Chaos : Applications In Organizational Change

Journal of

ISSN 0953-4814

Organizational Change Management

Volume 15 Number 4 2002

Chaos: applications in organizational change Guest Editors Laurie A. Fitzgerald and Frans M. van Eijnatten Paper format Journal of Organizational Change Management includes six issues in traditional paper format. The contents of this issue are detailed below.

Internet Online Publishing with Archive, Active Reference Linking, Emerald WIRE, Key Readings, Institution-wide Licence, E-mail Alerting Service and Usage Statistics. Access via the Emerald Web site: http://www.emeraldinsight.com/ft See overleaf for full details of subscriber entitlements.

Access to Journal of Organizational Change Management online _______________________________ 334 Editorial advisory board ___________________________ 335 Abstracts and keywords ___________________________ 336 About the Guest Editors ___________________________ 338 Chaos: the lens that transcends Laurie A. Fitzgerald _____________________________________________

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Ethics in organizations: a Chaos perspective Lisa Irvin _____________________________________________________

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The network multilogue: a Chaos approach to organizational design E.C. Hoogerwerf and Anne-Marie Poorthuis _________________________

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Chaos, dialogue and the dolphin’s strategy Frans M. van Eijnatten and Maarten van Galen ______________________

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Reflections: Chaos in organizational change Laurie A. Fitzgerald and Frans M. van Eijnatten _____________________

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Chaos speak: a glossary of chaordic terms and phrases Laurie A. Fitzgerald and Frans M. van Eijnatten _____________________

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Book reviews _____________________________________ 424

This issue is part of a comprehensive multiple access information service

CONTENTS

EDITORIAL ADVISORY BOARD James Barker HQ USAFA/DFM Colorado Springs, USA David Barry University of Auckland, New Zealand Jean Bartunek Boston College, USA Dominique Besson IAE de Lille, France Steven Best University of Texas-El Paso, USA Mary Boyce University of Redlands, USA Warner Burke Columbia University, USA Adrian Carr University of Western Sydney-Nepean, Australia Stewart Clegg University of Technology (Sydney), Australia David Collins University of Essex, UK Cary Cooper Manchester School of Management, UMIST, UK Ann L. Cunliffe California State University, Hayward, USA Robert Dennehy Pace University, USA Alexis Downs University of Central Oklahoma, USA Ken Ehrensal Kutztown University, USA Max Elden University of Houston, USA Andre´ M. Everett University of Otago, New Zealand Dale Fitzgibbons Illinois State University, USA Jeffrey Ford Ohio State University, USA Jeanie M. Forray Western New England College, USA Robert Gephart University of Alberta, Canada Clive Gilson University of Waikato, New Zealand Andy Grimes Lexington, Kentucky, USA

Heather Ho¨pfl University of Northumbria at Newcastle, UK Maria Humphries University of Waikato, New Zealand Arzu Iseri Bogazici University, Turkey David Jamieson Pepperdine University, USA David Knights Keele University, UK Terence Krell Rock Island, Illinois, USA Hugo Letiche University for Humanist Studies, Utrecht, The Netherlands Benyamin Lichtenstein University of Hartford, Connecticut, USA Stephen A. Linstead University of Sunderland, UK Slawek Magala Erasmus University, The Netherlands Rickie Moore E.M. Lyon, France Sandra Morgan University of Hartford, USA Ken Murrell University of West Florida, USA Eric Nielsen Case Western Reserve University, USA Walter Nord University of South Florida, USA Ellen O’Connor Chronos Associates, Los Altos, California, USA Cliff Oswick King’s College, University of London, UK Ian Palmer University of Technology (Sydney), Australia Abraham Shani California Polytechnic State University, USA Ralph Stablein Massey University, New Zealand Carol Steiner Monash University, Australia David S. Steingard St Joseph’s University, USA Ram Tenkasi Benedictine University, USA Christa Walck Michigan Technological University, USA

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Chaos: the lens that transcends Laurie A. Fitzgerald Keywords Organizational change, Chaos, Connecting, Emergent strategy The primary aim of this introductory article is to set forth a conceptual framework that sheds light on the evolving cosmology and meta-praxis of organizational change known as Chaos. The author who is also co-editor of this journal, points out how the five fundamental principles of this emerging worldview can be made both applicable to and actionable in the modern business enterprise. Ethics in organizations: a Chaos perspective Lisa Irvin Keywords Ethics, Connecting, Emergent strategy Scrutinizes one of the main features of the conventional credo of organizational management: The ‘‘ethic of selfpreservation’’ (ESP). The ESP is the inevitable by-product of a culture that denies interiors and encourages materialistic consumerism and narcissistic self-interest. Several pertinent questions will be explored: What is an ethic and what role does it play in governing both personal and collective behavior? What specifically is the ESP? How is it fostered by the prevailing culture of narcissism? What impact if any, does it have on the maintenance of organizational integrity? Furthermore, how can the Chaos principle of Connectivity be construed as an imperative for organizational adaptation and sustainability? Finally, what lessons can Chaos lend practitioners of organization development that will permit them to grasp, and ultimately, accept a new ethic based on the fact of connectivity in the essential process of organizational change?

Journal of Organizational Change Management, Vol. 15 No. 4, 2002, Abstracts and keywords. # MCB UP Limited, 0953-4814

The network multilogue: a Chaos approach to organizational design E.C. Hoogerwerf and Anne-Marie Poorthuis Keywords Networks, Organization, Connecting, Chaos The subject of this article is a novel new approach to organizing called the network

multilogue. Begins with a brief overview of the theoretical underpinnings of the process of network organizing. The conceptual model the authors hope to build through this exploration will feature three primary angles of perception informed by the chaos principles of connectivity, indeterminacy and consciousness in that order. By bearing in mind these fundamental concepts and the provocative image of a networking organization, the description of network multiloguing that follows will enable one to more easily grasp how network organizing can be made integral to the crucial process of organizational design.

Chaos, dialogue and the dolphin’s strategy Frans M. van Eijnatten and Maarten van Galen Keywords Chaos, Language, Strategy, Organizational change Documents a complex responsive process of profound organizational change taking place in a Dutch capital-equipment manufacturing firm over a two-year period beginning in September 1999. The primary focus of the initiative was on the transformation and development of the firm’s organizational mind – its ‘‘orgmind’’. Although the company had an extensive history of system renewal activities, an evaluation of a decade of organization development efforts revealed that the ‘‘exterior’’ aspects of the system, e.g. tasks, structures, processes, tools, technology, etc., had received the bulk of attention. In contrast, the firm’s ‘‘interior’’, consisting of such imperceptible qualities as the thoughts, beliefs, feelings and images held in the ‘‘mind’’ of the system, had been virtually ignored.

Reflections: Chaos in organizational change Laurie A. Fitzgerald and Frans M. van Eijnatten Keywords Chaos, Methapors, Organizational change In this concluding article the guest editors take a reflective stand with respect to this

special issue of the Journal of Organizational Change Management dedicated to exploring the ways in which Chaos is made applicable to and actionable in organizations. This summation chronicles a search for common ground as well as differences between the individual contributions. In addition, we respond to a number of issues we believe to be pertinent to the advancement of Chaos as a metapraxis of organizational change, concluding with a few suggestions for future research.

Chaos speak: a glossary of chaordic terms and phrases Laurie A. Fitzgerald and Frans M. van Eijnatten

Abstracts and keywords

Keywords Chaos, Terms of reference The following represents an attempt to define and clarify the evolving patois of chaos using the language that managers and practitioners find most familiar. The convention of italicizing words and phrases defined elsewhere in the glossary has been employed to facilitate the reader’s grasp of the terms.

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About the Guest Editors Laurie A. Fitzgerald, PhD is Principal and Senior Practitioner for The Consultancy, Inc., a US-based firm providing services in organizational design and whole-system transformation to the international business community. Her special expertise is in the facilitation of profound organizational change initiatives aimed at the creation of optimally sustainable enterprises. For most of the last 25 years, Dr Fitzgerald has anchored her practice in the tenets of chaos as it is defined in this journal, as well as in her 1996 publication Organizations and Other Things Fractal (a publication of The Consultancy, Denver, Colorado). In consequence, her clientele ranging from the Johnson & Johnson, Motorola and McDonnell-Douglas Aerospace in the USA to Nedcor Bank of South Africa report having achieved not only measurable results but also significant enhancements in their ability to thrive in the unprecedented turbulence of the global marketplace. Frans M. van Eijnatten is an Associate Professor at the Institute for Business Engineering and Technology Application (BETA) at Eindhoven University of Technology in The Netherlands. His main research interest is in socio-technical systems design (STSD), an ambition he has pursued by initiating and coordinating PhD design-oriented action research projects in R&D and information systems. In 1993, he produced a comprehensive overview of STSD entitled The Paradigm that Changed the Work Place (a publication of the Swedish Center for Working Life, Stockholm). Currently Dr van Eijnatten studies the implications of chaordic systems thinking (CST) for application in the process of organizational renewal. As founder of the European Chaos and Complexity Network (ECCON), he has participated in numerous European Union-funded research and development programs (4th and 5th Framework, IMS).

The Guest Editors extend their deep appreciation to their reviewers for their diligence and hard work: Jonathan Milton, Boston, USA; Dian-Marie Hosking, University of Brabant, Tilburg, The Netherlands; Peter Cressey, University of Bath, UK; Reidar Hansen, Conoco Corporation, Denver, CO, USA; Tomas Backstrom, National Institute of Working Life, Stockholm, Sweden; Lieke Hoogerwerf, University of Nijmegen, The Netherlands; Jan Forslin, Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm, Sweden; Lori Holden-Dowd, Colorado State University, Denver, CO, USA; Devonna Jonsson, University of Denver, Denver, CO, USA; and Michael West, Aston Business School, Birmingham, UK.

The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available at http://www.emeraldinsight.com/0953-4814.htm

Chaos: the lens that transcends

Chaos: the lens that transcends

Laurie A. Fitzgerald The Consultancy, Denver, Colorado, USA Keywords Organizational change, Chaos, Connecting, Emergent strategy Abstract The primary aim of this introductory article is to set forth a conceptual framework that sheds light on the evolving cosmology and meta-praxis of organizational change known as Chaos. The author who is also co-editor of this journal, points out how the five fundamental principles of this emerging worldview can be made both applicable to and actionable in the modern business enterprise.

Introduction The unprecedented explorations of twentieth century science have catalyzed a profound re-conceptualization of our universe. As a consequence, a wholly new way of seeing, thinking, knowing and being in the world has been rendered, one with astounding implications for how reality will be experienced in the twenty-first century. Ignited by a series of startling discoveries that debuted within a single generation (1900-1926), a so-called ‘‘new’’ science has coalesced in the form of a mathematical equation describing the behavior of the multiplicity of complex, dynamical, non-linear systems comprising our universe. Dubbed by its framers the ‘‘chaos theory’’, this powerful formula didn’t stop there. The original arcanum formulated in the late 1970s by an association of envelope-pushing scientists calling themselves the ‘‘Chaos Cabal’’ continues to metamorphose to this very day from a complex equation into an unparalleled cosmological meta-praxis. Those who have embraced it have come to know it most simply as Chaos (Gleick, 1987). In the following pages, the author will demonstrate how human organizations, most particularly the enterprise, are subject to the very same principles and precepts underpinning this new science – those governing the material, chemical, biological and cosmological systems of interest to the theory’s founding scientists. That said, a forewarning of sorts is in order: the reader is advised to hesitate before dismissing what follows as either speculative or ‘‘merely’’ metaphorical. The author has attempted to describe reality as it is directly experienced by a growing contingent of scientists and practitioners alike that have donned the Chaos lens. While liberal use will be made of metaphor, analogy and allegory in the following text, they seem most appropriate given the counterintuitive nature of the premises and postulates of the new science. The foundational premise on which this special issue has been built is this: Chaos is the science of complex, dynamical, non-linear, co-creative, far-fromequilibrium systems. Therefore, since organizations are in their very essence, complex, dynamical, non-linear, co-creative, and far-from-equilibrium systems,

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Chaos is the science of organization. Until an even more powerful lens on reality comes along to surpass it, Chaos can be regarded as the science of twenty-first century management. Although the author holds no illusions about this new science as some sort of be all and end all for organizational practitioners, it is by far the most comprehensive elucidation of the enterprise known. Just as Chaos has succeeded in unseating classical science as well as undermining the dogma of scientific management it spawned, one day metatheory will give way to an even more transcendent view of reality. In the meantime, Lynch and Kordis (1988) tell us we can rest assured: ‘‘Chaos theory is a pure, proven, Nobel Prize winning, earth-shaking science of a kind so fundamental and instrumental, that those who discover its direct applications to today’s complex organizations will deserve to be remembered as twentieth century (Isaac) Newtons.’’ One more note: your reading experience will be exponentially more profitable if you keep in mind the fundamental fact that Chaos is not something one ‘‘does’’. Nor is it a program one can implement in an enterprise or anywhere else. And it’s not a ‘‘fix’’ quick or otherwise, for your organizational woes. Rather, this newly emerging organizational cosmology is a specific way to look at and comprehend a specific reality – for our purposes: the increasingly complex organizations we find ourselves barely able to sustain in the turbulence and flux of the hyper-competitive global marketplace. Those who grasp this point as they don its ‘‘lens’’ will surely benefit from the superlative and empowering view of the dynamical, non-linear, co-creative, far-fromequilibrium systems they hope to create, manage and lead in the future. What is Chaos? Given its common connotation, Chaos is a rather unfortunate name for the new science. Microsoft’s thesaurus offers several synonyms for the term including ‘‘confusion, bedlam, anarchy, pandemonium, disarray and madness.’’ Furthermore, more than one English-language dictionary has defined it as the ‘‘complete absence of order.’’ In order to mediate the likelihood of misunderstanding, the convention of employing an uppercase ‘‘C’’ when referring to the meta-view of reality that is the subject of this special issue has been adopted. A similar disposition will be made of names of the five principles of Chaos you are about to be introduced to, most particularly the term Consciousness, so as to distinguish them from the meanings conveyed in the common parlance. Whenever ‘‘chaos’’ is found in the lower case in this journal, the more common connotation is meant. Nevertheless, it would be helpful to realize that a ‘‘complete absence of order’’ is both a logical and a factual impossibility. In fact, the most fundamental precept affirmed by Chaos is that chaos and order are not opposites from which one must choose, but two aspects of the very same reality. Kudos go to Hock (1995), founder and former CEO of Visa the credit card company, for coining the term ‘‘chaord’’ – an amalgam of these two fundamental facets of reality which so succinctly captures the fact of their

inextricable inter-penetration. Behind every outward show of order, chaos lurks. At the same time, every display of chaos is suffused with an orderly pattern patiently awaiting the opportunity to emerge. That said this introductory article begins with the assertion that Chaos is a lens that transcends the timeworn conventional reality (CR) espoused by modern management, legacy of the enormously successful science of the seventeenth century. Fortunately, in its quest for truth, science has continued to chip away at the ossifying assumptions underpinning its own orthodoxy. These presuppositions have given rise to a number of troubling paradoxes including the infamous ‘‘mind-body’’ problem, the mystery of ‘‘non-local’’ effects, and the inadequacy of the Neo-Darwinist account of survival-driven adaptation. While each of these scientific puzzles as well as a few others will be explained in due time, the point here is that the key to unlocking them is to be found in an unflinching examination of classical science thinking. I intend to do just that by drawing a rev comparison of CR’s assumptive commitments with the five arch-principles of Chaos as summarized in Table I. The inherent limitations of CR in its managerial form become even more pronounced due to the fact of its emphasis on ‘‘parts’’. In much the same way as its progenitor Newtonian physics sought, futilely I might add, to uncover the secrets of the universe by studying its ‘‘basic building blocks’’, managerial advocates of CR seek to establish dominance over their systems through the liberal application of analytical methodologies, and similarly, their efforts are in vain. In contrast, Chaos provides a lens that enables the wearer to take in the whole system, thus illuminating the hallmarks of the chaordic system: its five core properties – Consciousness, Connectivity, Indeterminacy, Emergence and Dissipation (see Figure 1). Together this quintet forms a sound and thoroughly pragmatic scaffolding from which remarkably effective action is informed. Although each property will be defined and explored separately in the following pages, their partitioning is undertaken with the following proviso: not unlike the fingers on one’s hand, each principle both informs and is informed by the remaining four. We now turn our attention to the core properties of the chaordic system as seen through the lens of Chaos. The mind’s undeniable primacy The moment seventeenth century French philosopher Rene´ Descartes uttered the familiar phrase ‘‘I think, therefore I am,’’ he effectively albeit unintentionally, split the universe in two. One ‘‘half’’ composed of material reality has become the self-proclaimed turf of the ‘‘hard’’ sciences, particularly those of physics and chemistry. The remainder incorporated the mystical never-never-land of mind and spirit, a realm the scientific establishment was quite happy to leave to its single greatest critic and fiercest contender of the times for the throne of Truth, the clergy. Given that this ‘‘Great Cartesian Schism’’ subsequently catalyzed an unparalleled advance in the societal standard of living, it didn’t take long for science to unseat religion as the primary authority on reality in the Western world. What with the profusion of

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Table I. Contrast: assumptions of conventional reality and the Chaos principles

Figure 1. The lenses of Chaos

Conventional reality’s core assumptions

Chaos principles

Materialism Matter is primary: the only true reality is that which may be known by the five senses or their instrumental extensions

Consciousness Mind . . . not matter comprises the fundamental ground state and the essence, as well as the omega point of the universe

Reductionism Because it is composed of a multiplicity of independently existing ‘‘things’’ each possessing its own unique properties, the universe is merely the sum of its parts . . . no more and no less

Connectivity The universe is one – a single unbroken and unbreakable pattern of relationships in which no ‘‘thing’’ can exist nor any event occur independently of the whole

Determinism Since each and every event (cause) produces a singular effect to which it is correlated in size and proximate in space, the future of the universe is subject to prediction and thus, to human control

Indeterminacy The universe is so dynamically complex, that any link between cause and effect is instantly obscured rendering its future . . . a future that nevertheless possesses no reality separate from the moment of Now . . . unknowable in advance

Mechanism Not unlike ‘‘clockworks’’, the universe becomes more complex only through the intent and actions of an intelligence existing external to it

Emergence The inexorable thrust of the universe is toward infinitely ascending orders of differentiation, coherence and complexity

Conservatism The potential of the universe for growth and progress remains unlimited as long as it is maintained in a steady state of equilibrium and unwavering stability

Dissipation The universe is a dissipative structure, which cycles perpetually through a process of ‘‘falling apart’’ then back together again, each time in a novel new form ungoverned by the past

economic, social, medical, and technological wonders that have continued to flow from the cornucopia of materialistic science, it is no surprise that Western society has come to question whether one really needs any of the ‘‘soft’’ stuff of spirit at all. In effect, matter has won out as the essence of reality, while mind has been subsequently relegated the subordinate status of being at most, a byproduct of electro-chemical interaction in the brain. An interesting point of historical fact is that in positing ‘‘proof’’ of his metaphysical being, Descartes intended to salvage the human mind from further encroachment by the burgeoning science of the time – a science founded on the presumption that matter is primary: the only true reality is that which may be known by one or more of the five senses or their instrumental extensions. In other words, all real ‘‘things’’ are composed of some substance imagined to be hard, solid and essentially inert, one is able to see, hear, touch, taste and/or smell. This conviction has produced a paradox with which conventional scientists continue to grapple to this day. The fact that one’s mental life is not hard, solid, or inert means that the thoughts and emotions we take for granted, fail to meet the basic criteria for being real. By their own ground rules, materialists are thus forced to rule out their own ideas, opinions and theories from that which they regard as reality. Of course, this absurdity of pure materialism will not be resolved by swinging to its opposite pole, since anti-materialists better known as idealists who eschew the material world altogether proclaiming it an illusion, have equal difficulty explaining the pain they feel when an ‘‘illusory’’ toe encounters an equally ‘‘illusory’’ table’s leg in the dark of night. It now appears that in spite of his good intentions, Descartes’ attempt to protect mind by segregating it from matter has backfired, producing the deeply perplexing ‘‘mind-body’’ problem captured in the question: ‘‘How could something as exquisitely complex and wholly immaterial as, for instance, a play entitled Macbeth be generated through the interaction of chemicals in Shakespeare’s head?’’ If one is to believe that the Bard’s contribution to the world is merely illusion, then the whole of materialist science must be rejected as well. After all, Newton’s laws of motion that have enabled the space shuttle to orbit the Earth are certainly no more substantive than ‘‘To be or not to be.’’ Did Descartes get it wrong? Is the ubiquitous experience of human thought merely, as CR contends, an epiphenomenon of electro-chemical processes? From the Chaos point of view, the great seventeenth century philosopher was actually pointing in the right direction, even though he committed a logical error – one that ultimately reinforced the materialistic bias he was striving to fend off. His mistake stems from the subtle presupposition of the very thing he was trying to prove . . . his own existence. By starting with ‘‘I think’’ he tossed into his premise a personal ‘‘I’’ that is simply not to be found in reality. Although cogito, ergo sum remains to this day at the heart of one of the most ubiquitous assumptions in the Western world, it turns out to be a tautology of the most grievous sort: an absurd circumlocution tantamount to claiming the

