“Sensitivity to”, to inform the study of sensemaking in a phenomenological and enactivist approach

Sandberg and Touskas (2020) develop an approach of sensemaking starting from phenomenologically inclined organizational research and enactivist cognitive scientist. Our theoretical proposition is embedded in this approach; it focuses on sensemaking in extreme contexts in order to understand polar expedition organizing. Sandberg and Tsoukas (2015) propose a relational and holistic conceptualization of sensemaking. In this conception, meaning cannot be separated from action; enaction simultaneously asks the question of what is happening now and what is to be done with it. The individual is always immersed in a socio-cultural world. "Sensemaking originates neither in cognition nor in social interaction alone, but in specific meaninggiving practice worlds, which agents inhabit" (Sandberg and Tsoukas, 2020, p. 23). Extending different works (Holt and Cornelissen, 2014; Guiette and Vandenbempt, 2016; de Rond et al., 2019), Sandberg and Tsoukas (2020) distinguish four types of sensemaking: 1) immanent sensemaking considered as a mode of elementary and direct engagement with the world; 2) involved- deliberate sensemaking, 3) detached-deliberate sensemaking and 4) representational sensemaking. The different sensemaking types "form a continuum, overlapping with each other to varying degrees at different points in time" (Sandberg and Tsoukas, 2020, p. 8). Thus, the most basic dimension, the immanent sensemaking, seems to be important to study as it influences the other processes. This leads to focus on it and to approach more closely the lived experience of individuals (Guiette and Vandenbempt, 2016) in order to contribute to the new trend about embodied sensemaking (Cunliffe and Coupland, 2012; Cornelissen et al., 2014; Maitlis and Sonenshein, 2010; de Rond et al., 2019; Meziani and Cabantous, 2020). In a non-dualist perspective, thanks to the enactivist conception, the intrasubjective level could be considered as an internal coherence, resulting from a history of internal validations of the interactions operated by a living being coping with analogous circumstances from its point of view (Varela, 2010). These internal validations depend on what is viable, what is positive for him in this kind of circumstances. Thus, the internal coherence seems to be a practical sense, a direction, an orientation to what is viable, what is positive for one practitioner in this kind of circumstances. In order to study this internal coherence of a coupling, we suggest using the notion of "sensitivity to" (Récopé et al., 2019). "Sensitivity to" could thus complete Sandberg and Tsoukas's model (2020): it adds a new level to extrasubjective and generic-subjective ones to understand immanent sensemaking. So doing, the notion of "sensitivity to" is a theoretical contribution to sensemaking's literature. Embedded in an enactivist and phenomenological approach, the notion of "Sensitivity to" (Récopé et al., 2019) emphasises the sensitive, affective, normative dimensions of immanent sensemaking. The permanent drawing up of what is meaningful is not only semantic; it is inseparable from an adaptive value or from the positive or negative valence it takes for the agent. Thus, it seems important to identify what is this adaptive value, what is the reference value, in order to understand practical sense. Our hypothesis is that the practical sense could be interpreted as a "sensitivity to" which is considered as a prevailing norm of activity which orients practical concerns. It is a norm of activity with three discriminating characteristics (Récopé et al., 2019): (1) it is controversial, in that it contains both the value and its anti-value (Canguilhem, 1966). Thus, by the norm, "any preference of an order is most often implicitly accompanied by aversion to the reverse order possible. What is different from the preferable, in a given field, is not indifferent, but repels it, or more exactly is repelled" (ibid.). According to Canguilhem (1966, p. 177), this is the core of the normal- abnormal relation: "The norm, by devaluing everything that the reference to it prohibits from being considered normal, creates on its own the possibility of an inversion of terms"; (2) it is practical, in that it is expressed in actions, and not only in judgments of appreciation. "The norm sets a framework for action" (Durrive, 2010), it is operational: "norms have no reality outside the concrete action through which they are carried out" (Macherey, 1998). Practical concerns are embedded in norms of activity; (3) it is mandatory, in that it is spontaneously imposed on the agent who incorporated it by requiring them to do what is necessary: "norms imply imperatives" (Livet, 2006). They push us, they determine us to act in accordance with them. It is a prevailing norm of activity because this particular value tends to usually, regularly, impose itself as more important than other values involved in/by the agent's activity within the considered socio- cultural practice field (Récopé et al., 2019). It refers to what is vital/crucial for the agent in this field, i.e., what is most important to him/her in situ and what is at stake. It is about understanding the object that guides, structures and motivates his/her activity within the considered socio-cultural practice field. "Sensitivity to" constrains (opens and closes) the possibilities for action, meaning and learning within the considered field of practice; it constrains the field of the agent's normative interactions. However, even if "sensitivity to" norms and initiates practical concerns, it does not determine the course of each action, which must be contextualized with reference to relevant circumstances from the agent's perspective. The focus on norms of activity is not a negation of cultural norms, of social roles or of organisationnal principles. "We are always already immersed within specific sociomaterial practice worlds" (Sandberg and Tsoukas, 2020). However, in a given context, "the same task performed by people of different characteristics will not generate the same activity" (Daniellou and Rabardel, 2005, p. 355). If the prescription constitutes the "grammar of the work", a frame work, agents project something of themselves into it (Grimand et al., 2017). Norms of activity re-normalise cultural norms, social roles and organisationnal principles.. We study "sensitivity to", prevailing norms of activity, in order to understand the basic dimension which orients the other types of sensemaking. This is the most implicit, embodied and affective level. If the concept of "sensitivity to" is interesting in different contexts (Récopé et al., 2019) to study "practical sense" (Sandberg and Tsoukas, 2020), it seems particularly relevant in extreme contexts; contexts in which the consequences are often negative, for example, the loss of human life, but the outcome may also be positive, e.g., new knowledge and innovations There is much at stake! Being able to understand ex post, what was meaningful for a practitioner engaged in extreme context is important. However, it seems much more important to be able, according to the "sensitivity to" of an agent in a given socio-cultural context, to build a prospective proposition on what could be his/her practical concerns in such or such future extreme context.