navigating the demands that we get by engaging in identity communications so that we develop a degree of inmunity to their demands.  

As mentioned before in a previous blog post, these authors talk about 'genuine pretending' as a way of flowing through life with ease.  Their reference to Eastern philosophy (Daoism, Zhuangzi) aims to offer us a humurous yet very powerful way of embracing life as it comes without attaching ourselves too much to rigid moral  or ethical principles, many (if not all) of which get deployed by these technologies as ways of thinking and acting.  

Staying sane would mean different things to different people.  To me and currently, it means abandoning heroic quests to do everything right (I have been fighting my perfectionism for at least a decade!).  In the day to day, it also means changing plans when my energy fades, saying no a bit more, and breathing and resting.  Maybe in the future my strategies to say sane could change.  These are the ones that work for me at the moment.  

I also have to accept that in my week and to remain sane, there needs to be time to improvise, talk to people and get angry if needed.  This goes against my upbringing as an easy to get on person, who feared authority and who dreaded to be seen as a bad son or bad student, if not a bad business analyst or family entrepreneur.  

So staying sane...also in winter.  No need to overdo in our identities.  

Systemic profiles and duels

During my academic journey of more than 20 years in the UK, I have to confess that I have struggled to navigate the different systems that surround us.  

A pressing issue that seems to represent this struggle is my concern with social media, in particular LinkedIn, a platform that, based on 'intelligent' algorithms, shows us continuously what goes on with other academics, professionals, and institutions.  By doing so, it helps reinforce in people like me (perfectionist) an urge to check and show that, I also do things which should be recognised within my institution and elsewhere.  In this way, I become my own target for scrutiny.  

The good news though.  Something that has helped me to better understand the why and how of this anxiety and fear is Hans Moeller and Paul D'Ambrosio (2021)'s notion of profilicity.  This is an identity technology or technologies which, in our societies and alongside other technologies (sincerity, authenticity), influence and are influenced by how we see ourselves and how we interact with others.  

Profilicity operates as systems of communications, or better, as context specific assemblages of communication that require us to continuously invest in curating how we want to be seen as being seen.  At the centre of this requirement is the operation of second order observations (the observer observes what/how other people  or systems observe).  This is something that these authors borrow from the work of Niklas Luhmann and his idea of society composed of self-producing communication systems.   

My view of profilicity (Córdoba-Pachón, 2024, Figure 2.4)

For academics like myself, profilicity seems to be an inevitable technology, in which alongside our attempts to show and be shown sincerity (performing established and required roles like educators) and authenticity (pursuing and showing our 'true' inner selves), we are to engage in validating our profiles continuously, using or being used by other profiles. 

Having come across profilicity a few years back, in my latest book on systems thinking and ritual (2024), I proposed the latter as a way of bridging gaps between managing first and second order observations.  I also adopted the above authors (Moeller and D'Ambrosio) recommendations to do my best to remain sane, to genuinely pretend.  I have proposed rediscovering and reflecting on rituals to help us start acknowledging the importance of pretending.  By doing so, I argue that we can have some space for reflection on how best to deal with ambiguities and uncertainties in our conversations with others.  

Sheerwater F.C visiting Knaphill F.C in August 31 2026: A mini-ritual at the local derby. 

Many of my academic colleagues seem to be more savvy than I am in curating their LinkedIn platform profiles: good for them!  What seems to be important is, according to Moeller and D'Ambrosio, is not to invest our authentic or sincere selves in our presentations.  Rather, it is to consider that there is a general peer, a sort of public sphere in this and other platforms.  Through these peers, we observe how others observe (and this includes our own profiles), and can engage with them (to seek validation).  

Sometimes, we get lucky and this peer observes us back, by for instance forwarding or highlighting our posts to a wider audience.  But most of the time though, this mutual validation feedbacks are ephemeral, or controlled by algorithms.  These try to ensure that other people can still see our profile posts or messages long after they have been posted; they can also ensure that they cannot see us!  

As profilers, our task is to keep a form of presence, so that the algorithms do not forget us.  And to grow our network of 'peers', often relying on their profiles to connect with them.  