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statement ‘‘it’s raining’’ actually refers to some real entity (it) performing the downpour (Hagan, 1995). What Descartes was actually cognizant of was not an ‘‘I’’ at all, but of awareness itself – in the lexicon of Chaos, Consciousness. An undeniable fact demonstrated by direct experience, is that mind is necessarily antecedent to matter. The man would have waxed more accurately if he had declared, ‘‘Mind, therefore I am . . . along with everything else in existence.’’ This quintessential property of being, capitalized to distinguish it from its common connotation of being awake, e.g. ‘‘the patient regained consciousness shortly after operation,’’ leads us to the first principle of the new science: mind . . . not matter comprises the fundamental ground state and the essence, as well as the omega point of the universe. And we’re speaking here of ‘‘Big Mind’’ as opposed to the Cartesian concept of a circumscribed personal self . . . ‘‘little mind’’. This Big Mind is all there is: Consciousness is the first cause of reality, and its ultimate destiny, as well as its very substance along the way. With this ‘‘Principle of Consciousness’’ comes the long-sought resolution, or more accurately, dissolution of the vexing mindbody problem wrought by materialist science. As it turns out, mind and matter are one and the same. The fact that both insubstantial thoughts and solid things arise from the same source is underscored by the early twentieth century discovery of what has come to be known rather affectionately by chaordic thinkers, as the quantum ‘‘wavicle’’. Today no reputable scientist would deny the fact that light manifests sometimes in the form of waves, and otherwise in ‘‘particular’’ structures called photons. Light therefore, exists as the composite we call the wavicle. But light is not the only phenomenon that behaves in such a peculiar (to our ordinary way of thinking) fashion. Thanks to the Einsteinian discovery captured in the universally known equation E = mc2, scientists now realize that energy (wave form) and mass or matter (particle form) are one and the same. Chaos posits that the singular one-and-the-same essence which manifests in such an astounding diversity of forms ranging from things to thoughts, from objects to objectives, from matter to mind, everything, everywhere and everywhen, is Consciousness. Quantum physicists now know that in its wave form, Big Mind consists of unrealized potential while in its particular mode, Consciousness manifests as a single actuality. Although this startling fact effectively eliminates the mindbody problem by illustrating how both solid objects and insubstantial thoughts arise from the same source, yet another puzzle seems to have cropped up in its wake. By what process does a quantum wave consisting of countless possibilities, become concentrated into a particular actuality? Erwin Schro¨edinger, contemporary of Einstein and one of the twentieth century’s leading quantum physicists, can be credited for devising a dramatic ‘‘thought experiment’’ – a cognitive device used routinely by scientists to test hypotheses when direct observation is not possible – which points to the answer.

To validate a mathematical proposition he called the ‘‘quantum wave function’’ (QWF), Schro¨edinger imagined a container equipped with a device randomly activated to deliver one of two possible substances to the occupant of the box . . . in this case, an imaginary cat. This feline faced a 50/50 chance of either enjoying a tasty morsel of cat food, or succumbing to the effects of a highly toxic titbit. Thus, life and death were the two most likely possibilities on the cat’s quantum wave of possibilities. After allowing sufficient time to be certain that his subject had consumed either the food or the poison, Schro¨edinger posed his experimental question: Is the cat dead or is it alive? To the CR-minded who tend to presuppose an either/or world of opposites, one of the most clear of which is the life/death twosome, the answer would likely be some form of ‘‘it depends . . . on which substance the kitty consumed.’’ However, according to the math, which has been confirmed repeatedly, the correct answer to the question ‘‘Is the cat dead or is it alive?’’ is ‘‘Yes.’’ The quantum kitty is both dead and alive. Furthermore, it would remain superimposed on a quantum wave of possibilities . . . until someone looks! There’s no denying it: should one open the box to find a lifeless body, the creature’s demise cannot be blamed on the poison or any other physical cause. And no . . . neither did curiosity kill the cat. Rather the culprit in this felinocide is the one who looked. Through an act of Consciousness, the QWF instantly collapses into, in this tragic instance, the singular actuality of death. Of course, in our day-to-day world, the very notion of a cat or any other creature for that matter, being both alive and dead at the same time is preposterous. Nevertheless, the reader might keep in mind that Schro¨edinger’s cat is a strictly metaphorical creature used to illustrate wavicle behavior so to answer the mind-body problem’s corollary question: what causes the wave of possibilities to collapse into a single actuality? No one could have been more surprised at the answer than Schro¨edinger himself who is said to have wished that he ‘‘had never heard of quantum physics’’ in the first place. Yet, being the consummate scientist he was, there was nothing he could do to ease his incredulity other than to accept the truth he had uncovered: it is Consciousness that ‘‘pops’’ the QWF (pronounced ‘‘quiff’’) into the particular reality of our experience. Underlying our apparent material world is a profoundly more ‘‘real’’ reality – a vast roiling sea of potential in formation – an infinite ocean of possibilities always in the process of formation. Consciousness, the name given to the essential substance of this sea, generates endless waves of ‘‘could-bes.’’ Each and every wave inevitably casts off a particle comprised of Consciousness just as each and every drop separated from the churning sea remains water. These ‘‘droplets’’ of Consciousness tend to appear as hard, solid, inert, and mindless matter existing a priori to our perception of them. But of course, they are not other than Consciousness in its material form. In other words, when one makes an observation or a measurement, they impart the appearance of matter on what is otherwise purely immaterial potential.

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At our current level of Consciousness – and there are far too many ‘‘levels’’ to count as we will see in the following paragraphs – we each must grapple with the Midas-syndrome, a perceptual limitation named after the ill-fated figure of Greek folklore: just as King Midas was unable to experience the downy softness of his child’s cheek lest he turn her into gold, everything we touch with our senses is instantly converted into matter. Under the tutelage of CR, those who have bought in to the materialist’s assumption suffer such a chronic overreliance on sensory apparati, that they are blinded to the bountiful waves of potential undulating on the immense ocean of Consciousness. According to physicist turned Buddhist priest Hagan (1995, p. 168), ‘‘Consciousness is . . . and there’s not a single shred of evidence to the contrary’’. Humans are indeed consummate ‘‘quiff-poppers’’ in spite of the fact that most are unaware of our intrinsic ability to convert something as insubstantial as a possibility into some ‘‘thing’’ that appears quite solid to the touch. Familiar objects as well as thoughts, beliefs and opinions experienced as ‘‘things in themselves’’ are simply not: each is derived from the quantum sea through continuous acts of both individual and collective Consciousness. This is not to say, of course, that individuals ‘‘create’’ the physical world through thought, as the idealists and social constructionists of post-modernity would have us believe. Instead, the reality one experiences is a reality ‘‘chosen’’ from among the infinite possibilities of the quantum sea of Big Mind. In its very first principle, Chaos has called into question the very foundation of CR – the primacy of matter, and thus obviated the ‘‘problem’’ of explaining how something as exquisitely complex and ethereal as mind could have evolved from something as basic and substantial as matter. Nevertheless, yet another question is likely to plague those who have gotten this far and yet still lean toward materialism: if an act of Consciousness precedes the collapse of the QWF into a particular reality, then who was thinking the multiplicity of ‘‘things’’ in our universe into existence before humans evolved to the point of having a thinking mind? The answer is so obvious to those who see the world through the Chaos lens, that in the interests of space, we won’t go into much detail here. Suffice to say that Consciousness is not a quality exclusive to humankind. Since Mind is the essence of the universe, every entity whether sentient (dog) or not (a rock), whether self-reflexive (a human) or merely instinctual (a bacterium), is comprised of the singular essence the new science calls Consciousness. The only difference in Consciousness between the reader and an insect is one of degree, not kind. And so with that potentially shocking assertion, we can now focus on the question at hand: what relevance does the Principle of Consciousness have for the application of Chaos in the transformation of enterprise? Given that organizations are microcosms of the universe, the same laws and principles holding sway over any other chaordic system must govern them. If this is so . . . and the evidence for it is promising, then it seems clear that the enterprise is essentially the end product of the act of Consciousness; in other words, a

‘‘thought’’ albeit a rather complex one. Paraphrasing what is known as the organizational design maxim, we can conclude that an organization has been perfectly thought to produce exactly the results it does. If one is unhappy with the results, there is only one thing to do to change them: rethink the system. Unfortunately under the influence of CR, managers are inclined to spend time and money in an effort to wrestle from their systems more and better results: they restructure, reorganize, downsize, right size, re-engineer, centralize, decentralize, consolidate, merge and divest, all to no avail. In contrast, the Chaos-smart executive will invest every available resource no matter how limited they may be, in the process of changing the organization’s mind, in the lexicon of the new science, the orgmind, so that it might ‘‘think’’ a new enterprise into existence. Of course, this form of creative thinking will not do much good if the thinking is coming from the same level of Consciousness that ‘‘popped the QWF’’ that is the current unsatisfactory system. An important note for the reader: this is not a pitch for ‘‘organizational learning’’, ‘‘knowledge management’’, ‘‘intellectual capital’’ or other trendy buzzword standing for interventions aimed at improving business performance by acquiring and controlling information deemed to be floating around ‘‘out there’’ in the marketplace. In the first place, Chaos demonstrates that there is no ‘‘out there’’. In the second, the new science reveals to us that it is (org) ‘‘mindfulness’’, that is the operant level of awareness of one’s thinking as it is being thought, that boosts the potential for change, for performance, and for sustainability by an order of magnitude . . . or better. The more aware one (an individual, a group or an entire organization) is of its thinking, the more adept it will be in ‘‘popping’’ the particular reality most desired from the quantum wave. Two and not two Now that we have pretty much settled the infamous mind-body problem, it is time to look more closely at yet another paradox arising from CR and specifically the ‘‘Great Cartesian Schism’’. The dire consequences of the reductionist’s assumption are profound indeed, striking much closer to home than the relatively subtle effects of materialism. The hallmark of contemporary Western society, a persistent and pervasive experience of fragmentation, isolation and alienation, has resulted inevitably from the CR-fostered compulsion to attribute ‘‘thingness’’ to the world of ‘‘no-thingness’’. Conventional science serves as a prime example: its entire corpus is about parts – discrete, distinct, autonomous units separated by time and space. Indeed Isaac Newton, chief architect of classical physics, spent his life in search of the most elementary of these. Subsequently, his grand mission was passed on to successive generations of physicists. Even Einstein, who had played such an instrumental albeit reluctant, role in laying the groundwork for the new science, struggled throughout his brilliant career to accept one of the most fundamental premises of his own work. Though he succeeded in demonstrating the essential wholeness of the universe via his equation E = mc2,

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proving not only that mind and matter were the same but also that everything is ultimately equivalent to everything else, he remained convinced to his death in 1954 that an error had been made in the evidence. So far, this ‘‘mistake’’ that only makes it appear that the universe is one is yet to be found – because no such error exists. The paradox that plagued Einstein is referred to by mystics as the puzzle of ‘‘two and not two’’, while establishment science refers to it as the ‘‘non-locality’’ problem. No matter what you call it, the difficulty in explaining how two entities, be they particles or people, are able to behave as if they were communicating instantaneously even though they appear to be separated by space, is the inevitable result of the inadequacy of CR. How the universe which by definition, is one and only one, can appear as two, three, four, etc. ad infinitum simply cannot be grasped by CR-informed reductionists who insist that because the universe is composed of a multiplicity of independently existing ‘‘things’’ each possessing its own unique properties, it is therefore merely the sum of its parts . . . no more and no less. Consider the true story of twin boys who were born co-joined and yet surgically separated when still infants. Their celebrity was gained not from the circumstances of their birth, but from their uncanny success for the remainder of their lives, in reporting each other’s experiences of both pleasure and pain no matter how much distance separated them. For example, when Brother A suffers a paper cut, Brother B experiences a stinging sensation in his own finger: at the time of the injury, the brothers were miles away from each other and had no way of knowing what the other was doing. Reductionists would have to contend that some sort of signal would have had to be exchanged by the twins to account for the simultaneity of cut and pain. However, the problem with such an explanation given the distance seeming to separate the siblings is that the signal would have had to be moving faster than the speed of light – an impossibility according to the laws of physics. Thus, one is forced to either dismiss the brothers as deluded, or consider the cut/pain connection a coincidence. Non-locality so it seems, turns out to be the functional equivalent of voodoo, which no devotee of CR could possibly accept: and yet, non-local events are amazingly common throughout human experience. Remember the last time an old friend came to mind, someone who within a short period of time, called you on the phone? The ubiquity of non-local events lends indefatigable support to the ‘‘Principle of Connectivity’’: The universe is one – a single unbroken and unbreakable pattern of relationships in which no ‘‘thing’’ can exist or any event occur independently of the whole. CR with its inherently mechanistic overtones has perpetuated the most wellhoned skill of contemporary management – the breaking up of wholes into component parts. Even those who claim to be ‘‘holists’’ in their approach to change, are often infected by the epidemic of organizational fragmentation: the term now implies an ability to take into account the myriad parts of a ‘‘whole’’ system thought to exist separately and apart from the so-called ‘‘holistic’’

observer. Not only does Chaos deny that one can study parts in isolation from the whole, but also more importantly it posits that the ‘‘one’’ doing the observing is a fiction as well. Wholeness rather than holism, from the new science perspective rests the assertion that there is no ‘‘out there’’ out there. With this core property of the chaordic system, we can begin to recognize the fact that ours is a non-local universe. Again we must contemplate the central question in this issue: of what relevance is the notion of Connectivity for the organization? If wholeness is featured at the cosmic level, most assuredly it characterizes the enterprise as well. Consequently, the myriad boundaries, divisions, ranks and other such lines of demarcation found in most systems are in blatant violation of the Principle of Connectivity. While CR encourages managers to fragmentize the enterprise in their efforts to contain complexity and to assert control over the looming prospect of chaos, the inevitable consequence of breaching the system’s inherent wholeness is the very havoc they strive to avoid. Donald Hebb, the distinguished Canadian neuro-psychologist, has put it more gently when he proclaimed his ‘‘rule’’ of connectedness: Whenever any two elements in a system are active together, their connection is strengthened. If not, it is diminished. However in no case can it ever be severed.

In other words, since all elements of a system are non-locally and inextricably connected, the erection of any barrier that reduces interactivity ultimately curtails the vitality and sustainability of the whole. Perhaps this very real albeit non-apparent fact of pervasive connections can be more readily grasped with the help of a concept created by Hungarian journalist Arthur Koestler who referred to an entity that was simultaneously a whole in its own right and an integral part of a greater whole as a holon. For example, you the reader are certainly a whole possessing all the rights and responsibilities your intrinsic individuality entails. And yet, you are also a member of an organization . . . probably a multitude of such. In turn, the enterprise in which you are employed is similarly a whole as well as a constituent part of say a larger conglomerate of companies, which is also a whole in its own right and part of a trans-global industry, which is . . . etc. indefinitely. By definition, every ‘‘thing’’ in the universe is holonic in its very nature. When considered via the Chaos lens, one sees that the cosmos is neither comprised of wholes nor of parts. It’s not a composition of objects, processes, or units of any kind. Reality in its entirety is made up of ‘‘wholeparts’’ or holons. So why then do we experience ‘‘two’’ when ‘‘not two’’ is what exists? Niels Bohr, the Danish architect of quantum physics, was confronted with this question when he observed a pair of ‘‘entangled’’ (meaning two objects that had been as Hebb would have said, ‘‘active together’’) mirroring each other’s behavior instantaneously . . . not unlike the twins mentioned above. Given the vast distance separating them, any explanation of their synchronous behavior involving some form of ‘‘communication’’ is precluded by Einstein’s Relativity, which states unequivocally that no signal can travel faster than the speed of

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light. Oddly enough, it was Relativity’s author himself who essentially ended his distinguished career in defeat when in the Copenhagen Debates of 1926 he resisted Bohr’s findings. Rather than open to the Dane’s conclusive evidence of non-locality, Einstein fell victim to the CR assumption of separateness. Reductionists, even those of the post-modernist persuasion claiming to be practitioners of ‘‘holism’’, err when they impose boundaries where none exists. Their mistake is only compounded by subsequently regarding the fragmented reality they have created as ‘‘the way things are’’. However, the real error is not the use of boundaries per se. After all, lines of demarcation are also drawn on experience by chaordic thinkers. What primarily distinguishes the holders of these two viewpoints is that the former take their distinctions for real, while the Chaos-smart know full well that a boundary is a ‘‘tool of convenience’’ . . . not an actuality. No matter how disparate any two objects, e.g. particles, human beings, business units, etc. may appear, they remain inextricably linked in the context of a greater holarchy (hierarchy of holons which is a holon itself). Given the fact of Connectivity, chaordic thinkers seek to optimize ‘‘holonic entanglement’’: as managers, they realize their first and foremost responsibility to be the nurturing of relationships . . . not just between people and groups, but among all holons comprising the extended field of the enterprise. Even so, before one can expect this strategy to pay off, the multitude of organizational boundaries long perceived as actualities must be exposed as the illusions they are – a process having more to do with dismantling beliefs than with eliminating titles, org-charts, reserved parking places, and office walls. Of course, negating these delimitations wouldn’t hurt either. Until the CR notion that the world is comprised of just two things – one’s ‘‘self’’ and every body/ thing else, the vast reservoir of holonic capacity within the organization will remain untapped. Face-to-face with the moment of now Another prominent figure in seventeenth century science was so confident in its explanatory power, he anticipated the day when scientists would know sufficient detail of present circumstances to be able to predict with precision, the distant future. By implication then, he had to believe that humankind would succeed in accounting for every detail of the past from the moment of creation. While Pierre Simone de Laplace certainly assented to the notion of connectivity, what he had in mind were connections of a different kind than the non-linear intra-dynamics of the universal holarchy as it is apprehended through the Chaos lens. For Laplace and other devoted determinists, time extends from past to present to future in a great chain of cause and effect. This simple, linear and causal concept of relationship became the basis for yet another central maxim of CR: That since each and every event (cause) produces a singular effect to which it is correlated in size and proximate in space, the future of the universe is subject to prediction and thus to human control. The hold that the presumption of linearity continues to have on us is only reinforced when our attention remains restricted to human-scale events. For

example, consider the apparent behavior of billiard balls put into motion by the external force of the pool cue. Following a collision, each proceeds along a path determined by Newton’s laws of motion seemingly unchanged by their fleeting encounter. Although the appearance of linear cause and effect is nonproblematic for a friendly game of pool or other events occurring at the human level of perception, through the Chaos lens one realizes that the CR assumption of determinacy is the source of the exasperating futility of relying on our most crucial predictions. Especially in business, and in spite of our best efforts to devise ‘‘strategic plans’’ as guides to the future of the enterprise, we find ourselves the hapless victims of the ‘‘butterfly effect’’. This phenomenon is so ubiquitous that the colorful little creature has become something of an official ‘‘mascot’’ for those of the Chaos persuasion. References to the butterfly came into vogue after repeated attempts utilizing the LaPlacian conceptual tools of prediction had failed in the arena of weather forecasting. In experiments involving applications of the original mathematical formulation of the Chaos theory, meteorologist Edward Lorenz succeeded in explaining a troublesome attribute of non-linear systems known as sensitive dependence on initial conditions – a technical term referring to the process of making a mountain out of a mole hill. Metaphorically speaking, he likened the phenomenon to the capacity of a butterfly flapping its wings in an Amazon rainforest to ‘‘cause’’ rain rather than sunshine several days later in New York City had it chosen instead to stay put on a leaf. Any attempt to identify a direct connection between the flapping wings (cause) and rainfall (effect) would be an exercise in futility . . . and not because there isn’t one. In fact, the connections are infinite in number. Nevertheless, Lorenz showed that the concept of ‘‘direct’’ can be dismissed as a relic of CR as far as chaordic systems like the weather are concerned. Don’t make the mistake of regarding the butterfly effect as limited to meteorological systems and therefore, of little concern to managers. One cannot even predict with any precision when the next drip will fall from a leaky water tap, let alone the behavior of a vastly more complex system comprised of humans no less – perhaps the most inconstant species on the face of the earth. Even the most trivial variation, e.g. a single ‘‘non-essential’’ employee deciding to take off a ‘‘mental health day’’, can amplify over time producing an unexpected and potentially disastrous effect. That such an insignificant flying insect could actually pull off this fantastic feat turns out to be not so amazing after all. One need only to embrace the Principles of Connectivity (explained above) and of Indeterminacy, to realize that in an absolutely connected universe, tiny variations in one locality can and routinely do initiate vibrations that travel throughout the entire system amplifying as they go. As long as the flux is not damped, huge inherently unpredictable effects can result. This ‘‘Principle of Indeterminacy’’ posits: ‘‘The universe is so dynamically complex, that any link between cause and effect is instantly obscured rendering its future . . . a future that nevertheless possesses no reality separate from the moment of now . . . unknowable in advance’’.

