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Breakdown or Breakhrough

LIFE LEADERSHIP DIGEST – Article by Steve Trivett – 23/09/2020

Are we moving towards a breakdown or a breakthrough?

Futurist Jamais Caisco believes that political mayhem, climate disasters and global pandemics are evidence that we are failing to understand ourselves or our symbiotic relationship with nature. Our reticence to learn from and adapt to the Complexity in living systems is causing us to fear the Volatility, Uncertainty and Ambiguity that our VUCA world is generating. These observations are not new, but they are making us more aware of what living at the “edge of chaos” could ultimately mean.

We have the capacity to change our “way of being” just by changing our thinking and acting accordingly. It’s produced by the language we use, the emotions and moods we adopt, the body state we display and the relationships we generate as a result. Our “being” is not just an expression of how we behave, it reflects how we think, which impacts on how we respond to the world as we observe it and make real to us.  

Jamais believes we must “be” more resilient in our thinking to be more flexible and less Brittle in our assessments. For example, the Anxiety produced by a VUCA environment will inevitably lead to breakdowns, as we have yet to learn how to accept and adapt to the unpredictable nature of the Non-linear systems that now dominate our life. Jamais believes that an understanding of how complex systems (in the mind and in our environment) work will help us make sense of what have become Incomprehensible interconnections (BANI).

For example, if we are unable to accept the facts now facing us, we could just freeze and get stuck in our thoughts and feelings. If we cannot unlearn or self-regulate our reactions, then resentment will build up and feelings of unfairness, inequality and injustice will come back with a vengeance. If we feel powerless to change in response to VUCA or remain blind to the dangers of BANI, we will just live in hope or look for something or someone to blame. If we cannot think differently about these serious challenges to our very existence our options remain limited, our consciousness is dulled and our actions constrained.

We need new thinking patterns and insights to go forward

Chaos happens when things get out of control and we fail to make sense of what’s happening. There are no patterns or discernible rules to latch onto when we don’t even know what the initial conditions were that triggered them. Unexpected surprises and novel events can have a major impact on our future, yet can only be fully understood with the benefit of hindsight. We know how personal concerns can cause breakdowns in the flow of normal life, like a pandemic for example. It’s as if we get “locked-in” to a cycle of “increasing returns” that produces a rolling “snowball effect”  of growth. It’s as if we are powerless to act until we have analysed the patterns in the interactions so we can investigate and test what makes sense so we can decide how best to intervene. But our innate capacity for insights and gut feelings can often shorten our assessments of complex situations.

For example, when birds flock, the patterns appear haphazard, until the simple rules and initial conditions are identified.  What’s interesting, is that the rules that explain flocking are the same rules we have used to guide us in our response to the Covid – 19. That is, to keep our distance from others, whilst at the same time staying close enough to serve our survival needs. It’s our linear thinking that assumes there must be one leader directing events. But that is an illusion. It’s compliance with rules that serve our best interests that are valued. They can be applied to serve the group whilst allowing each person the freedom to self-organise.

It’s the lessons we can learn from nature’s living systems that will help us rethink our response to VUCA and BANI. If we can connect through shared intentions and new ways of thinking, we see the value of collaborating to prepare for human and environmental breakdowns more effectively.  What’s encouraging is the way scientists, businesses and citizens are now coming together to combine their strengths. By recognising the value of diversity and inclusivity a new way of thinking could be shared that could reduce the destructive effects of a VUCA world.

A recently sponsored piece of research by The Harvard Business Review showed how teams with diverse memberships, using methods such as “independent pairs” can quickly process multiple perspectives and secure sufficient agreement to get an agreement of how to solve complex problems 60% faster. Much depends on the team’s capacity to engage in generative conversations and create the conditions for valuable insights to emerge.

It helps when conversations use “intuitive questioning”. This enables groups to:

  • Be more aware of paradox and be comfortable with ambiguity
  • Remain open to what they don’t know to consider the seemingly impossible
  • Ask open-ended questions when they can’t agree on any one answer
  • Be open to surprises, coincidences and synchronicity
  • Turn judgments and assertions into opportunities to explore new possibilities
  • Convert disagreements into a search for common ground
  • Use defensiveness and anxiety as a trigger for self-reflection

A shift of focus towards intuition and insight is unlikely to get more buy-in from those who would normally demand verification, certainty and logic. This is because they seldom deliver results as the same thinking fails to deliver creative thinking or innovation. 

Facilitating generative conversations

Conversations are not just about seeking clarity of purpose, they can be powerful vehicles for energising action and securing commitments.  This involves:

  • Both authentic speaking and deep listening
  • Making conversations activity focused, not a passive
  • Speaking that aids clarity by using intonation and body posture
  • Seeking actions that reflect personal skills, motivation and commitment

A conversation cannot work without an attentive listener, even if it’s ourselves. When we listen to our thoughts, we only hear our own concerns, assumptions and biases. What’s important is that we listen for understanding. We then look for what the data reveals and evidence proves. To create new insights, we have to empower each other to speak authentically and reflect on personal experience.

