Download - New Worlds
New WorldsGISC Gathering June 2012
Rob FarrandsDominik Heil
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Connecting in a disconnected worldGISC’s journey to encompass leadership and ODWhat ideas were informing our approach?What practices would make a differenceWere there structural constraints on the dream?
Research: approaches to organizing?Four open inquiry meetings – USA & SwedenEight internal papers, two Board reportsPublished articles on consulting, ethics & Gestalt
practiceA background conversation: virtual & actualClient work, conferences to socialise the
discussionMany questions: familiar solutions. Empiricism?
Asking different questions…Meeting Dominik HeilPursuing Maurice Merleau-PontyDaring to ask the ontological questionsRe-framing my own pastQuestioning GestaltArguing with Edwin
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The corporation as a physical object / machine
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The Corporation as an Organism
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The Corporation as a Human Being
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Categories of Being
A non organic entity e.g. a stone or a machine
A non human organism e.g. plant or animal
A human being A human work e.g. an art work
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The organisation as a Work/WorldA Work as in a work of art: a created form or
structure that throws out a World.Think of the experience of going into a cathedral,
a Merchant Bank, a school, Apple Co.Sets up a whole World to support and shape
human activity e.g. a ‘world of medicine’ or ‘worlds apart’.
The experience of being in a world is lived; it is not a series of assumptions held cognitively.
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“World” as a totality of Interpretations within which Humans move confidently
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Engaged AgencyOrganisational actors are always already profoundly
engaged and subject to taken for granted assumptions A world is not experienced as a set of assumptions
‘over there’. It is felt as the natural way to be. People are ‘touched’ and ‘moved’ into place. A world is what we live through not what we think.
Individual differentiation takes place from out of a intimate felt connection to a shared world
The organisation can only be understood from the inside
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Method
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Work/World: holistic form
WORK
WORLD
Confers intelligibility-makes WORK possible
Holds the WORLD in place-confers identity
Taken for Granted Basic assumptions
We are gripped. Freedom?
We are relational.
What is true?
Towards new practice…..Freedom to think requires freedom from taken for
granted basic assumptions – grip of the worldThis means engaging with the invisibility of the body.Truth is disclosure of the always already lived (not
correspondence)This requires authentic expression ….& then dialogue
Key practices: affect management, thinking and dialogue
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Methodological PrinciplesUse of self. Internal and external data are of equal
value & subject to equivalent constraintsTruth is a process of disclosing what already is
with as much integrity as possible: say how it is honestly
Freedom requires affective sensitivity & releaseRelying on experience requires being as open as
possible to contradictory or disconfirming dataListening freely becomes critical
Methodological toolsRe-thinking corporate strategy“World” Inquiry instrumentThinking feeling instrumentConversation/dialogue/listeningConsulting model: immerse/express/dialogueothers
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Strategic Inquiry & contextWORLD WORK
What is this world? How is it held in place?
What is possible in this world? How do we need to change it?
Strategic Intent
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Deliberate Inquiry: 20 Qs (Schein/Heil)
Cultural overview
Strategy Physical Layout
Authority/power
Accountabil-ity
Systems Success Failure Time Change
Abilities Sub-cultures
Relationship
Being human
Attitude to nature
History Defining moments
Trends Developme-nts
Metaphor
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Consulting modelClient Contact Intervention goals1. Diagnostic. Immerse in the client World. Build trust & relationship.
2. Describe/express the world/work structure. Explore strategic fit & possibilities. Dialogic process.
3. Offer & explore possibilities . Build leadership capacity. Dialogue again…..
4. Design programs to re-design and/or develop the world/work structure.
5. Proceed dialogically building momentum, refining diagnostic & building trust.
Articulation: re-gathering & retrieval of forgotten or occluded. Re-focus shared understanding of the “always already”.
Restructuring: attending to marginalized practices by drawing them into attention.
Cross Appropriation: Borrow from neighboring practice/theory.
Concluding
Being Outrageous
FREEDOM & TRUTH!
Gestalt CorrespondenceThe deep wisdom of Gestalt formTrapped in naïve “tactical” humanism Awareness as disclosing the always already – truthBodily sensitivity as a precursor to freedomLanguage/Listening as fundamentalsA body of practice that needs re-directingPotential for rejuvenation
Prospects…
The entities vital to sustainabile life such as organisms, humans and society cannot show up in their very nature in the predominant corporate world
Current arguments of sustainability & humanism are made in purely instrumental terms
What does it take to create organizations within which organisms, humans and society can show up in their very nature so that we can save the planet & ourselves?