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The not-so-subtle implication of indeterminacy that drives organizational determinists mad is the fact that the incontestable unknowability of the future cannot be mediated, reduced or eliminated by any degree of intelligence, reason or technology. All the future states we so busily envision, search for, plan, and otherwise anticipate ‘‘right around the corner’’ turn out to be quite literally, figments (contrived or fantastic ideas) of our imagination. Chaos assures us that what we call future does not exist . . . at least in the sense of a distinct chunk of time somewhere out ‘‘there and then’’. Rather being synonymous with the QWF, the future is a wave of potential existing right ‘‘here and now’’ on the vast sea of Consciousness. The same holds true for the past although not in the form of a possibility as yet unmanifest: instead, ‘‘before’’ is stored as memory. Past then is what time looks like a moment after collapse of the QWF into a particular actuality, while future is the potential for anything to be. Not past, not present, and not future exist as separate states neatly arranged along a straight line running through time and space. In fact, all are as one in the everpresent moment of now. Surrendering to the urge to emerge The CR-anchored worldview implies quite subtly, that complex systems come to be that way via an additive process involving the building up of structure over time. This evolutionary process is regarded not as the result of Darwinian random mutations, but in accordance with the will of intelligent (read human) beings. Like engineers, people organize the vast assortment of simple components we have at our disposal in the environment into increasingly more complex mechanisms comprising reality. To illustrate, consider the etiology of a major automobile manufacturer: it all began more than a century ago when an industrious mechanical engineer by the name of Henry Ford put his concept of mass production into practice. From a CR historical perspective, the Ford Motor Company grew through a process of incremental addition (workers, production lines, layers of supervision, new products, etc.) as well as subtraction (lay-offs, turn over, death, and obsolescence). As simplistic as it may seem, to advocates of reductionism it seems quite logical to presume that the international behemoth of automotive manufacturing was engineered into being from a few ‘‘basic building blocks’’ including the brilliance of a businessman and a mode of production. Ford not unlike any other enterprise tends to be regarded by aficionados of reductionism as a mere instrument of production: a mechanical contrivance comprised of cogs (people), wheels (bosses) and various parts and pieces (machines, departments, procedures, etc.). Mechanists believe that not unlike clockworks, the organization and the universe it occupies becomes more complex only through the intent and actions of an intelligence, to wit a human agent, existing external to it. ‘‘Not!’’ would be the likely response of those who have learned to look at the world through the lens of Chaos. Furthermore, they would most assuredly cite yet another il-logicality known to some with tongues in cheek as the ‘‘Who done

it? Paradox’’ (WDIP). WDIP arises from a long-standing presumption predating the rise of science in the sixteenth century. In fact, its modern form is an iteration of the fundamental belief of Western religion in the existence of a super-powerful external intelligence mediating reality from without. As we have already seen, the Chaos Principle of Connectivity in particular, indicates that there is no ‘‘out there’’ out there . . . essentially there is no ‘‘other’’. However, that has not discouraged advocates of reductionism from indulging in the anthropocentric illusion that the enterprise would not exist unless there was some superior intelligence to design it, engineer it, and arrange its myriad component parts into working order. Returning to our example of the Ford Motor Company, one wonders if Henry Ford himself was the master engineer of his company. Perhaps although that would not explain how the corporation has continued to grow in the 50-some years since his death. In that case, one may suppose that Mr Ford handed over his corporate engineering role to some trusted advisors prior to his death. Or it could be that his heirs were prescient enough to have retained the services of experts in the craft of organizational engineering. Of course, we could probably go on for pages speculating about just who continues to engineer Ford to into the production machine it is today. Instead we’ll cut to the chaordic chase, so to speak. The fact is that Chaos has resolved the WDIP now called the ‘‘argument for design’’, that continues to be waged with escalating intensity between the strict Darwinians and an opposing camp predominated by religious fundamentalists, with its ‘‘Principle of Emergence’’. By definition, an emergent is a quality of a whole (holon) that is not present in any of its parts. For example, the harmonic sound of the Mormon Tabernacle Choir cannot be found in any of its individual members – it results from the interaction of all of them singing together as a whole. Spawned by the dynamical interaction of the parts, emergents arise through the process of auto-poiesis – a term referring to the inherent ability of a chaordic system to bring about its own evolution to ever-higher, ever-more complex orders of being. One need only contemplate a system or two in the natural world . . . a chemical interaction, a termite colony, or perhaps a flock of geese on their way to warmer climes . . . to witness this self-making ability in action. Auto-poiesis is actually an umbrella term covering a triad of inter-related capacities: self-organization, self-reference and self-fractalization. The qualifier ‘‘self’’ has been emphasized in each to accentuate the fact that the system serves as its own cause eliminating the need for external agency. This extraordinary process is indeed evolutionary, although not in the sense of the neo-Darwinian course of incremental improvements brought about by the systematic addition of new elements: captured in the Chaos Principle of Emergence is the incontestable fact that chaordic systems are exceedingly more than the sum of their parts: The inexorable thrust of the universe is toward infinitely ascending orders of differentiation, coherence and complexity. In order to grasp the significance of this core precept, the following must be embraced: first, that Consciousness is the essential substance of reality; second,

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that given the absolute Connectivity of the universe, there exists no thing in itself separate and apart from the whole; and finally, that the intrinsic Indeterminacy of experience stems from the dynamically complex, non-linear nature of the universe. Put them all together and you get Emergence . . . fourth of the five properties of a chaordic system. Auto-poietic systems ranging from the lowliest amoeba colony to human civilization, which of course includes the enterprise, are all endowed with the ability to self-organize (generate greater and more complex order from lesser and simpler origins); self-reference (access all the ‘‘instructions’’ they would ever need to do what they do by ‘‘consulting’’ themselves); and self-iterate (reproduce their essential pattern self-similarly in increasingly complex fractal forms). Whether or not this vital capacity is fully tapped is another question altogether. Ironically, of the plethora of chaordic systems constituting our universe, it is only those associated with the human species that have components known as the ‘‘boss’’ . . . individuals who presume to control their systems through the imposition of order, the establishment of rules and regulations to inform action, and the enforcement of cancerous growth in size at the cost of life-sustaining complexity. As a consequence, over time the generative auto-poietic capacity of the enterprise atrophies to the point where havoc reigns in the absence of the ‘‘boss’’ on whom all ‘‘subordinate’’ parts have grown dependent. While it is true that Chaos posits the intrinsic potential of chaordic systems to self-generate, one would be mistaken to take this to mean that the greater is derived from the lesser – the notion of ‘‘upward causation’’ invoked by CR mechanists. While it may seem obvious that oaks grow from acorns, one cannot then conclude that the gigantic tree was ‘‘caused’’ by its tiny seed. The Principle of Emergence shows us that causation is in fact downward rather than ‘‘bottom up’’: the tiny seedling is attracted irresistibly to its highest potential in the form of the mighty oak, succeeding in its ascent only because it is free to tap into its inherent self-organizing, self-referential capacities, eventually fractalizing into new self-similar forms. Likewise, the enterprise is drawn toward the realization of its own highest potential inscribed not on a genetic code, but in the intricacies of its orgmind. And similarly, only when the system is free to self-organize, to self-reference and to self-iterate will it too prevail in attaining and sustaining higher orders of complexity. The implications of Emergence for managers and practitioners alike are profound indeed: not unlike the moon calling upon the ocean to rise toward it, a compelling vision (no, not the usual statement of corporate desire to be the ‘‘world’s leading producer of [fill in the blank]’’) serves as a mental and emotional super-magnet drawing the system ever closer to the full actualization of its potential. Of course, tapping into this enormous reservoir of possibilities comes with a price tag – apparently one that too few leaders have yet been willing to pay. Emergence happens – in fact it struggles to happen, but only in a context devoid of rules and regulations, policies and procedures, structures and systems imposed in tribute to the CR-inspired illusion of control.

Falling apart gracefully, before it is time To dissipate is to dissolve, to disperse, to break up, to disintegrate and ultimately, to disappear. Although the very idea of doing any of the above, whether voluntarily or otherwise, is anathema to modern day adherents of CR, few can dispute the fact established by their forefather, Isaac Newton – what goes up must come down. Dissipation is in other words, the inverse of the Principle of Emergence: complex forms arising from the dynamical interaction of a system’s component parts, must eventually and inevitably ‘‘fall apart’’ . . . if that is, emergents of even greater complexity are to unfold from the QWF. Owing to their ignorance of the ‘‘law of limits’’, conservatives are wont to insist that the potential for growth of the organization or the universe for that matter remains unlimited as long as the system is maintained in a steady state of equilibrium and unwavering stability. Although ‘‘steady as she goes’’ has become the mantra of CR, those who chant it are destined to learn that equilibrium is scientific . . . that is, from the new science . . . jargon for death. Since not a single exception to this universal dictate has ever been found, those who violate it through the imposition of rules, regulations, controls and structures, intending to quash and contain flux both within and exterior to their cherished systems, are certain to launch them on a painful and wholly unnecessary slide into oblivion. Given the provision of this inexorable law that ‘‘all systems are subject to limits to continuous extension, these brought about by the fact that over time, the conditions that once promoted growth change’’, the combination of a radically altered context and very much unchanged and proudly unchanging organization is lethal. No matter how abundant the resources, how advanced the technology, or how brilliant the leadership, no enterprise can remain the same (only bigger) and expect to survive in a marketplace marked by the unprecedented turbulence we know today. This is depicted in a simple twodimensional matrix on which time rolls forward on the horizontal axis with growth appraised on the vertical. Define growth any way that suits you – increase in market share, profitability, assets, size, any or all of the above, the fact remains that enterprises forced by conservative management to collide with their limits can never prevail. The enormous potential they once had for greater complexity and higher order performance has been depleted as a result of a misguided albeit still commonplace blindness to what chaordic thinkers call the ‘‘window of opportunity’’. Since Dissipation is not normally detectable by the senses, it often comes as quite a shock when the pace and extent of disintegration eventually surpasses the system’s ability to damp it. Even so, all is not lost; managers have available three basic courses of action at this crucial bifurcation. One can: (1) strive to break through the limits to growth; (2) regress from them; or (3) ‘‘leap’’ through the window in a process of whole-system transformation (see Figure 2).

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Note that we are talking about transformation and thus implying ‘‘going beyond form’’ rather than the mundane process of altering, adjusting and improving a given entity known as reformation. The first alternative is a veritable impossibility – there has never been a successful assault on the limits to growth in the entire history of business and industry. The second, a backing down and settling for ‘‘good enough’’, may earn some precious time . . . not necessarily a bad thing. However, not a single moment should be wasted indulging in the illusion that the system’s demise has been somehow circumvented. That leaves the third and as far as the Chaos-smart executive is concerned, the only reasonable option: intentional dissipation. Kind of like the proverbial calm before the storm, chaordic systems are prone to exist in their healthiest and most vital condition just prior to the inevitable encounter with their limits. The ‘‘window’’, otherwise known as a bifurcation or choice point, represents a moment in time recognized as ideal for the intentional dissipation of the system as it exists. That’s right. It is time to ‘‘disintegrate’’ the current system purposefully, systematically, and strategically, consequently releasing its potential to inform a wholly new enterprise at a higher order ungoverned by the past. Although the counterintuitive nature of prescribing intentional dissipation is admitted, it is abundantly clear that there is no other choice. The law of limits, a derivative of the Second Law of Thermodynamics established in 1824 warns that systems closed to change follow a trajectory leading toward increasing disorder, disintegration and decay, reaching an ultimate end in ‘‘maximum fatal chaos’’. Any attempt to stave off change in line with the now rapidly changing environment is bound to result in the exact consequences one is trying to avoid in the first place. Many of those who have donned the Chaos lens not only accept purposeful system Dissipation as a strategic necessity, but many take such delight in the prospect of the organization ‘‘falling apart’’ that they do whatever they can to accelerate the process.

The last but certainly not least precept of Chaos, the ‘‘Principle of Dissipation’’, depicts the universe and therefore, any chaordic system as a dissipative structure, which cycles perpetually through a process of ‘‘falling apart’’ then back together again, each time in a novel new form ungoverned by the past. Before drawing to a close on this introductory article, I wish to point out the fact that dissipation is not a finite event, although in the preceding description of the intentional act of leaping beyond the status quo, one may have inferred as much. On the contrary, an organization’s ability to take form is not static. In fact, the enterprise is a continuous flow of non-substantial ‘‘data bytes’’ which chaordic thinkers prefer to call potential information into, out of, and through a structural manifestation. Although our senses may tell us that the firm remains the same from one moment to the next, in actuality, organizations are like all other chaordic systems, perpetually playing out the twin processes of Emergence and Dissipation. Briefly . . . an afterword The purpose of this introduction to this special issue of JOCM, has been to elucidate the meaning and implications of Chaos not as just-anothermanagement-theory, but as a meta-cosmology sufficiently encompassing to enable those who don its lens to rise to and succeed with the challenge of profound change in the intensifying turbulence and flux of the global marketplace. It has been a windy road indeed, carrying us from the depths of the universal Mind to the heart of the Amazonian rainforest where we witnessed the power of a butterfly in flight; from the majesty of the cosmic holarchy to the mystery of Schro¨edinger’s cat; from the astounding selfcreating capacity of the chaordic system to its equally remarkable ability to self-destruct in service to the possibility of attaining a higher order of being. Of course, I realize that it will take more than an article, or for that matter, an entire journal dedicated to making Chaos both applicable to and actionable in the twenty-first century enterprise, for those responsible for organizational sustainability to ‘‘get it’’ – to grasp the new science so completely that chaordic becomes the primary descriptor of their being. Yes, I’ve been thoroughly enthralled by Chaos ever since my first hint of it in Zukav’s (1979) The Dancing Wu Li Masters in the early 1980s. Nonetheless, I must confess that until I had garnered the courage to relinquish the comforting sense of control I had derived from a life-long and profitable association with CR, the new science remained purely an intellectual pursuit often kept secret from my clients for fear that they would take me as a raving maniac. Though maniacal I am not, I am inclined to rave to anyone who will listen about the inordinate power of Chaos to liberate enterprise, not to mention the world around it from the materialistic, reductionist and mechanistic legacy of seventeenth century science. At the same time, I am enough of a realist to know that the transformation I envision starts here and now with a personal decision to cast off the chains of CR . . . or it doesn’t start at all. So how does one go

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about making that choice? Read to your heart’s content beginning with the following articles in this journal. Write down your thoughts both pro and con and share them with others either on paper or on one of the many electronic lists addressing the new science. Speak preferably in dialogue as opposed to monologue, with friends and colleagues who share your interest in the emerging meta-cosmology . . . there are a lot more of them out there than you might expect. Last but not least, enact the new science principles in your life and work. Whatever you do, never forget that Chaos is not something one ‘‘does’’. Rather it is a way, and a very powerful way at that, of seeing, thinking and being in our inexorably chaordic world. References Gleick, J. (1987), Chaos: The Making of a New Science, Penguin Books, New York, NY. Hagan, S. (1995), How the World Can Be the Way It Is, Quest Books, Wheaton, IL. Hock, D.W. (1995), ‘‘The Chaordic organization: out of control and into order’’, available at: www.chaordic.org/chaordic/res_wba.html Lynch, D. and Kordis, P. (1988), Strategy of the Dolphin: Scoring a Win in a Chaotic World, William Morrow & Company, New York, NY. Zukav, G. (1979), The Dancing Wu Li Masters: An Overview of the New Physics, Bantam Books/ William Morrow & Company, New York, NY. Further reading Goswami, A. (2000), The Visionary Window: A Quantum Physicist’s Guide to Enlightenment, The Theosophical Publishing House, Wheaton, IL. Wilber, K. (1995), Sex, Ecology, Spirituality: The Spirit of Evolution, Shambala, Boston, MA.