High trust conversations are more likely to prompt honest reflection and self-realisation. As we become more aware of our words, moods and emotions, and their power to access intuition and gut feel, we become more powerful observers of how to improve each other’s Way of Being.

Generative conversations tend to focus on getting commitments from each other that are carefully coordinated to produce collaborative action. They deliver added value to regular conversations that share ideas, monitor progress, share ideas, clarify priorities. When everyone knows what each other is committing to they are motivated to deliver a result that they all care about. When passions are aroused and everyone knows what they are “fighting” for, they are energised to go the extra mile.

Individuals and teams find themselves contributing to a complex network of conversations that negotiate and coordinate offers and requests to satisfy a shared promise made to each other. It holds the key for eliminating blind spots in the planning and resourcing of tasks, thereby reducing the number of breakdowns and bottlenecks. Leaders and coaches are well placed to facilitate these conversations to ensure they stay on track.

When we think about what gets in the way of effective engagement, it’s often poor direction, misunderstandings, ignorance or emotional outbursts. Leaders and coaches have a crucial role to play here too in identifying and supporting people’s different motivators. Some people are turned on by good relationships, others by a sense of achievement and others who want to make a difference. They work to reduce the VUCA issues that stop teams delivering breakthrough results.

Appreciating the importance of resilience and diversity

“ Resilience is the capacity to tolerate disruption without collapsing, to withstand shocks, to rebuild itself when necessary and improve whenever possible” – Dictionary definition

Techniques such as “large group interventions” and “appreciative inquiry” can help process a multitude of perspectives around a shared concern, aligning themes around what matters most to build a consensus for action. We can either resign ourselves to a lifetime of learning to cope with our fears, or look to “explore possibilities”, “embrace uncertainty” and engage in a mood of gratitude and determination.  Without ambition, the threats posed by BANI and VUCA will continue to degrade our culture, economy and environment.

If we cannot respond effectively to our breakdowns, we have to build our capacity for resilience to generate a future that can deliver breakthrough results. Hence the need to work on our own way of being and working more authentically to improve the things we care about as human beings.

What’s important here is our capacity for innovation. Bob Dunham argues that it’s not a policy or process to be managed, it’s a personal skill that can be practised and built into organisational effectiveness. It’s the art of getting people to adopt change lies in the capacity to sense, envision, embody and lead change in our Way of Being. It then becomes a community-led, bottom-up process. For example, how many times have we asked the following questions of Government when the answers lie in our own hands as citizens.

For example:

  • Where are the environmental improvement and community “care schemes” to boost local employment?
  • Where are the “engagement initiatives” that will involve all communities in the education and welfare of disadvantaged children?
  • When are we going to create a “wellness service” that engages communities in promoting and supporting mental health?
  • When are we likely to see local communities benefit from “social businesses” to provide sustainable employment for people with disabilities and special educational/ social needs?
  • When will communities and businesses pull together organise for “inclusivity” to seriously address inequality, child poverty and poor mental health?

Complexity Scientists call these “phase transitions”, where breakdowns are a stimulus to generate a new order or mental state. Nature shows us how we can use our collective intelligence to resolve these breakdowns. For example, fire ants and bees use their “swarm intelligence” to survive a multitude of unforeseen threats. There will always be breakdowns where only collective action can breakthrough. Coronavirus is showing us that we can be much more adaptable and agile in the way we “lead our lives” to serve our health and wellbeing to sustain valued social networks and economic structures.

Our responsibility to do what works and really matters?

To make a difference we have to get in harmony with each other and nature. Leadership must promote harmony with life. If we don’t commit ourselves to learn about and care for living systems, we will never build our resilience to future “black swan” events.

Nature is showing us how to recover from shocks to our nervous system. We have to work at combing our creativity and intuition to develop our collective intelligence and coordinate our responsibilities as citizens. For example:

  • How to open our minds to new thinking and insights that motivate us to unlearn redundant habits and beliefs that stop us working collaboratively?
  • How to re-energise and engage each other with more trust, optimism, vision and passion?
  • How to commit to improving our relationship with nature through active participation and greater self-awareness?
  • How to build simpler and more collaborative working with all stakeholders?
  • How to help organisations produce more flexible and agile responses to disadvantaged groups in society to accelerate social change?

Raising everyone’s consciousness of complex living systems

Nature has a lot to teach us about how to survive, even thrive, on the planet that is now plagued by man-made “viruses” such as VUCA and BANI.  We are a “keystone species”. This means our behaviour impacts on all life on earth – animal, vegetable and mineral. Each one of us has to start changing our Way of Being to preserve our life support systems.

