Meg Wheatley Quotes
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Organisations are now confronted with two sources of change: the traditional type that is initiated and managed; and external changes over which no one has control.
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For example, I was discussing the use of email and how impersonal it can be, how people will now email someone across the room rather than go and talk to them. But I don't think this is laziness, I think it is a conscious decision people are making to save time.
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Yet we act as if simple cause and effect is at work. We push to find the one simple reason things have gone wrong. We look for the one action, or the one person, that created this mess. As soon as we find someone to blame, we act as if we've solved the problem.
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I'm sad to report that in the past few years, ever since uncertainty became our insistent 21st century companion, leadership has taken a great leap backwards to the familiar territory of command and control.
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I believe that our very survival depends upon us becoming better systems thinkers.
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Everyone in a complex system has a slightly different interpretation. The more interpretations we gather, the easier it becomes to gain a sense of the whole.
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Even though worker capacity and motivation are destroyed when leaders choose power over productivity, it appears that bosses would rather be in control than have the organization work well.
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In our daily life, we encounter people who are angry, deceitful, intent only on satisfying their own needs. There is so much anger, distrust, greed, and pettiness that we are losing our capacity to work well together.
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I think we have to notice that the business processes we use right now for thinking and planning and budgeting and strategy are all delivered on very tight agendas.
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I think a major act of leadership right now, call it a radical act, is to create the places and processes so people can actually learn together, using our experiences.
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Circles create soothing space, where even reticent people can realize that their voice is welcome.
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Most people associate command and control leadership with the military.
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Too many problem-solving sessions become battlegrounds where decisions are made based on power rather than intelligence.
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I've wanted to see beyond the Western, mechanical view of the world and see what else might appear when the lens was changed.
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We have created trouble for ourselves in organizations by confusing control with order.
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Aggression is the most common behavior used by many organizations, a nearly invisible medium that influences all decisions and actions.
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And time for reflection with colleagues is for me a lifesaver; it is not just a nice thing to do if you have the time. It is the only way you can survive.
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For eons, humans have struggled to find less destructive ways of living together.
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When leaders take back power, when they act as heroes and saviors, they end up exhausted, overwhelmed, and deeply stressed.
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For me, this is a familiar image - people in the organization ready and willing to do good work, wanting to contribute their ideas, ready to take responsibility, and leaders holding them back, insisting that they wait for decisions or instructions.
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For us, someone who is willing to step forward and help is much more courageous than someone who is merely fulfilling the role.
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In virtually every organization, regardless of mission and function, people are frustrated by problems that seem unsolvable.
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Listening is such a simple act. It requires us to be present, and that takes practice, but we don't have to do anything else. We don't have to advise, or coach, or sound wise. We just have to be willing to sit there and listen.
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I think it is quite dangerous for an organisation to think they can predict where they are going to need leadership. It needs to be something that people are willing to assume if it feels relevant, given the context of any situation.