The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available at http://www.emeraldinsight.com/0953-4814.htm

Ethics in organizations: a Chaos perspective

Ethics in organizations

Lisa Irvin Adjunct Faculty, Department of Communications, Metropolitan State College, Breckenridge, Colorado, USA

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Submitted July 2001 Revised November 2001 Abstract Scrutinizes one of the main features of the conventional credo of organizational Accepted February 2002 management: The ‘‘ethic of self-preservation’’ (ESP). The ESP is the inevitable by-product of a culture that denies interiors and encourages materialistic consumerism and narcissistic selfinterest. Several pertinent questions will be explored: What is an ethic and what role does it play in governing both personal and collective behavior? What specifically is the ESP? How is it fostered by the prevailing culture of narcissism? What impact if any, does it have on the maintenance of organizational integrity? Furthermore, how can the Chaos principle of Connectivity be construed as an imperative for organizational adaptation and sustainability? Finally, what lessons can Chaos lend practitioners of organization development that will permit them to grasp, and ultimately, accept a new ethic based on the fact of connectivity in the essential process of organizational change? Keywords Ethics, Connecting, Emergent strategy

Introduction: Survivor recast Picture a television series like the US hit Survivor – only with a difference: in this imaginary bit of ‘‘reality TV’’, all participants who successfully ‘‘survive’’ the challenges of play are permitted to divide the prize money as they consensually see fit, contrary to standard practice of awarding the entire purse to a single triumphant contestant. Imagine that the contestants agreed to play the game with the provision that no matter who ‘‘succeeded’’ as the survivor, everyone would receive an equal share of the prize. Although the specter of cooperative play would probably cause a good portion of the viewing audience to switch channels, it is nonetheless likely that the well-being of the team as a whole could be enhanced through its dynamics. The attributes of ‘‘rugged’’ individualism and self-interest so cherished in Western culture would be replaced with the collective goal of group survival and collaborative performance. What would the nature of relationships and the dynamics of interaction be like among the contestants if the ‘‘survival’’ of each depended on their contribution to the performance of the others? How would contestants behave differently if they were encouraged to override their instinct for self-preservation by transcending the personal ‘‘I’’? What if survival was ensured only to the degree to which participants genuinely supported and collaborated with others? At this point in the development of Western culture, a series of this genre would be unlikely to capture the level of ratings to keep it on the air. Nevertheless, a vision for the future of organizational ethics may well be intimated in this imaginative scenario. In direct opposition, one finds the prevailing ‘‘ethic of self-preservation’’ (ESP): the narcissistic value system that

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has cost business millions in production inefficiencies, customer loss, employee turnover, and other symptoms of sub-optimal performance. Not only does this all too pervasive notion inhibit the establishment and nurturing of healthy internal relationships necessary for systemic sustainability, but also it stymies the system’s inherent capacity for learning, adaptation, and growth. In spite of the dismal rate of success of conventional ‘‘programs’’ aimed at affecting change in both the individual and the collective, managers faced with the lackluster performance of these costly interventions are often hesitant to initiate a concerted inquiry into why these initiatives fail to deliver the improvements in performance, productivity and profitability they had hoped for. Instead, they are prone to renewing their search for that ‘‘quick fix’’ that will eliminate once and for all the dilemmas of managing in turbulent conditions. However, given the relentless change, unpredictable occurrences, and increasing complexity of the modern world, a failure to comprehend these realities leads managers and practitioners to persist in practices that reinforce the ESP. Metaphorically speaking, denizens of organizations thus find themselves under mounting pressure to enact the role of contestants as if on an endless episode of Survivor. The purpose of this article is to expand the reader’s grasp of the implications of systemic ethics for the ultimate sustainability of enterprise. Taking a critical perspective, we will examine the host of prevalent beliefs, values, and practices that endanger organizational vitality, focusing specifically on the realm of the ‘‘ethical’’. As we proceed, the reader is advised to keep in mind that the term ‘‘ethics’’ will bear an unconventional slant. By setting aside its common connotation as religious doctrine, one is able to move more readily toward a deeper understanding of the powerful framework provided by Chaos. This meta-lens enables us to see the world with eyes that integrate patterns, recognize the absoluteness of connectivity, and appreciate the potential lying within for emergence to ever-higher orders of being. Ultimately, what lies beneath and beyond that which appears to ordinary ‘‘eyes of flesh’’? In particular, we will call on the Chaos principle of Connectivity so to facilitate our recognition of an order of ethical relations that transcends operant levels of awareness, and consequently foster the critically needed transformation of organizational change theory. We will see how, in addition to offering revolutionary principles to guide systemic transformation, Chaos also provides a way to conceptualize the modern enterprise that honors its dynamic nature. The scourge of scientism Before delving into the primary theme of this discussion, a historical account of the development of modern day organizational values will be reviewed. The difficulty in understanding why organizations fail to thrive is, in part, attributable to a pervasive reluctance to question the tacit assumptions underpinning contemporary management theory and practice. Perhaps the greatest challenge to comprehending why organizations operate and continue

to operate as they do in spite of efforts to the contrary, can, at least in part, be attributed to the messages conveyed through the mainstream media. Leading business magazines and the endless stream of books promoted by the management gurus of modern times persist in reflecting and maintaining, rather than questioning the presuppositions underlying modern management theory. In order to gain a clearer and more insightful comprehension of the dysfunctional nature of contemporary organizational change strategies, one must appreciate the astounding impact modern science continues to have on the evolution of organizational theory and practice. Even though managers are beginning to show signs of an awakening to the necessity of changing their view of reality, prospects for success in the transformation of enterprise remain dismal unless and until a critical mass of business leaders are ready, willing, and able to question the presuppositions underpinning conventional managerial wisdom practice. So that such introspection and self-inquiry can occur, one begins by acknowledging the scourge of ‘‘scientism’’ – the depreciation of scientific knowledge into ‘‘scientistic’’ dogma. Perhaps nothing has contributed more to the corruption of contemporary management theory, values, and practice than this disastrous mutation of the scientific worldview into the managerial doctrine, hinged as it is on the ethic of self-preservation. Scientism in the realm of enterprise has led to the evolution of organizational cultures that mandate and reward excessive self-interest. As a consequence of our entrancement with the spectacular social, economic and technological achievements of modern science, scientism has become the fundamental philosophy underlying the values and pursuits of Western civilization. Ken Wilber along with such leading philosophers as Sir Karl Popper, Immanuel Kant and Jurgen Habermas, have distinguished three distinct ‘‘cultural spheres’’ that have served as the subjects of inquiry, domains of theory, and voices of values throughout human history. The first ‘‘world’’ comprises a set of assumptions about the individual self, personal expression, and subjective experience, which Wilber has named the sphere of the ‘‘I’’. Because the second speaks to values regarding collective processes such as worldviews, shared meanings and values, and cultural mores, it is called the ‘‘WE’’-sphere. While both are essentially subjective and interior, the third realm is not. Concerned as it is with empirical forms, quantification, objective surfaces, rational-positivistic methods, functionality, and measurable behavior, modern science has focused exclusively on the third cultural world designated the sphere of the ‘‘IT’’ until that is, the emergence of the ‘‘new science’’. Transcending its predecessor, Chaos offers a lens through which all three spheres are united into an integral whole; a framework that takes into account both the objective exterior surface of the enterprise as well as its vital subjective interiority. Nonetheless, since Chaos has not yet entered the mainstream of managerial thought, the inarguable success of modern science has effectively precluded managers and practitioners from acknowledging the

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existence of the organizational interior, let alone questioning its content. In consequence, the emergence of a more powerful and truly holistic way of knowing, seeing, and understanding the world is frustrated. Central to scientism is the claim that the only real truth is derived from monological inquiry using empirical and positivistic methods aimed solely at the objective exterior of the system. Knowledge gained through other modes of understanding such as those that are primarily subjective, interpretive, intuitive, dialogical, and/or artistic in nature, are summarily dismissed as ‘‘metaphysical’’ in the most pejorative sense of the term. Over time, modern science, or more accurately scientism, has come to reign as the predominant belief system in the West – a ‘‘religion’’ of sorts devoted to the pursuit of material abundance and economic security. Owing to the fact that science has succeeded in putting humans on the moon, eradicating disease at a record rate, extending lifespan by decades, and expanding our leisure time with a continuing slew of revolutionary technologies and innovations, we have effectively relegated to it the moral authority to dictate which aspects of existence are of importance and value . . . and which are not. So entranced are we with scientific achievements, the exterior IT-sphere is now regarded as the ‘‘real’’ reality while the remaining two realms of experience are now honored as valid. By attending exclusively to the apparent surface of the system and consequently, ignoring its interiority, the ‘‘scientific method’’ is thus replicated by managers and practitioners at every level of enterprise, subsequently reducing it to parts, performance measures, efficiency ratings, and observable behavior. Aspects of the interior such as beliefs, values, feelings, intentions, thoughts, assumptions and every other element of the whole that can be neither observed nor measured are neglected by people intent on managing the ‘‘bottom line’’. In spite of the wave of interest in ‘‘organizational culture’’ inspired by a handful of management theorists in recent years, the interiority of enterprise has been all too frequently marginalized and/or ‘‘outsourced’’ to socalled ‘‘experts’’ in organizational culture. Wilber (2000a, p. 242) explains how: . . . the power of industrialization joined with the accomplishment of empirical science where ‘‘ITs’’ alone are real. The ‘‘IT’’-domain was growing like cancer – a pathological hierarchy – invading and colonizing and dominating the ‘‘I’’- and the ‘‘WE’’-domains . . . All problems in the ‘‘I’’- and the ‘‘WE’’-domains were converted to technical problems in the ‘‘IT’’-domain. And thus, science (theoretical and technical) would not only solve all problems, it would decide what was a problem in the first place.

The more organizations that are subjected to the scientistic gaze by managers and practitioners who remain focused on exteriors – that which can be predicted, controlled and measured – the more the humanity of enterprise becomes compromised and corrupted. Inevitably a monological mode of inquiry seeking to analyze and objectify, but never to interpret or to grasp anything but the exterior, has come to dominate managerial practice: Scientism has thus succeeded in colonizing the practice of organizational development and change.

Consider the attempts to ‘‘engineer’’ production line behavior conducted in Detroit’s automotive factories during the early years of the twentieth century. Henry Ford along with other leading industrialists of his time were prone to regard their organizations as ‘‘machines’’ and the workforce as an assortment of interchangeable and therefore dispensable parts together, subject to control and manipulation for the purposes of increasing efficiency and enhancing productivity. Fostered by Frederick Taylor’s popular doctrine of ‘‘scientific management’’, the mechanistic casting of the enterprise further expanded managerial license to exploit workers by reducing them to quantities devoid of value or meaning. Although such a dehumanizing perspective is rarely acknowledged today, reflecting a growing concern with morale of the ‘‘human resource’’, the people-as-parts paradigm continues to live on in management theory, values, and practice. Today’s conventional managers and practitioners may acknowledge the reality of the interior domains, but nevertheless persist in objectifying and consequently disassociating the ‘‘I’’ and the ‘‘WE’’ from the predominant ‘‘IT’’. The fact that progress continues to be pursued through monological methods attests to entrenchment of the ‘‘exteriors only’’ value system on which the control and command paradigm is anchored. This predominant ideology is indicative of the inability of managers to integrate adequately the values and voices of the different culture spheres into their mindsets. Subsequently, a wave of narcissism has beset both individuals and institutions throughout Western civilization, emerging as one of the foremost and most formidable challenges faced by agents of organizational change. The failure to transcend the conditioned and culturally situated tragedy of selfabsorption in order to attain and sustain collaborative relationships between individuals and groups has the stamp of the ESP writ large all over it. This exploration of the relationship between Chaos, ethics and organizational change began with a definition of ethics and some preliminary thoughts about their role in informing individual and collective performance, for the purposes of exposing the detrimental impact of the prevailing ESP on organizational growth and prosperity. In order to convey more effectively the urgency behind this call for profound change in modern ways of thinking about, operating in, and leading enterprise, we now turn to the nature of relationships in the organizational context in order to build a case for adopting an alternative ethic – one informed by Chaos and in particular, its principle of Connectivity. It will become abundantly clear that the crucial difference between the optimally sustainable enterprise and one that must struggle to survive is nothing less than the commitment of the former to optimizing the quality of relationship. Governance and moral reasoning While the subject of ethics tends to be laden with religious connotations, the relationship of managerial values and resulting behavior is indisputable. Consistent with most dictionaries of the English language, an ethic can be

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defined as a system of accepted beliefs and principles of conduct typically based on moral imperatives that govern the behavior of individuals and the groups and organizations to which they belong. While the similarity of these concepts is apparent, they only begin to scratch the surface in terms of conveying the essential meaning of these codes of behavior. Contrary to conventional wisdom reducing organizational ethics to a set of explicit ‘‘dos and don’ts’’ formalized in corporate policy, the values that actually govern conduct emerge as normative responses from the interior of the system to form a basis for moral reasoning. In other words, ethics are an emergent property of a social entity that bears distinctive cultural and historical roots. They are manifested in patterns of behavior designed to ensure the survival of the system. Thus, ethics exist both in ‘‘context’’ as well as in relation to history, culture, social influence, and beliefs. While several schools of thought have begun to address the issue of ‘‘evolutionary ethics’’, the main premise of this perspective is two-fold: first, that ethics emerge in response to the intrinsic urge to survive, particularly in environments where competition for scarce resources is strong. Second, that humans seek to negotiate such competitive or hostile environments by adjusting their cultural mores, albeit unconsciously. The resulting adaptive response manifests as an ethic, simultaneously ensuring cultural survival, individual fitness, and normalcy of behavior. In conjunction with their responsive and adaptive features, ethics also perform a governance function, that is, a way of ‘‘conceptualizing all those more rationalized programs, strategies, and tactics for ‘the conduct of conduct’, for acting upon the actions of others in order to achieve certain ends’’ (Foucault, 1977). A style of action, when reinforced, rewarded, and normalized through language, policies, and other structural properties, soon enters the arena of governance where it exercises influence over the actions of others subsequently reinforcing normative standards of behavior. The difference then, between a formal policy and an ethic is in their source: rules originate from explicit intent, are imposed by one party on another, and tend to direct behavior in a manner calculated to serve the interests of the rule-maker. Ethics however, emerge from the system’s interior and out of the awareness of its members, affect everyone indiscriminately, and influence behavior in a way that cannot be predicted. Ethics then comprise a complex feedback loop emerging from a cultural system, and in turn playing a role in the reproduction of that system. This cycle discussed by numerous systems and social theorists, finds support in Giddens’ ‘‘theory of structuration’’, which highlights the recursive nature of behavior in organizations and societies. The theory describes how the dynamic relationship between the behavior of agents in a system and the structures supporting them normalize and therefore ‘‘institutionalize’’ such behavior. Unlike many traditional organizational theorists, Giddens places a major share of responsibility on individual agency in the perpetuation of existing social structures and behavioral norms. While his attribution will be recalled in this article when the transformation process is discussed, in the meantime, the

pertinent point is that ethics are both rooted in and formative of the system in which they exist. This fact can be illustrated by calling once again on the television allegory Survivor in which the rules of the game effectively inform the basic structures underpinning participant behavior. Contestants initially cooperate with their own team to defeat their opponents. Once done, the rules change, requiring the winners to do what ever is necessary to best eliminate their former teammates given that only a single participant will prevail. This structure sets up the individualistic ESP among participants who had previously cooperated with each other. Earnest contestants are hard pressed to engage in any other manner than that which best serves their own interests. This hypothetical analogy illustrates the dynamic and recursive nature of the relationship between individual behavior and human systems. Individuals indeed respond to the rules and structures of the system in ways that reflect the beliefs and values implicit in the system’s design. However, two important aspects of this dynamic are often overlooked. The first has to do with the responsibility system leaders bear for creating rules that permit individual agents to ‘‘survive’’ and succeed given that these structures inexorably foster adaptive responses. Second, since individual responses serve to maintain and even to reinforce the system and its structures, the agents themselves must also be held to account for their own behavior and its consequences for the entire system. Wilber (1995, p. 66) describes this recursive process as ‘‘the micro is in relational exchange with the macro at all levels.’’ From the philosopher’s perspective, ethics are part and parcel of the feedback loops rooted in and formative of the systems they underpin reflecting the same basic structures of Consciousness within both the individual and the collective (Wilber, 1995). Apparently, ethics play a crucial role in keeping a system stable and constant since once an ethic is normalized, it begins to exert influence on both individual behavior and the system as a whole. The ethics informed by the outdated ideology of traditional management continue to ‘‘steer’’ organizational behavior within, often in ways that are decidedly dysfunctional. In particular, the ESP tends to foster and reinforce system cultures rife with competition, individualism, and defensive tactics that reflect the institutionalization of narcissistic self-interest. The ethic of self-preservation: a critical analysis Management based on the legacy of scientism when coupled with habitual ignorance and subsequent neglect of any reality existing beyond the system’s exterior surface has served as a fertile breeding ground for the multitude of narcissistic organizational cultures anchored in the ESP that characterize the current marketplace. While the instinct for survival may be a necessary capacity to sustain life, the ESP as the fundamental value system of the modern enterprise has grown increasingly problematic in its expression. Certainly then, it behooves us to examine the relationship between collective culture and individual perspectives that together created the ESP.

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A primary theme of this article is that the ESP is the antithesis of organizational sustainability as well as the foremost and most formidable obstacle to the success of the system’s transformation. Given that an ethic is an adaptive response to the context as it is perceived by individuals in relation to the collective, it is therefore crucial to grasp just how the particular value set comprising the ESP came to be. Observers of Western business have noted a proliferation of the ‘‘culture of narcissism’’ epitomized in US-based corporations. One of the first to expose the extent of the narcissistic personality in the general culture of the West, as early as 1979, Lasch pointed to growth of self-interest among the American populace occurring simultaneously with the propensity to undervalue others and their contributions. However, psychologists stand in agreement that the inner experience of the narcissist is one of self-hatred and not the excessive selfregard apparent in their behavior. In fact, it is a nagging sense of alienation and emptiness that results in attempts to inflate one’s self-importance while deflating that of others (Wilber, 2000b). A culture of narcissism is ‘‘a culture of competitive individualism, which in its decadence has carried the logic of individualism to the extreme of a war of all against all, the pursuit of happiness to the dead end of a narcissistic preoccupation with the self’’ (Lasch, 1979: p. xv). In other words, narcissism breeds narcissism. Coincident with the rise of the modern corporation and the consequent shift in values from community to material prosperity, merit and loyalty ceased to be focal points of either the individual or the enterprise. Success took on a whole new meaning emphasizing the necessity of perception management given the exclusionary focus on exteriors and images thereof. Lasch (1979, p. 59) explains how: . . . success appeared as an end in it own right, the victory over your competitors that alone retained the capacity to instill a sense of self-approval. The latest success materials differ from the earlier ones – even surpassing the cynicism of Dale Carnegie or Pearle, in their frank acceptance of the need to exploit and intimidate others, in their lack of interest in the substance of success and in the candor with which they insist that appearances – ‘‘winning images’’ count for more than performance, ascription for more achievement.