Like (non-league) football clubs (Sheerwater and Knaphill included),  many universities in the UK and elsewhere continuously profile themselves in order to attract audiences.  Academics have to be aware of these profiles and often shape their own profiles.  Somehow our own institutions become part of our general peers.  They observe what we do, and in some cases they profile it.  

A social media post from Sheerwater F.C on X, September 15 2026

There is (still) a degree of freedom in deciding what to do about our profiles.  As individuals, we can engage with these profile interactions (individual, organisational).  Let me call such interactions 'duels' (where one can accept a challenge to regain honour after an offense).  I use this term to account for the possibility that duels can be seen as rituals, according to Byung Chul Han (2020)'s description in his book "The dissapearance of rituals".  

In duels, honour and form rather than personal pride or smartness prevail.   Han (2020) also presents other types of rituals like the Japanese tea ceremony.  Similar to duels, form prevails to the expense of individuality.  If that is the case, rituals of profiling could be better seen not as demonstrations of individual or collective authenticity or sincerity from those who profile themselves or their institutions, but of seeking (and maybe obtaining) validation from the general peers, whoever those might be.  A football team might seek validation from followers and fans if not the league where they play.  A university might seek validation from the 'general public' (students, employers, rating agencies etc).  Platforms like LinkedIn become the 'theatres' where validations are sought and obtained, leading to further validations.   

Moeller and D'Ambrosio (2021) aim to encourage us as individuals to make sure that we do not become the profiles that we show.  To differentiate between branding ourselves and showing ourselves authentically or sincerely.  If we take the idea of duels forward, we might decide not to bring our 'true' selves (whatever this might mean for each of us) to the challenges.  

There is a price to pay if we decide to profile ourselves too much or if our institutions do the same.  We had better consider that our lives are too dynamic to be attached to profiles.  Maybe as academics or individuals, we do not need to aspire to become social media celebrities after all.  Let's try to pretend, genuinely, in such aspirations.  Who knows, maybe one day, we will forget all about this.  

References

Córdoba-Pachón, J.R. (2024).  Ritual and Systems Thinking:  Managing an Initial Encounter.  London:  Routledge

Moeller, H. G., & D'ambrosio, P. J. (2021). You and your Profile: Identity after authenticity. Columbia University Press.

The systems thinker that was (not) there

By its own nature and origin, the discipline of systems thinking, in its various forms, is inter-disciplinary in the face of volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous (VUCA) situations.  It is best to address such situations with as many different perspectives as possible, so that we can learn from and with other people who come from diverse backgrounds and who might also have different goals to us.  

Systems thinking offers a common language for dialogue.  During the twentieth century and stemming from the work of biologists, philosophers and psychologists, among others, science often arrives at a single and communal idea:  that of a system. A set of inter-related, inter-connected parts whose interaction leads us to consider what emerges, or could emerge, if we decide intervene in situations (although we cannot fully control or determine what is to emerge).  

As discussed before in this blog (see latest post), in practice, this arrival is often accompanied by a similar one:  Acknowledging one's own values in relation to those perceived to be enacted or lived in the system.  The emergence also includes shift in people's identities.  Faced with the complex nature of situations, we and others might not see as experts anymore.  

I have called this dual situation (one as ethical subject, the system or systems in which one is operating) as 'arrivals', many of which could be acknowledged as common by different science or management professionals or practitioners.  In my systems thinking journey as both practitioner and academic, these arrivals include ethical reflection on the type of person I have been and want to become.  Arrivals also include a realisation that am only a part of systems or situations, so any change does not depend entirely on me, even if my perfectionist self would say otherwise (or the institutional metrics require).  A realisation to continue being engaged in situations, now protecting my own sanity and that of loved ones.  

Other systems thinkers like Jean Boulton, adopting ideas from Taoism and Metaphysics, would prefer to call arrivals becomings.  The difference between these two terms could only be epistemological and in relation to how a system thinker places him/herself in relation to what goes on.  Boulter's take seems to be more directed at not distinguishing much the individual, but oriented more towards the fluid and emerging patterns of interaction betwen human and non human elements of a 'system'.  Here the idea of a system seems to be better understood as relational processes (of becoming), which one could also term as processes of organising.  