As leaders and coaches, we are well placed to bring this awareness into the mainstream of people’s consciousness. We have the skills and techniques to engage everyone in taking personal and collective responsibility to create a culture we want to live and work in. Even just promoting the art of “generative conversations” would greatly improve mental health and social cohesion, not to mention productivity and satisfaction. For example, conversations are vital in helping us produce new insights and make promises that we commit to deliver on.

Seeing BANI and VUCA as viruses could help us see a way of transforming our approach to global and local challenges. We urgently need to find better ways of getting agreement and coordinating our actions to find the simplicity that lies inside complexity. For example:

  • How to build greater resilience, inclusivity and flexibility into our systems?
  • How to generate mindsets that are intuitive, creative and empathetic?
  • How to engage everyone in listening more deeply and living more flexibly?
  • How do we regenerate local communities to be more empathetic and self-sustaining?
  • How to build enough trust and transparency into our actions to deliver better breakthrough results through collaborative working?

Conclusions

VUCA and BANI represent worldviews that appear threatening yet, they are enabling us to reflect on our weakness as a human species and our capacity to learn and evolve. As we become more aware of the “complex adaptable systems” that we live we have to deal with the duality and contradictory nature of reality. We question our need for certainty and control, but we yearn for the predictability and security it brings.  

“Life is a series of natural and spontaneous changes. Don’t resist them – that only creates sorrow. Let reality be a reality. Let things flow naturally forward in whatever way they like.” – Lao Tsu

Complexity has always been there, but as we transition from a linear to no-linear thinking we have come to see ourselves as living systems that compete to thrive and cooperate to survive. Survival is dominating our collective consciousness and influencing how we relate to each other and the natural world. They are generating new insights and a realisation that we have to develop the innate capacities of human beings and a deeper understanding of the global ecosystem. As Clare Graves observed, we are transitioning to a holistic global view that is taking us beyond the personal to an interconnected culture driven by an ever-increasing set of complex life conditions.

 There will always be self-doubts and feelings of uncertainty. But when we are relaxed, ambitious, curious and resilient we feel more confident in ourselves and our capacity solve problems. Leaders and coaches with these qualities exude certainty and reassurance in uncertain situations and others pick up on their confidence. They have a deeply embodied understanding that everyone has the innate capacity for health, realisation and transformation. We come to realise that it is only our thoughts that separate us from nature and other human beings.  For example, a mind free of irrational fear knows what it needs and how to take the next step, whatever the situation. This is an essential life and leadership skill that enables us to thrive in a VUCA environment and deliver breakthrough results.  

Taking action and being courageous is the best way to move forward. Transformational leaders and coaches understand that some people will fear their vulnerability and need help to accept their responsibilities, get unstuck and renew their thinking. Most of us know intuitively that we are all living on the “edge of chaos”.  The Covid-19 Pandemic has brought this realisation into sharp focus. Knowing we have the capacity for insight and self-regulation, is a powerful motivator – it just requires the right trigger.  

The challenges are many as complexity generates distinctions and reasons to define ourselves as different from each other. For example, racial and cultural differences. This gives rise to different ideologies and points of view on gender, sexual orientation, etc. Only dialogue can help us build our capacity to find common ground and collaborate around fundamental values that connects us at a human level with each other and our planet. Visionaries such as Shariff Abdullah are searching for ways that we can commit ourselves to pursue “inclusivity” and a global common purpose. We have to remain optimistic and believe we can work across boundaries to co-create a better future. The Covid-19 experience has shown us how to build a more resilient spirit to move our mindset from despair to hope as we connect with each other’s stories.

Only when diverse perspectives are included, respected, and valued can we start to get a full picture of the world: who we serve, what they need, and how to successfully meet people where they are.

Daring leaders fight for the inclusion of all people, opinions, and perspectives because that makes us all better and stronger. That means having the courage to acknowledge our own reticence and staying open to learning about our biases and blind spots. It’s also listening, centring, and honouring stories that reflect experiences that are different than our own.

Courage is listening, learning, unlearning, knowing when to lead, and knowing when to let others lead.

References

Global Mind Change – by Willis Harman. Noetic Sciences 1998
Simple Habits for Complex Tmes – by Jennifer Garvey Berger & Keith Johnston. Stanford 2015
Navigating Complexity – by Arthur Battram.  Industrial Society 1998
Creating a World That Works for All – by Shariff Abdullah. Berrett-Kohler 1999
Change 3.0 – by Wendy Nieuwland-Hill & Maaike Nooitgedagt.  vL&dB 2018
Facing the Age of Chaos – by Jamai Cascio. Article: Medium.com 2020
Adaptive Action – by Glenda Eoyang &Royce Holladay. Stanford 2013
Spontaneous Evolution – by Bruce Lipton & Steve Bhaerman. Hay House 2011
The Everyone Culture – by Robert Kegan & Lisa Laskow Lahey. Harvard 2016
From Chaos to Confidence – by Susan Campbell. Simon & Schuster 1995
The Innovator’s Way – by Peter Denning & Robert Dunham.  MIT 2010