This transmutation from the derivation of pride and meaning from the activity of work itself to the increasingly frantic efforts to construct and maintain the image of success marks a sad time in human history. When the value placed on public perception exceeds the importance of contribution and competence, people and their organization can only suffer. As external displays of behavior and the maintenance of the ‘‘right’’ image became institutionalized, the monological gaze of scientism became an essential feature of life in the workplace. This linear mode of inquiry finds its roots in conventional science, specifically in its presuppositions that the observer and the observed are distinct and independent entities, and furthermore, that the object of inquiry is just that – an objective ‘‘thing’’ bearing no subjective interior of its own. In keeping with the materialistic reductionism of these presumptions, managers

developed the dehumanizing habit of retaining all manner of social scientists to assist them in the observation, classification, measurement and evaluation of the human ‘‘resource’’. Much credit can be given to nineteenth century industrial engineer Frederick Taylor for his role in institutionalizing monological inquiry as the modern corporation’s primary approach to establishing policies deemed most likely to maximize efficiency and productivity. His credo of ‘‘scientific management’’ epitomized the ever-popular machine metaphor and in turn, gave rise to the ‘‘control and command’’ paradigm that continues to be embraced by mainstream management. Although the primary components of Taylor’s doctrine have been all but abandoned by contemporary theorists, the practice of appraising the complexity of human behavior using monological methods remains as popular as ever in the modern corporation. Through the extensive utilization of empirical methods based on the image of the workplace as a laboratory, scientism has managed to creep into the organizational mindset, subsequently leading to the objectification of its members: the individual became just another ‘‘It’’ of scientific inquiry subject ironically to the control and manipulation of executives who recognized no contradiction in regarding themselves as the crucially important ‘‘Is’’ and ‘‘WEs’’ without whom the enterprise would not exist. In the words of Rose (1998, p. 19), people are ‘‘. . . individualized through classifying them, calibrating their capacities and conducts, inscribing and recording their attributes and deficiencies, managing and utilizing their individuality and variability’’. He adds further that quantifiable normative standards of behaviors focusing solely on exteriors are institutionalized as ‘‘. . . human capacities and mental processes could be turned into information about which calculations could be made’’ (Rose, 1998, p. 103). People who are cognizant of being observed, assessed, evaluated, and essentially objectified, particularly in the context of a competitive environment, grow ever more self-conscious as if living out their lives in a ‘‘house of mirrors’’. The culture of narcissism which gives rise to the ESP normalizes self-oriented behaviors and hyper-sensitizes individuals to the perceptions of others. Before long, the notion described by Rose (1998, p. 154) as the ‘‘. . . enterprising self will make an enterprise of its life, seek to maximize it own human capital, project itself a future, and seek to shape itself in order to become what it wishes to be’’ begins to gain credence. He goes on to explain how ‘‘. . . the vocabulary of enterprise links political rhetoric and regulatory ‘‘self-steering’’ capacities and . . . designates an array of rules for the conduct of everyone’s existence, energy, initiative, ambition, calculation, and personal responsibility.’’ The pervasive adoption of the persona of the enterprising self has been further reinforced by the pronouncements of social scientists, particularly psychologists. During the latter decades of the twentieth century, popular literature was rife with recipes for achieving success, making more money, being the greatest salesperson in the world, getting a well-deserved raise or promotion, shining in job interviews, and so on ad infinitum. Via this media-blitz of sorts, self-

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centered individualism was legitimized throughout the corporate world as well as in general culture. Westerners learned that power and influence, as well as recognition and reward are the just desserts of skillful image management. Whether on the factory floor, in the boardroom, on the university campus, or in the community at large, self-preservation through the manipulation of perception has become the central ethic of modern times. As Deetz (1992, p. 300) explains: ‘‘As long as the person is not really there, the image makes the decision and the image is suddenly the end rather than the means.’’ The purveyors of many popular organizational change methodologies unwittingly perpetuate the ESP by virtue of their exclusive focus on the system’s exterior. For example, the performance appraisal technique known as ‘‘360-degree feedback’’ fails to address the crucial issues of the personal integrity, intentions, values or beliefs of the individual under scrutiny, even though it does enhance the credibility of the ‘‘subordinate’s’’ perception of supervisory performance. Nevertheless, this otherwise innovative technique remains a thoroughly linear tool of assessment. In the absence of dialogical give-and-take, individuals thus turn the monological gaze of scientism on the other as well as back on themselves. People who have been so conditioned, inevitably engage in a form of image management that fosters intensive selfabsorption disguised as performance management. In his attempts to model the dynamics of self-organizing systems, Axelrod (1984) found that purely selfish behavior so common in the ESP-based organization, was detrimental not only to the system but also to the individual actors. It appears that both ‘‘other’’ oriented as well as ‘‘whole system’’ focused intentions and behavior are crucial to the prospects of the system and its agents to thrive in the turbulence of the twenty-first century marketplace. Clearly, the optimally connected enterprise is neither the product of the ESP, nor does it embrace such self-serving values. Not unlike the feral animal that exhibits threatening behavior even though they may be harmful to self, the ‘‘I/We’’ realm of the contemporary enterprise has adopted a virulent survival mode of existence. Given that the systemic value system recognizes and rewards only what is measurable, observable and subject to control, the resulting ethical response may be adaptive but essentially pathologically so. Habermas (1987, p. 141) has referred to this phenomenon as a ‘‘. . . disturbance of the socialization process which is manifested in psychopathologies and corresponding phenomena of alienation.’’ He goes on to posit that the ‘‘. . . personality system can preserve its identity only by means of defensive strategies that are detrimental to participating in social interaction . . .’’ therefore explaining the behavioral similarities of a feral animal and a human participant in the context of the ESP. As long as exteriors are deemed the ‘‘real’’ reality, people will grow ever more self-absorbed and subsequently, less able to enter into authentic dialogical relationships with others. Moreover, the vast majority of contemporary organizational change and development methodologies further exacerbate the inadequacy of human connectivity within the enterprise. The prevalence of

techniques and methods that further foster self-interest and self-preservation is indeed problematic if not deleterious to both people and their organizations. Because the great majority of managers and practitioners operate from a reductionist perspective, their tendency is to focus exclusively on ‘‘parts’’. Consequently, the system’s dynamical core of human interaction is neglected. The fact is that any technique that encourages self-centered and self-preserving behavior is an antithesis to the creation of sustainable enterprise. In effect, the ESP emerging from the milieu of narcissism is the sin qua non of barriers to attaining and sustaining optimal organizational performance. Wilber (2000a, b, p. 4) has repeatedly warned that such an ethic ‘‘. . . is antithetical to an integral culture’’ due to the proclivity of self-absorbed narcissists to ‘‘. . . strenuously resist communion’’ or in a term more apropos to this discussion, connectivity. Further, the habitual use of monological methods by change agents only serves to undermine human connections so essential to the sustainability of the system. If we are to succeed in evolving beyond the current state of organizational fragmentation, the constituent ‘‘parts’’ must learn to engage with each other in a context of shared meaning and purpose. As long as individuals are encouraged to perceive themselves as separate and absolutely distinct entities, they will continue to make decisions informed by the ESP and subsequently, fail to take into account the effect of their actions on others. The disconnection each experience with both others and the whole becomes then the major inhibitor of moral reasoning based on something other than the ‘‘self’’ known as ego. We have now seen how the ESP has legitimated the current environment of self-interest, superficiality, and cut-throat competition that continues to defeat us in our struggle to attain a higher order of organizational performance. Indeed, it appears that by donning the emerging lens of Chaos and putting into practice its principle of Connectivity, our chances for success in the creation of enduring enterprises are marked by cohesion, integrity, and robust mutuality. We now turn to what the author believes to be the antidote to the dissociating effects of the ESP. Competencies of connectivity The Chaos principle of Connectivity as defined in Fitzgerald’s introductory article, assures us that ‘‘the Universe is one – a single unbroken and unbreakable pattern of relationships in which no ‘thing’ can exist or occur independent of the whole.’’ This core precept of the ‘‘new science’’ suggests that the fragmentation, the separateness, and the opposites so commonly experienced in the modern world, are in fact the products of a way of seeing based as it is in the assumptions of a decidedly scientistic worldview. The fact is that every aspect of the universe exists ‘‘in relation to’’ every other, and furthermore, that every ‘‘thing’’ arises from the interaction of what only appears as separately existing parts. Even the ESP is the product of the movement of the whole.

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The following pages are based on the author’s conviction that those who not only comprehend but also have embraced the principle of Connectivity are no longer capable of conducting themselves as do the self-absorbed narcissists characteristic of the ESP. While the implications of this principle extend well beyond the realm of enterprise, its application in the organizational context activates a pair of inter-related practitioner competencies essential to success of the transformative process. Even though both depend on attaining a higher order awareness of the complexities environment, one is distinguished from the other by its respective focus. We’ll begin by examining the competency referred to as ‘‘awareness of systemic connectivity’’: ASC comprises an intuitive grasp of the myriad dynamical relationships of the system as an integral whole. While the view afforded by the ASC is commonly referred to as the ‘‘big picture’’, the second capability allows one to perceive the impact of individual behavior on the larger context; in other words what might be called ‘‘awareness of individual connectivity’’. Although AIC entails a certain degree of selfconsciousness, it is of the sort that transcends the egotistical demands of the narcissistic culture described above. AIC rests on the premise that ‘‘. . . being a self is always being a self in-relationship’’ (Wilber, 1995, p. 183). In order for the organization to surmount the pathological limitations of normative selfpreservation and so advance to a higher order of moral reasoning, it becomes imperative that individuals at every level of the system actuate both this and the parallel capacity for ASC. One begins by accepting the quantum proofs of absolute connectivity or the oneness of existence, in spite of the ‘‘evidence’’ of multiplicity detected by our senses. However, this pillar of quantum physics needn’t be embraced on the basis of faith alone. The well-documented dynamic of ‘‘sensitive dependence on initial conditions’’ that has been shown to characterize systems ranging from amoeba colonies to human societies should be sufficient to dispel any lingering doubts about the essential connectedness of the organization. As far back as 1972, in a paper entitled ‘‘Predictability: does the flap of a butterfly’s wings in Brazil set off a tornado in Texas?’’, MIT’s Lorenz cautioned meteorologists to temper the certainty of their weather forecasts. Using computer simulations, he was able to show that a small difference in an initial condition will ‘‘spread’’ through the system and eventually give rise to large differences in outcome. Not only did Lorenz (1972) succeed in overturning the scientistic assumption of predictability, he also established the butterfly as Chaos’ major icon by demonstrating an affirmative albeit qualified response to his experimental question: yes, the flapping of a butterfly in the rainforests of Brazil may indeed cause a cyclone to touch down in Texas. The duly named ‘‘butterfly effect’’ refers to the potential for (but not the certainty that) a tiny local disturbance in a system can amplify over time, eventually producing a system-wide effect of enormous proportions. Forgive the mixing of metaphors, but the butterfly’s flapping was the straw that breaks the camel’s back. Although the image of a butterfly in flight is most often invoked to illustrate the Chaos principle of indeterminacy (see introductory article), for our purposes

what is most significant about this dynamic is the fact that perturbations in initial conditions and a specific locality amplify throughout the entire system via the tapestry of connectivity comprising the whole. Consequently, it seems reasonable to conclude that the greater the strength of its connections, the greater the sustainability of the system. This is precisely what the late Canadian D.O. Hebb, regaled as the ‘‘Father of cognitive psychobiology’’, found in his explorations of the neuronal network of the brain. Hebb’s ‘‘rule’’ holds that whenever its elements are active together, a system is strengthened. When not, it is diminished. The implications of this fundamental tenet of systems dynamics for the enterprise are profound. Increased interaction among organizational members enhances the system’s resilience to flux in its environment, both internally and externally. Given the escalating turbulence of today’s business landscape, it only makes sense to rid the organization of the multiplicity of barriers to interaction that have been erected in keeping with the prescriptions of the control and command paradigm. According to conventional managerial wisdom, the path to certainty, constancy and control is one of fragmentation. By reducing the organization to its elementary parts, the possibility of interaction between agents that might otherwise serve to enhance the resilience and sustainability of the system is defeated (Fitzgerald, 1994). The weaker the connections in a system, the slower the rate at which information can be communicated, processed and acted on. In turn, as the flow of vital information is reduced, so too is the rate at which the organization can respond to the multitude of changes impinging on it. Consequently, the ultimate cost of the comforting illusion of control derived from the fragmentation of the system, is nothing less than the diminishment of organizational sustainability. The proclivity of conventional managers to make such a disastrous trade-off is reflected in their favored approach to organizational change: externally focused, short-term, reformative rather than transformational, localized problem-fixing strategies that rapidly fizzle out and rarely produce the outcomes desired. Owing to the diminished strength of a system in which its connectivity has been compromised, the benefits of interactivity and perturbation soon disappear (Lewin, 1992, p. 62). Such systems become ‘‘frozen’’, lacking sufficient connectivity to endure the turbulence and flux that are part and parcel of the contemporary business environment. From the Chaos perspective, connectivity is the key to a system’s ability to process new information, change in sync with its environment, and remain robust in the face of accelerating change and spiraling complexity. ASC is thus a prerequisite for managers and practitioners seeking to bring about the degree of systemic change mandated by the environment. This ability to perceive both the strong and the weak connections in the context of a complex system is nothing less than the key to success in the transformation of enterprise. Sensitivity to the nature of the connective tapestry comprising the organization

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enables one to identify systemic structures including both explicit policy and tacit values and beliefs that hinder requisite interactivity. While ASC is indeed a crucial capability of those responsible for the health of an organization, without the corollary sensitivity to the dynamics of personal relationships known as AIC, the value of one’s capacity to grasp the ‘‘big picture’’ is significantly reduced. Not only does AIC enable one to perceive the subtle nature of their relationships with others in a local context, but also it allows individuals to transcend the limitations of the ego-sense of being a separate being. In other words, people equipped with AIC begin to recognize themselves as integral to the greater whole which is none other than the unique system that has emerged from the relational dynamics of connectivity. As Lewin and Regine have so eloquently put it, ‘‘. . . from these interactions among individuals and teams emerge the company’s creativity, culture, and collective purpose’’ (2000, p. 41). Via AIC, one realizes that individuals only exist in relationship to others, and therefore, it is only through unrestrained interaction that meaning is generated for the use of both the individual and the system. Consequently, an invaluable by-product of this competency is the extent to which individuals accept, as integral members of a greater whole, responsibility for the effect of their personal actions. Together ASC and AIC comprise a duet of competencies required in the realization of an optimally connected enterprise – one in which the system’s surface is distinguished from the vast hidden realm of the ‘‘I’’ and the ‘‘We’’. By making this critical distinction and more importantly, by honoring the longneglected voice of the latter . . . at least as much as we value the tangible, measurable and concrete exterior, we liberate ourselves from the narcissistic, internally competitive, greed-driven structure of self-absorbed individualism informed by and entrenched in the ESP. Those who develop their capacity for ASC and AIC come to understand why relationships founded on the basis of mere self-gratification will never allow for the full potential of interaction to be realized. As individuals who are integral to a greater whole, people equipped with these competencies are able to evolve from the egocentricity displayed by their counterparts in a conventional system to a system-centric and eventually to a world-centric point of view. The dialogue imperative In order to grasp fully the nature of an optimally connected enterprise, an examination of the modes through which people interact in such a system is in order, particularly as they contrast to the typical styles of communication among people ensnared by the culture of narcissism that has given rise to the ESP. Owing to the proclivity of the latter to act in ways that put self-interest above relationship, communication among them is not really communication at all, at least in the deepest sense of the term. Since to commune means to form a unified whole, there is nothing unified or whole about members of a narcissistic organizational culture who tend to ‘‘interact’’ in a monological fashion, as if the

‘‘sender’’ were merely pouring information into an empty vessel that is the ‘‘receiver’’. In contrast, the primary form communication takes within an optimally connected system is known as dialogue. Interestingly enough, a highly developed level of AIC calls for participants in an interaction to discover ‘‘shared meaning’’ – the functional equivalent of mind reading, regarded with disdain by those lacking an awareness of connectivity. In the author’s experience, there is no more direct pathway to commonality of understanding than the process of dialogue. In contrast to discussion, the more common mode of organizational interaction, dialogue stands out as a generative process in which people are ‘‘not playing a game against each other, but with each other’’ (Bohm, 1990, p. 2). Through dialogue, individuals are able to connect with each other on a much higher order of consciousness where they may examine openly and aloud their own tacit assumptions, opinions, and interpretations of experience. By doing so, participants in the process come to share the content of the collective ‘‘mind’’ while at the same time, each is supported in recognizing the intrinsic incompleteness and in identifying the inaccuracies in their own thought. It is only through this process that such flaws can be corrected so that each is enabled to move beyond ‘‘self’’ into what Bohm has termed a ‘‘participatory consciousness’’ – the ultimate effect of optimal connectivity. Within organizations marked by such a communion of consciousness, the connections between self and other become so constitutive and enduring that no matter how virulent the ESP is in the external world, the chances of it taking hold within are virtually non-existent. The advantages of dialogue when adopted as an organization’s primary mode of communication are two-fold: first, it fosters relationships based on an awareness of personal interconnectedness, thus enhancing the operant level of accountability for the effects of individual actions and decisions. In other words, dialogical interaction supports ethical responsibility. Second, it attunes the members of the system to the fact that the whole (group, department, organization, etc.) is always greater than the sum of its parts. ‘‘There is the possibility for a transformation of the nature of consciousness, both individually and collectively . . . when we have this very high energy of coherence, it might bring us beyond just being a group. Such energy has been called communion’’ (Bohm, 1990, pp. 40-1). In summary then, we have examined in detail the nature of the conventional organization – a product of the culture of narcissism that has developed in the West as a result of scientistic thinking. In stark contrast, we have explored an image of what we have termed the optimally connected enterprise, and defined two fundamental competencies essential to its vibrancy and sustainability – awareness of system connectivity (ASC) and awareness of individual connectivity (AIC). In addition, primary modes of interaction common to each type of system, monologue and dialogue respectively, have been distinguished with the weight of value clearly on the latter. Throughout the discussion, every

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effort has been made to put forth a compelling rationale for embracing a wholly new ethic, one informed by the precepts and principles of Chaos. The system of accepted beliefs and principles of conduct . . . governing the behavior of individuals and the groups or organizations to which they belong proposed in this respect is the ethic of connectivity (EOC) to which we now turn our attention. The ethic of connectivity Up to this point, we have discussed the relationship between scientism and the onset of the ESP, the consequent dilemmas confronting organizations in their efforts to bring about change, as well as the benefits of increasing awareness of and attention to the inherent connectivity of the organization’s multiplicity of constituents. The author’s intent has been to establish the legitimacy of the mandate of the increasingly turbulent global marketplace for the advancement of enterprise to a higher order of thinking and being. If that is indeed the case, it becomes incumbent upon those managers and practitioners who hope to lead their organizations to a larger perspective of reality, to fashion an ethic that better reflects the reality perceived through the Chaos lens. While it may seem to some that the process of replacing the prevailing ESP with a new and more fitting ethical code would be as easy as announcing a ‘‘policy’’ of normative behavior, it is not at all that simple. Assuming that one’s ethics are inexorably intertwined with their operant view of reality, we may safely conclude that an evolution of ethical reasoning is intricately tied to a concurrent evolution of consciousness. According to Kohlberg (1981), people at the conventional stage of moral development tend to be oriented to social norms and are judged by others at that level in terms of compliance. In contrast, those who have attained the post-conventional stage are characterized by behaviors that can be evaluated according to normative standards based on principles. Accordingly, in order for an ethic of a higher order to be inculcated in the context of the organization, the principle(s) underlying it must first be acknowledged, grasped and integrated into the thinking of a critical mass of participants in the enterprise. In this respect, one would have to search far and wide to find a more apt ideology than that articulated in the Chaos precept of connectivity. The author thus proposes to transcend the alienating ramifications of the ESP by learning to embrace the EOC. The EOC would comprise a fundamental organizing principle for the enterprise – one that informs both individual and collective behavior oriented toward the recognition and honoring of the inalienable unity of the subjective (interior) and objective (exterior) realms of a system so long regarded as dual, at least insofar as the former was acknowledged at all. Since we have already covered the ground of the ongoing fragmentation of human experience into the separate categories of the ‘‘real’’ nature of the universe, i.e. physically concrete, material entities, and the ethereal, metaphysical stuff of the mind that appears to lack any real existence, we will not ad lib any further. However, it is important to bear in mind the fact that Chaos has

made so abundantly clear: The apparently distinct realms of being – interior and exterior – are inextricably bound in the indivisible whole of the relationship. Furthermore, the source of both is consciousness as defined by the ‘‘new science’’, which works with directionality from within to without. Ergo, the EOC is presented here as an ethic of relationship, recognizing no boundary between self and other. In the following discussion of this principle of moral action, we will explore its theoretical and philosophical foundations as well as some practical suggestions for facilitating the integration of this ethic into the organizational mind. From a philosophical point of view, the existence and too often the threat of ‘‘other’’ has been a fundamental component of human experience for thousands of years. As has been shown, the advancement of science has only exacerbated the conception of self as separate and apart from other, illustrated by the fact that ego-centered as opposed to community-oriented cultures have taken hold in the West where modern science makes its home. The strong inclination of the denizens of such cultures to act in ways that favor self to the disadvantage of other is a phenomenon that does not refute the principle of connectivity, but rather confirms it. The very fact that the actions of one inevitably affects the other, regardless of the perception of separateness maintained by the two individuals, attests to the inseparable nature of their connection. Furthermore, one may consider the human proclivity to act in ways meant to distinguish self from other as separate and independent beings as evidence of an ontological propensity to actually reify the connection of self and other: people who genuinely regard themselves as distinct beings possessing an independent existence would be unlikely to experience love or hate, attraction or fear, nor any other reaction for that matter, whether mental, emotional or physical, toward another. Owing to the utter impossibility of extricating the self from the vast tapestry of relationship, one’s refusal to acknowledge the absoluteness of connectivity is nothing less than the hallmark of ignorance. Since one’s reaction to other, irrespective of its nature, belies the presumption that ‘‘I am I and you are you and never the twain will meet’’, realization of the same is a prerequisite for advancing to the next stage in the ongoing process of ethical development. Those who rise to that plane have transcended the egoistic drive to evaluate, utilize, control and possess the other, and so begin to awaken to the reality of a greater whole encompassing all beings. Unfortunately, this recognition does not occur in the space of a single moment: rather, once people have successfully surpassed the egocentric plane of moral development, they initially become group-centric. Whether the bounds of their reference group encircle their family, their race, religion or gender, or their nation, their perception of the world remains fragmented: rather than the me/you split, the us/them schism comes into being. Witness the deadly feud of the Hatfields and the McCoys in the hills of Kentucky (familial-centricity), the horror of ethnic cleansing in the Balkans (ethnocentricity), or even the ‘‘war on