Systems thinker Mike Jackson (2024), on the other hand, would prefer to first distinguish ingfeatures of systems or situations using systemic perspectives.  These, in my mind, are metaphorical narratives, comparisons that, using our inherited ability to associate or filter things via language devices, can help us identify and appreciate salient features of how things and people 'work' or relate.  All of this under a big realisation that we will never gain a full appreciation of what goes on in a situation.  A big arrival, which can then taken to promote practical improvements in a situation.  

In his latest development (EPIC), Mike Jackson has enriched his set of perspectives with features provided by popular systems methodologies and methods, to be also tackled with their help.  For example, a perspective of interrelationships aims to identify and bring to debate how people and issues, activities and technologies become interrelated so that the action or behaviour of one impacts on others and vice-versa. Also, a methodology or method like systems dynamics could then help us better identity and address such relationships (in terms of stocks and flows for example), if that is deemed to be relevant by stakeholders.  

To this kind of 'procedural' logic of Mike Jackson (many other systems thinkers, including myself, would share it), Jean Boulton would add that it is important to first look at what is becoming, and act as promptly as possible, so that if there is a detrimental pattern of interaction in a situation (system), it can be then avoided in its potential escalation.  It is researchers and practitioners who are to navigate this complexity of becomings (emerging patterns).  To effectively do that, they had better become flexible and bendy.  If needed, they can then promote more beneficial patterns, being helped by systems methodologies or methods.  

In both of the above cases (Boulton, Jackson), either by intervening early or later, with or without systems methodologies or methods, researchers or practitioners (individuals) would need to keep an eye on what goes on, given that through time other issues which would emerge from adopting other perspectives (i.e. mechanistic, cultural/political, social/environmental) require changes in an intervention strategy.  This, inevitably, will also bring us inside the picture, where we would need to reflect on our own preferences and biases, our blindness, influenced by what we think are our own values and those of others.  

Arrivals in practice

When reviewing and using Boulter and Jackson's ideas in my own practice (that includes teaching systems thinking), I find myself arriving at certain points where reflection and (in)flexibility is required.  An educator or a student that notices something salient in a situation, for example an opportunity to implement a creative idea, or a pressing issue that nobody wants to discuss inside or outside the classroom, arrives at some realisations, emerging from his/her understandings, which s/he can share with others.  It is then when s/he has an opportunity to 'steer' things in certain directions.  Like a football game, the ball falls at his/her feet.  What to do then? What is the next move?  

Doing nothing is one option. Inviting other people, from other backgrounds or disciplines to contribute is another; leaving others to decide another one; or taking action on his/her own another one.  From the perspective of an educator, there is also the tempation to say: "Let the students sort themselves out!".  Myself, I prefer challenging students to go beyond the classroom, and if possible, supporting them, until I realise that my own sanity comes first.  In a future post, I will talk about a recently completed project with my students.  

In any case, we then arrive at a kind of paradox.  The systems thinker, someone who has been somehow leading the observing of a situation (or inviting others to do so),  using the idea of a system and its derived applied methods or methodologies, comes to the foreground to almost inmediately disappear, as if s/he has not been there at all.  

A curious insight.  Hamlet's words "to be or not to be" resonate with me at this point.  And te reader might ask at this point:  How can we then appear and disappear (shortly after presumably)?  

One thing to say about this question is that systems thinkers are not magicians, that is for sure.  But we can make sure that we have some presence in situations.  

Many years ago, a student of mine asked me a similar question: How can we be systems thinkers without being 'punished' by that?  She wanted to use systems thinking in her job, but feared to be sidelined.  She wanted to be and not be there I think.  

My reply then was:  "Do your best.  Work as openly possible with other people's views.  Let them know yours. If possible, focus on learning about a situation, and trust your use of a systems methodology.  And hope that what comes out is beneficial for us all."

Today I can say that my perspective would be very similar.  Only to add that in a situation,  there might be a need to let people know that you are or were there, but not as the main character or leader.    That would be self-defeating.  We are not the system that is trying to promote improvements.  

So if people ask:  What should we do? You can always say:  "I really do not know [I was/am not there!], but if you keep asking, we can always try to find out answers together".