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terrorism’’ which has proceeded on the assertion of the US president that ‘‘either you’re with us or you’re against us’’ (nationalism). Certainly, group-centric moral reasoning is far more advantageous to the organization seeking to sustain itself in a world of uncertainty and flux than that which is directed by the ego-self due to the fact that through the process of embracing other as self, the ‘‘We’’ is formed. Nevertheless, even the handful of organizations that evidence an abiding sense of togetherness in practice, and not just in the popular language of ‘‘teamwork’’, cannot compare to the vitality and robustness of a system comprised of those who have ascended the plane in their moral evolution that affords them a world-centric view of reality. It is from this order of consciousness that the EOC ripens into the sin qua non of moral codes. In this light, the EOC cannot be regarded as some contrived ideal impossible to attain. Of course, the path to a higher order of moral development is not without its potholes, some of which are daunting. However, the good news is that what is sought at its end, that is the makings for a vibrant and engaging culture of collaboration, is already there. After all, Chaos assures us that connectivity is the natural order of being in the universe: the very fact of connectivity predisposes any act or behavior to always fall in the realm of ethics. If people were not bound with each other in relationship, rendering each vulnerable to the actions of others, the very concept of ethics could not exist. To speak of the ‘‘ethical’’ is to imply the principle of connectivity. Those who see the world through the lens ground from Chaos come to know this as the very nature of nature itself. Such a knowing can lend support to and in turn be supported by the culture of ‘‘we-ness’’ or even better by a world-centric context which gives rise to the ethic of EOC. Levinas (1961, p. 79) has referred to the resulting relationship of person to person as the ‘‘. . . primacy of an irreducible structure upon which all other structures rest.’’ Given that this quintessential fundament of connectivity is and has always been right there in front of us existing in the form of a metaphysical principle underpinning human ‘‘being’’ and relating, we can rest assured that those who acknowledge it are predisposed to act ethically. The question then becomes not whether enacting the EOC to any great extent in the context of a complex organization is even possible, but rather how to awaken its members to a much greater and more encompassing sense of being – a self-sense that assuredly transcends the puny construct of the ego so preoccupied with erecting boundaries on reality in an effort to protect and defend what is ‘‘me and mine’’ from what is ‘‘you and yours’’. The EOC informs a transcendent way of being in the world . . . one guided by the unassailable fact of the oneness of self and other, of exteriors and interiors, of the subjective and the objective. Although one cannot ‘‘know’’ it and not heed its call, many already ‘‘know of’’ it and yet have failed to translate it into practice. In their increasingly frantic search for resolution of the mounting problems of conflict, fraud, embezzlement, alienation, treachery, theft, insubordination, violence . . . the list goes on and on, evidenced by

employees at all levels of the system as well as by customers, suppliers, and even accounting firms, e.g. Arthur Andersen’s role in the collapse of Enron, practitioners have never wanted for expert advice. Although the gurus of management may claim to represent a unique ‘‘fix’’, a review of their prescriptions reveals a commonality: call it what you will – teambuilding, shared visioning, group dynamics, self-organizing systems, team-based structures, communication skills, etc., it all boils down to the criticality of connections. Yet, in spite of its abundance, few who have taken the time to peruse this sage wisdom have taken the next step of putting it into practice. Ergo, it is fair to say they ‘‘know of’’ but don’t ‘‘know’’ the EOC. The likelihood that the EOC will ultimately prevail over and replace the currently pervasive ESP may be enhanced not by mandating a code of behavior, but rather allowing what is real, what suffuses the interior, what already exists to emerge. The term ‘‘allowing’’ is used here specifically in acknowledgement of the tendency of people in power, i.e. managers, to unwittingly diminish the vitality of their systems through the imposition of rules, regulations, policies, procedures and structures aimed at the establishment of control. By doing so, the potential for optimal connectivity is essentially disallowed. Thus, it becomes clear that another way of managing is called for . . . one that is conducive to nurturing relationships throughout the system. Although there may be a variety of avenues to fostering the emergence of the EOC and its subsequent practice in the organizational context, there are four primary strategies that bear consideration. The first adheres to the necessity of heightening awareness of Chaos in general and the principle and implications of connectivity in particular. The second involves the integration of dialogical methods of interaction through which people can more easily attain to higher orders of consciousness. The remaining two call for the establishment of practitioner accountability for the methods employed in their work, as well as the design and institution of structures that support and reinforce norms congruent with the principle of connectivity. The author holds that at a minimum, these four components of a change process are essential to the successful fruition of the EOC. As mentioned above in the section describing the fundamental competencies of relationship, the first ‘‘step’’ toward integrating a system-wide appreciation of the deep meaning of the principle of connectivity is taken when the a glimpse through the Chaos lens is offered to, rather than imposed on, the members of the organization. By supporting with skillful facilitation those who venture to ‘‘look’’ through the lens, the reality of the inexorable connectivity of every being can be slowly but surely comprehended by the individual, and eventually by the mind of the organization. Once the nature of connectedness becomes part and parcel of one’s social and cognitive understanding of the world, the groundwork has been laid from which the EOC may more readily arise. Various activities such as seminars, conferences, discussion groups, the dissemination of books and articles, and training in interpersonal

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communication have all proven effective as ways to bring the principle underpinning the EOC to the attention of individuals. As an added benefit, a language that supports this new way of thinking can be more easily integrated into the lexicon of the organization. The key objective of this consciousness-raising process is to stretch the boundaries of thought currently enveloping and thereby limiting people in their ability to recognize the essential inextricability of their connections with others and the world around them. Once individuals rise to this plane of awareness, a window through which to contemplate the moral reasoning process as it occurs is opened to them – a window affording the opportunity to those who look to experience the reality of connectivity directly. The second avenue to establishing the EOC in the organizational mind is based in the presupposition that one’s operant level of moral development is always on par with the order of consciousness they have attained. In other words, ethical reasoning that takes the interests of other into account will be virtually non-existent in individuals who experience reality from the confines of the personal ego, e.g. the child who takes a toy from another by force if necessary, to satisfy her personal desire for it. Perhaps a more relevant example would be the spate of corporate executives who finagle a huge bonus, as the company they’re responsible for slides into bankruptcy. Since it is self-interest and self-absorption that undermines the ethical responsibility each of us has to the other, success in transcending the ego-self in order to create a vibrant and sustainable culture of connectedness depends on our mutual progress in ascending the ‘‘ladder of consciousness’’. Once a critical mass of organizational members succeed in rising to ever-higher orders of consciousness, the more encompassing and inclusive EOC will begin to manifest. Although thereafter there will be no going back to the suffocating prison of self-preservation, the question still remains as to how this journey of transcendence can be nurtured in the egocentric context of contemporary culture. It is most certain that such an undertaking cannot be mandated, but rather can be consciously chosen by each who sets out on the road to higher consciousness. As the old saw goes, you can lead a horse to water, but you cannot make it drink. Recognizing this truism, there is nothing more likely to attract people to the ‘‘window on consciousness’’ from where a leap to a higher order of seeing, thinking, knowing and being in the world can be either chosen or declined than the powerful mode of conversation called dialogue. The transformative potential of dialogical interaction lies in the direction of the participant’s gaze. In comparison to ordinary bouts of verbal communication in which the focus is placed squarely on subject matter existing ‘‘out there’’ and therefore as other, the attention of those who have encountered each other in dialogue is drawn within. Through a sustained process of self-reflection, participants are able to generate a flow of profound meaning shared among them. This shared meaning arising from the within of each party to the conversation, is none other than the common within of the entire group – its interiority.

Owing to the likelihood that newcomers to the experience of dialogue will initially and frequently revert to the more familiar monological and externally focused modes of interaction, skillful third-party facilitation of dialogue ‘‘practice session’’ is highly recommended. The reader may recall the premise offered earlier that the egoistic conviction of separateness and self-primacy is further reified through monologically-based interaction wherein other is never afforded the opportunity to challenge the flaws in or incompleteness of a speaker’s thinking. Without the guidance of an incisive facilitator, people having their first experience of dialogue are likely to regress rather than advance on their journey to higher consciousness. While monologues in the form of ‘‘. . . reason speaking in the first person that is not addressed to the ‘other’ . . .’’ as a participant in conversation, e.g. the oneway act of lecturing a class, can be invaluable in conveying information effectively and efficiently, this mode of interaction will play a diminishing role in the lives of people who have become aware of the power of dialogue to enhance the connectedness of self and other, and at the same time, to transport both up the ladder of consciousness (Levinas, 1961, p. 72). Because dialogue presupposes connectivity, the dialogical encounter thus serves as the ground from which the EOC can be fully enacted. In addition to the strategies proposed for raising awareness of connectivity and rising to higher orders of consciousness, a word must be said about the responsibility managers and practitioners must bear for the techniques and methodologies they employ in interventions aimed at bringing about organizational change and development. Given what is known about the pervasive encroachment of the ESP in Western enterprise, as well as the imperative that the absolute connectivity of existence be acknowledged, one can no longer afford to endorse and enact approaches, methods, or tools that reinforce the destructive illusion of self-primacy. In order to counteract its influence, it becomes incumbent upon those who attempt to apply any of the vast range of change technologies available to the modern practitioner to do so only after a rigorous assessment of its congruency with the EOC. A partial list of questions to be explored would include: Does this technique reinforce self-centeredness or other egoistic tendencies? Are we running the risk of giving more credence to observable behavior than to the interior realm of being? Will this tool have the effect of inhibiting the individual or discounting their uniqueness and/or contribution to the organization? Is this methodology facilitative of dialogical interaction? Does this approach serve to enhance or detract from the operant level of awareness of connectivity? Will this program optimize the chances for creativity and innovation? How will this initiative contribute to the emergence and integrity of a sense of ‘‘WE’’? Finally, there is the broad-ranging issue of organizational architecture: at the risk of portraying the organization as an object to be manipulated and controlled, which it is most definitely not, the term architecture is used here simply to convey the image of an overarching pattern suffusing the whole system. According to the central maxim of systemic architecture, every

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organization is perfectly designed to produce the results it does. Organizations that have been fashioned to encourage interaction, communication, participation, and creative integration among their members will generate a resilient network of relationships that extends beyond the boundaries of the system per se reaching out into its customer base and to the larger environment as well. In contrast, organizational structures built on the narcissistic culture of selfishness and greed underpinning the ESP are bound to emit a pathological pattern of behavior that ultimately poisons the relationships that are the life blood of the enterprise. To repeat: every organization is perfectly designed to produce the results it does. If the behavioral patterns generated by the system are conducive to the establishment and integration of the EOC, then this last recommendation can be safely by-passed. However, as is more likely the case given the rarity of enterprises founded in Chaos and its core principle of connectivity, the results produced in terms of the vitality, strength and resilience of ethical-governed relationships leave much to be desired. If that were the case, then one’s best recourse is to design the system anew. Make no mistake: no mere shuffling of the boxes on the ‘‘orgchart’’ will do. Nor will even the most radical ‘‘re-engineering’’ intervention. If the objective is to transcend the ESP, the current structure in which it is entrenched must be transcended as well. To design the organization anew is to envision a superbly robust, highly sustainable and optimally connected system as it would appear through the lens of Chaos. And that clearly requires that managers and practitioners, who on behalf of their organizations aspire to attain the higher order of moral governance known as the EOC, must begin by embracing the principles of Chaos and enacting them in their daily lives. Conclusions If we are to heed the increasingly desperate call of those seeking meaning, purpose, and fulfillment in their work lives, we can no longer rely on simplistic explanations of the exceedingly complex issues facing us in this new millennium. The conventional wisdom founded on the tacit assumptions of modern science has been the chief carrier of the simplification of reality achieved through the violence of fragmentation and reductionism. Nevertheless, today a window of opportunity to escape the scourge of such scientism has opened to us all. Chaos now offers us a coherent and penetrating perspective on the inexorable and intelligent oneness of existence. Those willing and ready pioneers of organizational change and development who dare to see their world through its lens are empowered to transform their systems to ever-higher orders of ethical being. Chaos allows one to see more clearly the dysfunctionality of the emergent properties of conventional systems, the pervasive obsession with control, an enduring preoccupation with the details, and most pertinently the ESP itself, to name but a few. In addition, it reveals the fact that all ‘‘things’’ are connected in one vast tapestry of reality. Even the seemingly separate events of past,

present, and future do not escape the reach of connectedness as illustrated through the metaphor known as the ‘‘butterfly effect’’ – the process through which a butterfly flapping its wings in China causes a change in the weather days later in London that would not have occurred had the winged insect not taken flight. It is by gazing at the world of enterprise through the Chaos lens that managers and practitioners can come to terms with the costly history of failure marking their efforts to create complex business systems that thrive in chaos. By illuminating the fact of connectivity as the essence and creative force in our dynamically complex non-linear systems, Chaos demonstrates how and why the oft-ignored organizational interior is the effect source of its surface manifested in patterns of behavior, performance and growth. Most importantly in terms of the purpose of this article, Chaos elucidates an integral set of precepts from which a new ethic transcending the ESP can emerge and take root in the minds and hearts of all. References Axelrod, R. (1984), The Evolution of Cooperation, Basic Books, New York, NY. Bohm, D. (1990), On Dialogue, Routledge, London. Deet, S. (1992), Democracy in an Age of Corporate Colonization, State University of New York Press, Albany, NY. Fitzgerald, L.A. (1994), Organizations and Other Things Fractal: A Primer on Chaos for Agents of Change, The Consultancy, Denver, CO. Foucault, M. (1977), Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison, Random House, New York, NY. Habermas, J. (1987), The Theory of Communicative Action (Volume Two) Lifeworld and System: A Critique of Functionalist Reason, Beacon Press, Boston, MA. Kohlberg, L. (1981), Essays on World Development: Volume I & II, San Francisco, CA. Lasch, C. (1979), The Culture of Narcissism: American Life in an Age of Diminishing Expectations, WW Norton & Company, New York, NY. Levinas, E. (1961), Totality and Infinity, Duquesne University Press, Pittsburgh, PA. Lewin, R. (1992), Complexity: Life at the Edge of Chaos, The University of Chicago Press, Chicago, IL. Lewin, R. and Regine, B. (2000), The Soul at Work, Simon & Schuster, New York, NY. Lorenz, E. (1972), ‘‘Predictability: does the flap of a butterfly’s wings in Brazil set off a tornado in Texas?’’, paper presented at the AAAs Convention of the Global Atmospheric Research Program, MIT, Cambridge, MA, 29 December. Rose, N. (1998), Inventing Our Selves: Psychology, Power, and Personhood, Cambridge University, Cambridge. Wilber, K. (1995), Sex, Ecology and Sprituality, Shambhala Publications, Boston, MA. Wilber, K. (2000a), A Theory of Everything, Shambhala Publications, Boston, MA. Wilber, K. (2000b), A Brief History of Everything, Shambhala Publications, Boston, MA. Further reading Cilliers, P. (1998), Complexity and Postmodernism, Routledge, London. Wilber, K. (1998), The Marriage of Sense and Soul, Broadway Books, New York, NY.

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E.C. Hoogerwerf and Anne-Marie Poorthuis

Netwerkimpuls, Kortenhoef and Deventer, Submitted October 2001 Revised February 2002 Keywords Networks, Organization, Connecting, Chaos Accepted March 2002

The Netherlands

Abstract The subject of this article is a novel new approach to organizing called the network multilogue. Begins with a brief overview of the theoretical underpinnings of the process of network organizing. The conceptual model the authors hope to build through this exploration will feature three primary angles of perception informed by the chaos principles of Connectivity, Indeterminacy and Consciousness in that order. By bearing in mind these fundamental concepts and the provocative image of a networking organization, the description of network multiloguing that follows will enable one to more easily grasp how network organizing can be made integral to the crucial process of organizational design.

Journal of Organizational Change Management, Vol. 15 No. 4, 2002, pp. 382-390. # MCB UP Limited, 0953-4814 DOI 10.1108/09534810210433683

The networking organization Network organizing is a distinctive approach to designing a system for optimal sustainability in a world fraught with uncertainty, turbulence and discontinuous change not unlike the circumstances of the new millennium. Through this highly generative process, the individuals comprising an organization are able to give form to the content of their collective consciousness as a self-ordering unity – a network of minds operating as one. One can consider the art of network organizing to have been mastered when every participant in a system is afforded virtually complete freedom and autonomy, while at the same time exquisitely complex patterns of action continuously arise from their dynamical interaction. We offer a model for a networking organization that is composed of two concentric triangles wherein the outermost represents the larger context in which the system resides while the inner triangle stands for the internal processes of perception and interpretation . . . in other words, the psyche of the system. Alternatively, one can think of the former as the organizational landscape and the latter as the organizational mind, or ‘‘orgmind’’ for short. The intent of this simple configuration is to illustrate the nature of a networking organization from three distinct but nevertheless integral viewpoints or perspectival ‘‘angles’’: the angle of connectivity, the angle of indeterminacy, and the angle of consciousness. It is important to note that it is no coincidence that this trio share the names of the primary principles of Chaos. We intend to make the reasons for the use of these terms clear in the following paragraphs. In the meantime, we will begin with the namesake of the Chaos precept that speaks to the indivisible oneness of the universe. From the angle of connectivity, the networking organization is regarded as an integral aspect of an infinite whole taking in the limitless universe. Although this is admittedly a rather sweeping concept, nevertheless it may be

contrasted with the common reductionist perception of an enterprise as an independent entity existing for its own purposes within the boundaries of its own walls. Owing to the imperative that one sees the world through the Chaos lens, members of a networking organization are unlikely to be overwhelmed by the vastness of the concept of universal connectivity whereas those who do not will inevitably fail to thrive in such a system. In practice, chaordic thinkers recognize the boundary between, for instance, the organization and its market as a conceptual tool for making distinctions as opposed to an a priori reality. In other words, boundaries do not so much separate as connect. By comparing a conventional system with a networking organization, it becomes apparent that the former occurs in two primary forms consistent with the extent to which the angle of connectivity has evolved. In a system that has not yet developed beyond the ethos of egocentricity, narcissistic individualism reigns. Its members conceive of themselves as separate persons operating independently of all others and most certainly from the greater organization. Owing to the selfserving character of those who are prone to act on the basis of an analysis of ‘‘what’s in it for me?’’ applied repeatedly as they go about their business, organizations of this nature inevitably implode unless an extensive arrangement of stringent mechanisms of control have been put in place. The stunning collapse of the energy infrastructure services giant Enron serves to illustrate the point. A second and more evolved form found among conventional systems is one in which the plurality of its members have succeeded in extending the primary boundary from the personal ‘‘I’’ to the collective ‘‘us’’. To some extent, individuals begin to see that their best interests are served when the interests of the greater whole are served. What distinguishes one such person from another is the extent of their concept of the ‘‘greater whole’’. For some, that might entail ‘‘me and my work team’’ while others are able to conceive of the entire enterprise as the whole of which they are part. Organizations founded on the ethos of ‘‘teamwork’’ (in practice and not just in name) fall into this second category. While the need for extensive oversight so crucial to the continuing existence of an egocentric system is significantly reduced in the team-centric form, control in any conventional sense of the term is essentially redundant in the networking organization. This is not to say that anarchy reigns in such a system. In fact, since it is incumbent upon the members of a networking organization to see the world through the Chaos lens, the emergence of exquisitely complex order from the interaction of a multiplicity of autonomous agents acting in the context of virtually complete freedom is only natural. Why natural? Simply because those who have adopted as their own the angle of connectivity thus recognize themselves as integral aspects of a unity, whether that be universal or localized in the form of an enterprise. As long as participants in a system see the world that way, they will as the saying goes ‘‘think globally and act locally’’ thus eliminating the necessity of imposing the myriad artificial mechanisms of control so essential to the sustainability of the conventional organization. In the networking organization, all control is selfcontrol informed by the principle of connectivity. And a good thing that is given that the modern world is characterized by escalating complexity, mounting uncertainties and increasing turbulence. The

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second major angle of perspective is that of indeterminacy – the seemingly paradoxical notion propounded by Chaos that although reality abides by the universal law of causation, at best knowledge of the effect of any particular cause is an approximation (in mathematical terms, a statistical probability) and never a fact that can be known in advance. In other words, we live in a causative world, the future of which from the next moment on is indeterminate. Once again, one can compare and contrast the nature of a conventional enterprise with that of a networking organization specifically from the angle of indeterminacy. The former remain heirs of the legacy of Newtonian concepts of time and causation, i.e. that time is comprised of three separate but related ‘‘parts’’ including the past and the future in addition to the present, and that causation is linear extending from the past to the present and then to the future. The implications of this way of conceptualising reality in terms of the approach taken in the management of complex systems are both obvious and odious . . . at least to those who view the world through the Chaos lens. Managers and practitioners who fragment personal experience as well as organizational history into the separate and distinct compartments of past, present and future find it necessary to link each with the next with a deterministic notion of the cause-effect sequence. In other words, they are prone not only to make but also act upon the unwarranted presupposition that given sufficient knowledge of current conditions, the future is rendered predictable . . . with increasing specificity no less as computational power continues to grow . . . and therefore subject to control and manipulation. Consider the typical ratio of the amount of time and expense organizations managed from this perspective spend on planning efforts with the degree to which they are ‘‘successfully’’ implemented. It becomes clear that there is something amiss in our conventional understanding of time, cause and their relationship. We propose that deficiency to be none other than the failure to grasp the Chaos principle of indeterminacy – ignorance that is and must be dispelled in order to create and realize the networking organization. In these extra-ordinary systems, it would be unusual to find anyone who would assert that a choice of future results is available at any given point in time. Given the fixity of cause at the moment – a cause that remains unknown and unknowable until it is revealed in a manifest effect – to hold that there is a choice of effects in a straight-line extension of the causative continuum would be regarded as an insult to intelligence. Although those who have donned the Chaos lens know full well that one may speculate on and infer what the initial cause of any particular occurrence may have been, they spend very little time in such reflection since whatever knowledge might be gained is essentially useless in ascertaining the ‘‘correct’’ next move. As Chaos makes exceedingly clear, ours is an indeterminate world governed by the inexorable law of causation in which past, present and future are enfolded into the totality of Now. Furthermore as one sees clearly from the angle of connectivity, all that occurs must necessarily arise from a total movement in which each individual is but one ‘‘I-center’’ of perception, action and reaction. To accept these facts is to empower oneself to act with utmost confidence, courage and integrity whether one belongs to a conventional

enterprise or enjoys the opportunity to participate in a networking organization. Nevertheless, comprehension of the principles of connectivity and indeterminacy is necessary but is not a sufficient condition to enable one to truly thrive in the midst of growing turbulence and flux. In addition, what is called for is a grasp of the implications of consciousness in the complex process of designing a complex, dynamical modern business system. According to the Chaos principle of the same name, everything is in its essence consciousness; everything arises from the movement of consciousness; and every ‘‘thing’’ proceeds along a trajectory to ever-higher orders of consciousness. So what then is this consciousness of which we speak? And more relevantly, what does it have to do with the distinctive design process we call network multiloguing? That after all, is the primary subject of this paper. As such, a concise response to the first question should provide a framework through which to grasp the answer to the second. The reader is assured that an explanation of consciousness will be provided in much richer detail elsewhere in this journal. We begin by noting that the consummately esoteric notion of consciousness has and will continue to perplex even the greatest of scientific minds at least that is, until those who seek to understand the quintessential nature of reality have donned the lens of Chaos. In the meantime and for our purposes, the most pertinent aspect of its first principle is that organizations of any kind, both conventional and networking, are the ultimate products of the collective thinking/ feeling/perceiving/believing of all the individuals comprising them. The primary distinction in this regard then between the conventional systems predominating the business landscape, and the rare few networking organizations is simply this: participants in the former are unaware of having brought the very entity they believe they ‘‘work for or in’’ into existence through the continuous movement of consciousness. Members of a networking system are aware. Figuratively speaking, there are three levels of mind: (1) individual mind denoted by the lower-case; (2) organizational mind comprising the collective consciousness of every individual within the bounds of a given system ranging from for instance, a family to a nation; and (3) mind (upper-case) comprising ‘‘the fundamental groundstate, the essence, as well as the omega point of the universe’’ (Fitzgerald, 1996). Although our focus will be on the intermediary plane we will refer to as ‘‘orgmind’’, mind at all levels can be understood as the expression of the universal totality. The orgmind is ever in motion, conceiving thoughts and feelings, shaping desires, assembling plans, evaluating experience interpreting perceptions, and initiating actions. As such, the collective consciousness of the organization can be regarded as the causal body manifesting in the subtle body of thought, the building block of the phenomenal universe. In other words, consciousness gives rise to thought that in turn manifests in the familiar form known as the organization. Because the chaordic thinkers composing the networking enterprise are cognizant of the genesis of their system, they realize that the quality of its

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design is inexorably tied to their operant degree of mindfulness – the degree of attention paid to the perpetual movement of their orgmind. The greater the awareness of the constant stream of concepts, images, feelings, beliefs, assumptions, values, judgments – in short, all the flotsam and jetsam in the stream of conscious contained in the orgmind, the more likely a vital and sustainable design will result. In contrast, conventional systems are inevitably sub-optimized due to the prevalence of mindlessness among its members. Furthermore, organizations of this genre tend to be plagued with frustration arising from the inevitable disappointment of human hopes and expectations. Consider the case of the numerous executives who invested time, energy and a great deal of money on ‘‘re-engineering’’ initiatives with hopes of boosting performance, productivity, and most importantly profitability. Critics have suggested a 10 per cent success rate for this thoroughly mechanistic change initiative, a figure that seems rather generous. Even so, those who see the world through the Chaos lens would be unlikely to attribute the failure of reengineering to the intervention per se, but rather to the managers and practitioners who bought into it or any other change program that fails to take into account the content and workings of the orgmind – a prerequisite for convening the generative process of network multiloguing. The network multilogue Derived from the Russian conference method known as ‘‘open gaming’’ developed in large part by Andrey Zaitsev and Tatjana Artemova in the early 1990s at the Kaluga Institute of Sociology, a network multilogue (NWM) is an emerging methodology which plays out in the context of a conference of two to three days in length, and involves anywhere from a dozen up to 35 or so participants. Although it is not essential that participation be limited to members of a given organization, for our purposes the intra-organizational version will be the focus of the following discussion. The reader is asked to bear in mind that our objective here is not to provide a ‘‘recipe’’ for a NWM, but to point out its basic ingredients. In brief, NWM begins with the establishment of a common theme that will be studied from the three primary angles of perspective introduced above. Based on the resulting exploration, a script of questions is addressed in a number of rounds of inquiry by participants who have been sub-divided into smaller groups. Finally, the knowledge and insights generated during the conference are translated into applicable form in the ‘‘real world’’ outside the context of the NWM. This unique process proceeds through three major phases: (1) preparation; (2) multilogue proper; and (3) application. Phase 1 – preparation Prior to convening the NWM, a number of tasks are carried out by its sponsors, most commonly managers, practitioners and on occasion, three or four potential participants. Together they decide how to invite and select

participants, the schedule, facility, logistics of the session, room arrangements, and most pertinently, the overarching theme given that the success of the NWM is highly dependent on the selection of one that is compelling, thoughtprovoking and relevant to the current situation that the system and its members face. For instance, the authors facilitated multilogues addressing the topics of ‘‘social responsibility’’, ‘‘transcending organizational boundaries’’, and ‘‘what do we want to become’’. Regardless of the chosen theme, each activity in the conference is structured to support the overall focus. With respect to selection of participants, the objective is to involve only those who: . have a stake in their organization’s future; . demonstrate a strong attraction to the theme; and . volunteer their time and effort.

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It is essential that senior management participates along with people representing as many levels and functions as feasible. Diversity in the make-up of the conference attendees is the goal. The invitation extended to all potential participants should include a clear and concise definition of the conference theme as well as a general description of the NWM process. Our preference for a conference facility is one with a single room large enough to offer a modicum of privacy for the deliberations of sub-groups while at the same time, serving as a symbol of the connectivity of the entire group (Figure 1). Within this room is a common area as well as distinct corners for subgroup work, and a focal point where participants can present their conclusions. Note: Although participants generally sub-divide into three

Figure 1. Network multilogue room arrangment

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groups – one for each angle of perspective – the graphic depicting the meeting room arrangement includes additional space for the deliberations of a fourth grouping that has been pre-defined by the conference hosts. For instance, they may elect to explore the angle of perspective informed by Chaos’ ‘‘twin’’ principles of emergence and dissipation.

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Phase 2 – NWM proper The conference begins when its sponsors, including members of the preparation committee, welcome participants who are seated at tables in the room’s common area, and express their appreciation for the time and energy each is about to contribute in the multilogue about to commence. A number of ‘‘ground rules’’ are then made clear, the most important of which is that the conference is not about finding and solving problems. It is rather, a valuable opportunity to collaborate in the design and realization of an organization far more robust than the current one, an optimally-sustainable networking organization highly suited for the turbulence and flux of the modern world. There are five major segments of the multilogue, each lasting up to three hours. The first and typically the shortest is the acquaintance process in which participants share their interpretation of the conference theme in addition to specifics about who they are, the nature of their work, and their reasons for participating in the NWM. The importance of this initial round should not be underestimated; although it is crucial to establish a spirit of camaraderie, trust and cooperation from the outset of the gathering, it is even more critical that participants realize shared meaning of the theme they are about to explore. Various interpretations are best brought forward and worked out during the early hours of the conference and prior to disassembling into subgroups. The second phase involves the participants in generating an inquiry script (a list of open-ended questions) to guide their deliberations once they are subdivided into smaller groups, each associated with a specific angle of perception. In almost every NWM script, at least three basic questions are found: (1) What are the boundaries and/or limitations of (insert theme)? (2) How can (insert theme) be realized? (3) What will (insert theme) mean to you personally? Depending on available time, additional queries may certainly be added. At the conclusion of this segment of the process, the subgroups are formed: who joins which depends on the individual participant’s interest in exploring the theme from the perspective of one of the three primary angles. Since these subgroupings will essentially stay together for the remainder of the conference, it is helpful for the newly formed groups to ‘‘customize’’ the overall theme of the conference in an expression of particular relevance to the angle of perspective they are about to explore. To illustrate, imagine that the theme of choice has been defined as ‘‘doing business chaordically’’. In other words, how might things be if every member of the enterprise were to don the lens of Chaos? In this case, the group pursuing the angle of connectivity might adopt the specialized topic of ‘‘strengthening relationships among the system’s

stakeholders’’ while the indeterminacy subgroup simultaneously explores the issue of ‘‘dealing with uncertainty and discontinuity’’. At the same time, the consciousness subgroup may be working on ‘‘ways to optimize mindfulness’’. In the subsequent activity, each group delves as deeply as possible in the time allowed into a specific question drawn from the inquiry script while working from the angle of perspective that initially attracted its members. To illustrate, recall our imaginary case: if the question in focus is ‘‘What does doing business chaordically mean for you?’’ examined from the angle of indeterminacy, some possible responses might include: preparing for surprise, letting go of plans and procedures as definitive ‘‘rules’’ for acting, and/or accepting responsibility for my role in producing the consequences of joint action. This phase plays out in several rounds depending on the extent of the script in which each is focused on the investigation of a single question. At the conclusion, each group presents its findings to a plenary of all participants. During the fourth segment of the process, each of the subgroups engages in an exercise in which they generate from the perspective of their chosen angle a list of concrete ideas about what may be possible in practice in their workaday world. Following through with the illustration cited above, the subgroup for the connectivity angle may identify such activities as removing or ameliorating departmental boundaries, replacing individual performance appraisals with work group assessments, or even eliminating job descriptions. Once again, the results produced by each of the subgroups are shared in a plenary session. The fifth and final segment of multiloguing proper involves asking the full body of participants to reflect on what they have learned and to make three lists of ‘‘next steps’’: actions each is willing to personally commit to, actions their departmental or functional area should consider, and actions affecting the entire system and therefore requiring the endorsement and leadership of senior management. These action lists are synthesized according to type: individual actions are retained by their creators for personal use, functional lists are made available to the department in question for further consideration, while the whole-system action proposals become the subject matter of an intensive workshop held immediately after the network multilogue. Ideally, this critical dialogue would have been put on the schedules of the organization’s leadership prior to initiating the conference by its hosts. Phase 3 – application The action proposals generated at the conclusion of the network multilogue conference comprise the content of this final phase of the network organizing process. Of course, it is impossible to predict the nature of the process as it unfolds with any specific organizational context. Even so, it is essential that in addition to the departmental and senior management workshops, a working session involving the full membership of the sponsoring committee is held approximately two or three days after the network multilogue. Given the overall purpose of debriefing the experience, it is highly recommended that both the principles and practice of network organizing be invoked in this follow-up session. In other words, a new network multilogue is convened in which the overall theme is ‘‘the value of NWM in our organization’’. It is not

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only possible, but also advisable to involve in this experience other members of the system, e.g. department managers who will be asked to consider the functional action proposals produced in the initial conference, even if they were not present in that session. Conclusions It has been our intent throughout this discussion to not only present a compelling rationale for adopting the approach to organizing presented herein, but also delineate the major landmarks found along a path through which the networking organization may be realized in practice in the ‘‘real’’ world of business. Whether or not we succeed in fulfilling this dual purpose will depend less on our ability to put forth sufficient detail of theory and/or practice, and more on the reader’s willingness to experience directly the abundant advantages of network multiloguing as an ongoing and highly fluid approach to designing sustainable organizational systems capable of thriving in the most turbulent of environments. As far as we know, the only way such an outcome can be assured is by actually putting the technique into practice at least on an experimental basis at first so to fine-tune the process. Since no two multiloguing sessions are ever the same, we are quite certain that the experimenter who considers our description of the process as a list of ingredients rather than a recipe that must be followed precisely, will soon discover what works best in their own unique context. More importantly, we wish to conclude this discussion by reiterating the vital importance of embracing the principles of Chaos, particularly those of consciousness, connectivity and indeterminacy, as fundamental perspectival angles taken on one’s approach to the process of organizational design. Unless and until the criticality of attending to the content of both the individual and the organizational mind; optimizing relationships throughout the system, and at the same time, relinquishing the notion that outcomes can be known in advance, are acknowledged by those who seek to create a viable enterprise, any approach to organizational design, no matter how far-reaching, is likely to falter. Reference and further reading Abraham, R., McKenna, T. and Sheldrake, R. (1992), Trialogues at the Edge of the West, Bear & Cy Publishing, Santa Fe, NM. Fitzgerald, L.A. (1996), Organizations and Other Things Fractal. A Primer on Chaos for Agents of Change, The Consultancy, Denver, CO. Gleick, J. (1987), Chaos: The Making of the New Science, Wiley Publishers, New York, NY. Prigogine, I. and Strengers, I. (1984), Order out of Chaos: Man’s Dialogue with Nature, Bantam Books, New York, NY. Weisbord, M.R. (1993), Discovering Common Ground, Berret-Koehler, San Francisco, CA. Wheatley, M.J. (1992), Leadership and the New Science: Learning about Organization from an Orderly Universe, Berrett-Koehler, San Francisco, CA. Zukav, G. (1979), The Dancing Wu Li Masters: An Overview of the New Physics, Bantam Books, New York, NY.

The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available at http://www.emeraldinsight.com/0953-4814.htm

Chaos, dialogue and the dolphin’s strategy

Chaos, dialogue and the dolphin’s strategy

Frans M. van Eijnatten Faculty of Technology Management, Eindhoven University of Technology, Eindhoven, The Netherlands, and

Maarten van Galen Dasstraat 22, Eindhoven, The Netherlands Keywords Chaos, Language, Strategy, Organizational change

391 Submitted September 2001 Revised November 2001 Accepted January 2002

Abstract Documents a complex responsive process of profound organizational change taking place in a Dutch capital-equipment manufacturing firm over a two-year period beginning in September 1999. The primary focus of the initiative was on the transformation and development of the firm’s organizational mind – its ‘‘orgmind’’. Although the company had an extensive history of system renewal activities, an evaluation of a decade of organization development efforts revealed that the ‘‘exterior’’ aspects of the system, e.g. tasks, structures, processes, tools, technology, etc., had received the bulk of attention. In contrast, the firm’s ‘‘interior’’, consisting of such imperceptible qualities as the thoughts, beliefs, feelings and images held in the ‘‘mind’’ of the system, had been virtually ignored.

Introduction Evidently, new ways of seeing the world tend to emerge in concert with an equally new lexicon. Chaos is no exception. Therefore, it makes sense to begin this attempt to chronicle the extraordinary tale of the transformation of a Dutch capital-equipment manufacturer by clarifying the meaning of a vocabulary that may be unfamiliar to the reader. There are at least a half dozen such terms and concepts, the comprehension of which is crucial to grasping the significance of the change process undertaken by the enterprise featured in this article. These include: . chaords or chaordic systems as well as chaordic systems thinking (CST); . their interior and exterior dimensions; . dialogue; . holons, holonic capacity and the holarchy; . the notion of an attractor, specifically the ‘‘dolphin’’ attractor; . the notion of a complex responsive process and the practice of emergent leadership. Through the Chaos lens, one sees organizations as complex, dynamical, nonlinear entities – systems in which chaos and order co-exist. Their interrelationship is expressed in the notions of ‘‘chaords’’ and ‘‘chaordic systems’’ coined by Hock (1996). He defines a chaord as: ‘‘Any self-organizing, adaptive, non-linear, complex organism, organization or community, whether physical, biological or social, the behavior of which harmoniously blends

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characteristics of both order and chaos. Briefly stated, a chaord is any chaotically ordered complex. Loosely translated to social organizations, it would mean the harmonious blending of intellectual and experiential learning’’ (Hock, 1996). The Chaordic Alliance (1998) defines chaordic as: . anything simultaneously orderly and chaotic; . patterned in a way dominated neither by order nor chaos; . existing in the phase between order and chaos. A chaordic system is defined as a . . .complex and dynamical arrangement of connections between elements forming a unified whole the behavior of which is both unpredictable (chaotic) and patterned (orderly) . . . simultaneously. Chaos then is the science of such ‘‘chaordic’’ entities (Fitzgerald, 1997, p. 1).

Although virtually any system can be regarded as chaordic, the focus in this paper will be on human-constructed systems as opposed to those occurring naturally, e.g. a termite colony. Business enterprises, specifically those that have been consciously designed for optimal sustainability in far-fromequilibrium situations, will assume the spotlight. As with any chaordic system, the organization is governed by the five core principles of Chaos explained in detail in the lead article. Those who succeed in donning the Chaos lens, ground as they are from the tenets of Consciousness, Connectivity, Indeterminacy, Emergence and Dissipation, and thus relinquishing the assumptive commitments of conventional science, readily become skilful in the practice of chaordic systems thinking. Chaordic systems thinking is a lens, a way of thinking, and subsequently an approach to designing a complex organizational system that recognizes the enterprise not as a fixed structure, but as ‘‘flow’’; a dynamical process passing from one attractor basin to the next in an incessant journey toward the ‘‘edge of chaos’’. CST as it will be called in the following, is a powerful way of conceptualizing the enterprise that enhances the ability of managers to develop, lead and bring about change with much greater efficacy than was ever before possible. CST enables its practitioner to appreciate the fact that every chaordic system is comprised of both an exterior and an interior (Wilber, 1996) – a perceptible surface and an internal essence. The exterior consists of entity or event that can be described empirically via the senses or their instrumental extensions, e.g. a microscope. Owing to the legacy of conventional science, managers and practitioners have become over-reliant on their senses and subsequently, on the information received through them, thus the attention of those who seek to bring about change in a system that is held captive by its external manifestation. As a consequence, the interior realm comprised of the ‘‘soft stuff’’ of thought, i.e. beliefs, values, assumptions and images, is commonly neglected. Given the fact that its ethereal ‘‘within’’ serves as the primary source of the chaordic system’s external manifestation, change initiatives focused exclusively on the system’s surface are not only prone to failure, but will

inevitably undermine the health and sustainability of the enterprise in which Chaos, dialogue they are executed. Consider externally focused approaches such as socio- and the dolphin’s technical systems design, re-engineering, total quality management, as well as strategy most organizational development (OD) initiatives: although these may appear to be quite effective in manipulating structures, procedures and tasks, as long as the system’s ‘‘other half’’ – its interior continues to be routinely ignored, 393 changes brought about in its surface are rarely sustainable. Wilber (1996) has pointed out that both the interiority and the external manifestation of a system have individual and collective aspects, suggesting that an enterprise can be modeled as a unity consisting of four quadrants as illustrated in Figure 1. The individual exterior may include such elements as tasks and titles, while the collective exterior manifests as departments and production processes. In contrast, the individual interior comprises such ‘‘thought-forms’’ as personal values and emotions, whereas the collective interior is commonly referred to as organizational culture, or as practitioners of CST like to think of it, the organizational mind, ‘‘orgmind’’ for short.

Figure 1. The chaordic system in four quadrants, after Wilber (1996)

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Although all four quadrants comprise the unified whole that we refer to as a chaordic system, the distinction between its interior and exterior ‘‘halves’’ has profound implications for how one goes about ‘‘knowing’’ them: since the latter can be readily perceived by the senses, Wilber (1996) suggests that the relationship of the manager or practitioner with the system’s external component is ‘‘monological’’, i.e. one observes the system via a unilateral, subject-to-object, sensory-dependent process. In sharp contrast, the system’s interiority is always and forever hidden from the so-called ‘‘eye of flesh’’. Consequently, an organization’s ethereal within – its orgmind, can only be accessed ‘‘dialogically’’ or via the process of dialogue. Given the fundamental role this special mode of conversation has played in the transformation of the subject of this paper, a deeper definition of the term is in order. Consisting of the prefix dia which connotes the notion of ‘‘through’’ rather than ‘‘between’’ as some may think, plus the root logos conveying the sense of ‘‘meaning’’, dialogue can be construed as a stream of meaning flowing through a unified whole, whether that be an individual or a collective (Gerard and Ellinor, 1999). It follows that in order to truly ‘‘know’’ a chaordic system, the sensory observation of its manifest exterior will not suffice: one must enter into the orgmind, and simultaneously allow the collective meaning found therein to enter into one’s self through the process of dialogue. The term ‘‘holon’’ as well as its variations holonic capacity and holarchy, is now commonplace in the lexicon of the firm this paper seeks to study. By definition, a holon is any entity that is both a whole in its own right as well as a part of a greater whole. For all intents and purposes, no thing can exist that is not in its essence a holon (pardon the double negative). However, one ‘‘wholepart’’ is distinguishable from another by virtue of its holonic capacity – its relative degree of wholeness. For example, through the Chaos lens, one realizes that both a person and a dog are simultaneously distinct individuals and parts of greater wholes: the human is part of his/her family, the ski club, the community, etc. all the way up to society at large. By the same token, the dog is part of the species Canis familiaris. Nevertheless, one must acknowledge the fact that human beings possess higher degrees of wholeness than do dogs. This measure of holonic capacity is illustrated in the ability of an entity to operate with greater mindfulness, and expanded awareness, as well as increased control- and response-ability. While this same concept is used to differentiate the relative wholeness of holons, the emphasis in this article will be on the distinction of one enterprise from another. Further, since the collective interior is comprised of the sum total of tacit beliefs, assumptions, premises, values, and conclusions that members of a chaordic system hold in common as ‘‘truth’’, the orgmind can be considered the ‘‘container’’ of an organization’s holonic capacity. It may be apparent that the notion of holonic capacity implies the presumption of the hierarchical nature of reality, an axiom fundamental to CST. However, it is important to note that due to the increasingly disagreeable

connotation of hierarchy, a by-product of the very human tendency to construct Chaos, dialogue systems in which power over others rather than wholeness has become the and the dolphin’s prime criterion for determining one’s rank and status, an alternative term has strategy been adopted in its place. Accordingly, the numerous parts comprising a whole are understood as being ordered in the ‘‘hierarchy of increasing wholeness’’ – a holarchy. 395 In addition to these notions, CST acknowledges the profound influence of an attractor on the behavior of a chaordic system. Not unlike a magnet drawing metal objects toward it, attractors operating in the system’s interior compel it to behave in patterned ways. These entities range from the relatively fixed, in which behavior repeats itself within the constraints of relatively narrow boundaries, to the ‘‘strange’’ variety which allows the system much higher degrees of freedom to behave in highly complex and unpredictable yet orderly ways. For example, the behavior of occupants of an elevator tends to be governed by a fixed attractor while the actions of spectators at a football game would likely verge on the strange. In any case, attractors influencing organizational system behavior either individual or collective are comprised of thought, that is of beliefs, ideas, concepts, images and most pertinently, metaphors contained in the orgmind. Given this article’s focus, a specific form of the latter that emerged through the Dutch firm’s change process as a powerful strange attractor should be mentioned: The dolphin attractor, based on the efforts of Lynch and Kordis (1988) to introduce Chaos to non-scientists, refers to the idea that the potential for emergent leadership (defined below) is enhanced when the members of a system are guided by a few simple rules. In the case of the subject of this paper, these were: .

be present;

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pay attention;

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speak truth; and

.

let go.

The aforementioned emergent form of leadership is best explained by comparing it to the more common variety – the practice of designating specific individuals as leaders by virtue of their title or position. In sharp contrast, leadership that arises when needed from the whole system, first from one individual or group, then with another irrespective hierarchical status, is by definition, emergent. The last term to be defined is a ‘‘complex responsive process’’ of profound organizational change. This term, coined by Stacey (2001), is indicative of intensive, continuous, mutual and equivalent interactions between human agents – both managers and workers – who enable the emergence of real transformation or ‘‘novelty’’ in an organization.

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Decade of change: a synopsis The primary reason for going to such great lengths to define terms as well as to differentiate the four quadrants of the model presented above, has been to provide a rationale in support of the unusual process of organizational change initiated by the Dutch manufacturing firm we will refer to as DMF in this paper. We now turn to their remarkable story. DMF is the undisputed market leader in its industry, enjoying a global market share of nearly 60 per cent. In business for more than a quarter of a century, the firm employs upwards of 550 people at its headquarters in the south of The Netherlands, the bulk of more than 800 working worldwide. Although the firm is Holland-based, 95 per cent of its turnover, consisting of customized complex processing systems, is delivered outside The Netherlands. In response to a number of issues cropping up in the 1980s including extensive throughput time, unsatisfactory product quality, product and volume inflexibilities, as well as flagging morale, DMF initiated an organizational renewal process based in the socio-technical approach in 1988. The central feature of this change initiative was the establishment of selfmanaged teams beginning in the parts-production department. By 1992, the concept of self-management had been extended into assembly, stock and shipping operations. The following year, the focus shifted to improving quality by assigning temporary responsibilities for coordination and communication regarding problems and improvement between teams to select team members serving in ‘‘star roles’’. At the same time, self-management was extended from the factory into the offices. In addition, multi-disciplinary product-creation groups known as ‘‘parallel development teams’’ came into being. Each consisted of a small core that was involved throughout the duration of the project, as well as several peripheral members who participate on an as needed basis. In addition to the team formation process, DMF simultaneously embraced the Dutch approach known as integral organizational renewal (IOR) (De Sitter et al., 1997) as the mode through which it would restructure its production processes. Although it seems certain that a decade of organizational change had indeed enabled the company to consolidate its position as a market leader, an independent evaluation carried out at the end of that period revealed that, in spite of the apparent success of the initiative, the once-strong commitment and enthusiastic participation of the employee body in the change was rapidly waning. A tentative diagnosis of cause indicated that individual and collective interiors had been virtually ignored while the locus of attention was invested in developing and improving tasks, structures, processes, and systems – the system’s exterior. In response, DMF management decided to seek guidance in bringing about the profound transformation of the entire enterprise. Beginning in September 1999, a team of senior and director level managers, an external consultant from the USA who operated from a theoretical foundation in Chaos, and the authors of this paper who served as the research team entered into a collaborative effort

focused on transforming the company from the inside out. The journey they Chaos, dialogue initiated then and continue to this day is the subject of this study. and the dolphin’s Over the two-year period covered in this study, numerous sessions were held strategy in which nearly one-quarter of the employees of the firm participated. There are plans to involve another quarter of the employees in the next six months, and those remaining at an accelerating pace over then next 12 months. The sessions 397 which ranged from didactic training to facilitated ‘‘depth’’ dialogue, were designed to ensure the sustainability of the system even as it underwent transformational change by engaging both the minds and the hearts of its people, and supporting them in developing the requisite competencies of life and work in an optimally chaordic system. The Chaos project If one wishes to grasp the significance of this ‘‘case study’’ in chaordic system transformation, it is important to note that no strategic plan of action was ever devised or followed throughout the course of the project. Virtually every action taken over the two years of the study emerged from the flux of trial and error. Activities that ‘‘worked’’ were repeated while some were solidified as the primary learning ‘‘components’’ described below. Other efforts that faltered were simply abandoned. The primary participants at start-up were managers, followed by the gradual involvement of technical and professional staff. At long last, at the conclusion of the study described in this paper, shop-floor personnel began to take part and continue to do so at an accelerating pace, with expectations that every member of the company would be involved in the process by early 2003. The idea is that every individual will eventually have the opportunity to participate in five learning events as described below. (1) Chaos concepts workshop. The purpose of this intensive one-day workshop was to offer the participant a ‘‘peek’’ at themselves, their organization, and the world in which they live as it appears through the lens of Chaos. Included in its content is a systematic comparison and contrast of the tacit assumptions underpinning the current ‘‘scientific’’ worldview and the vastly more encompassing perspective emerging from the core principles of Chaos: Consciousness, Connectivity, Indeterminacy, Emergence and Dissipation. The session concludes with a facilitated conversation designed to help participants translate theory into direct practice. In other words, the session is designed to help participants become proficient in chaordic systems thinking (CST). (2) Dialogue training. Only after completing the Chaos workshop, groups of 10-15 people are introduced to dialogue as the mode of communication more consistent with the principles of Chaos as well as with the practice of CST than its more common alternative, which is hierarchically constrained, competitive discussion. Although the bulk of the one-day session is devoted to practice of dialogue’s core skill set, every opportunity is taken both to integrate learning with the concepts

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presented in the Chaos workshop, and to prepare participants for the follow-on session described below. (3) Dolphin training. The metaphor of the ‘‘dolphin’’ holds a very special and powerful meaning for members of DMF. In brief, it was adopted from the original work of Lynch and Kordis (1988), the first authors outside of establishment science to introduce Chaos to the lay public. In any event, the ultimate goal of this highly interactive session is to enable every member of DMF to emerge to leadership on an ad hoc basis: in other words, when the situation demands it. In order to enable this emergent form of leadership, participants are introduced to the ‘‘strategy of the dolphin’’: a set of empowering guidelines for action and moral decisionmaking. (4) Visioning conference. The vision conference involves a larger number of people than the preceding sessions – as many as 50 at one time. The principle underlying this one-day dialogue-based experience is that a company’s true ‘‘vision’’ is one that incorporates the personal dreams and desires of each individual member in one unified whole comprising the essence of the orgmind. The uniqueness of this approach becomes apparent when compared with the standard corporate ‘‘vision statement’’, typically a word craft created by and ultimately imposed on the system by its senior managers. Using a variety of experiences most of which emerge in the moment through the process of dialogue, participants elaborate on personal visions expressed in statements, actions and drawings, and specify what it is they need from the organization and their fellow-participants to realize their dreams. (5) Depth Chaos. Approximately one year after completing the initial Chaos workshop, participants are invited to take part in a facilitated dialogue designed to help them confront themselves with respect to the congruence of their behavior with the principles of Chaos. The goal of this provocative one-day session is to ensure the effectiveness of people in ‘‘walking the talk’’. The reader is advised to consider the preceding description of ‘‘learning modules’’ as a very small percent of the time and energy invested in DMF’s transformational journey. In addition to more than 650 workdays during the first two years of the process spent on these sessions alone, immeasurable time and energy has been invested in a wide range of informal activities necessary to sustain DMF’s change. Remarkably, the bulk of that substantial investment has been made by a core group of senior and middle managers comprising the change management team (CMT), including most prominently the company’s future CEO. The CMT team spent one day a month for the whole project period to have dialogues about the process. As the number of those actively involved in the process slowly but steadily grew toward the current figure of 25 per cent, people within virtually every

function and role throughout the company have assumed responsibility for Chaos, dialogue moving forward on their transformational journey. For example, more than 25 and the dolphin’s people have volunteered to facilitate the growing number of teams being strategy formed and reformed continuously to carry out DMF’s mission. Such a commitment involves not only many hours of their time, but also the willingness to complete an intensive ongoing training process in the art of 399 facilitation. Until well into the second year of the project, every workshop, training event, vision conference, strategy meeting, and coaching session was designed, delivered and facilitated by the external consultant. Even so, both the consultant and the CMT were well aware of the necessity of internalizing the ‘‘expertise’’ she initially provided. Consequently, in September 2000, an initiative was designed to educate and develop the cadre of facilitators noted above, and to provide a team of ‘‘trainers’’ who would assume responsibility for diffusing the Chaos ‘‘lens’’ and the practice of dialogue throughout the company in the context of formal learning sessions. This of course, required the translation of the workshops noted above from English into Dutch. Designing a chaordic system To reiterate, the primary goal of the Chaos project and the rationale behind the enormous investment of time and energy over the first two years have been to enable DMF to achieve optimal sustainability in their turbulent marketplace as a result of ‘‘leaping’’ to a higher order of interior coherence: in other words, to catalyze the Emergence of their orgmind. As implied in the four-quadrant model, any change in the interior of a system necessarily mandates, in fact, leads to, change in its exterior. For example, individuals who have undergone a so-called ‘‘near death’’ experience are highly likely to express a change in their appreciation for life held internally, through such exterior behaviors as quitting their jobs to travel or making amends in conflicted relationships. Although Chaos suggests that the ‘‘natural direction’’ of chaordic system change is from the interior to the exterior, in the case of an enterprise like DMF, a much more directive effort is called for. The firm’s exterior, consisting of the structures, procedures, roles, positions, departments, work processes, and so on, had become increasingly fixed over the years reinforced by their history of exceptional success. Consequently, many employees, but most specially its managers who had spent years ‘‘climbing the corporate ladder’’ to their current positions of power, privilege and status, had great difficulty relinquishing their conviction that the company’s exterior could take any form other than what it had been for more than a quarter of a century. Fortunately, the CMT was resolutely committed to seeing the world through the Chaos lens whether they liked what they saw through it or not. And what they recognized from the very beginning was the necessity of strategically, intentionally and creatively destroying their system as it was, so that a wholly new, optimally sustainable chaordic system could emerge in its place. Although it took nearly two years of intensive dialogical interaction within the

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CMT to settle on a structure and process that would allow them to dissipate DMF completely, while at the same time, continue to manage business effectively as usual, they succeeded by the conclusion of this study to do so. Even though the design team responsible for devising the chaordic system architecture that will eventually replace their current conventional structure had not begun their deliberations by the time this article went to press, this initiative should be noted as an integral part of DMF’s transformation. A preliminary evaluation In a series of surveys and interviews conducted by the authors during the course of the project, DMF employees, both those who had participated in the process and those who had not, perceived increasing openness in interpersonal relationships and greater directness in communications. Notably, managers who had been involved in the change project reported that they had become more authentic in their dealings with others, and at the same, willing to become more vulnerable then they had in the past. Many attributed these positive changes to the adoption of dialogue as the primary mode of communication in the firm. Although a number of ineffective behavioral patterns remain, the operant level of awareness of them has increased dramatically, as has the willingness to reflect on personal behaviors, feelings and thoughts. Most attribute this to having embraced the metaphor of the dolphin. Respondents roughly characterize the change process in the past as dominated by ‘‘quick-and-dirty’’ result-oriented activities. Although the Chaosinformed approach has required far more time, energy and personal commitment, due to the fact of its focus on the orgmind rather than on the systems, tasks and procedures that are the stuff of conventional organizational interventions, it strikes DMF people as more personal and therefore, more real and worthwhile albeit difficult. People who had not yet been involved in the process but had heard repeatedly of it in their work area, opined that the increasing focus on people and the human aspect of the company was most welcomed and appreciated. Furthermore, they believe that managers were listening more deeply to their employees, were more accepting of criticism and open to others speaking out. Conclusions The dolphin attractor slowly is becoming the new dominant pattern in DMF, and already has started a whole array of complex responsive processes, relating DMF employees of distinct levels and disciplines to each other, and sharing their deepest personal dreams and desires, regularly. This facilitated the active and continuous development of an orgmind that is showing deeper consciousness, more holonic capacity and greater Connectivity. Also, DMF’s orgmind is more open to Emergence: the appreciation of real and profound organizational transformation that comes from within, and that may create real novelty at a moment in time undetermined by the people involved. DMF

employees are increasingly seeing their enterprise as a chaordic system: that Chaos, dialogue means not as a fixed structure but as flow. and the dolphin’s The highest measure of success of the transformation process that was the strategy subject of this article is not whether people are able to recite verse and chapter, the axioms of Chaos. It is not even whether they learn to act chaordically, i.e. in a manner consistent with the principles. Rather the acid test of this 401 transformation process is whether they can be chaordic in every aspect of their lives, whether on the job or at home with their families. References (The) Chaordic Alliance (1998), available at www.chaordic.com De Sitter, L.U., den Hertog, J.F. and Dankbaar, B. (1997), ‘‘From complex organizations with simple jobs to simple organizations with complex jobs’’, Human Relations, Vol. 50 No. 5, pp. 497-534. Fitzgerald, L.A. (1997), ‘‘What is chaos?’’, available at: www.orgmind.com/chaos/whatis.html Gerard, G. and Ellinor, L. (1999), ‘‘Dialogue: something old, something new; dialogue contrasted with discussion; the building blocks of dialogue: a living technology; behaviors that support dialogue’’, available at: www.sonic.net/dialogroup/whatsdialogue.html Hock, D.W. (1996), ‘‘The chaordic organization: out of control and into order’’, available at: www.cyberspace.com/~building/ofc_21clidhock.html Lynch, D. and Kordis, P. (1988), Strategy of the Dolphin: Scoring a Win in a Chaotic World, William Morrow, New York, NY. Stacey, R.D. (2001), Complex Responsive Processes in Organizations: Learning and Knowledge Creation, Routledge, London. Wilber, K. (1996), A Brief History of Everything, Newleaf, Dublin. Further reading Ellinor, L. and Gerard, G. (1998), ‘‘Creating and sustaining collaborative partnership at work’’, Dialogue, Rediscover the Transforming Power of Conversation, John Wiley, New York, NY. Fitzgerald, L.A. (1996), Organizations and Other Things Fractal: A Primer on Chaos for Agents of Change, The Consultancy, Denver, CO. Gerard, G. and Teurfs, L. (2000), ‘‘Dialogue and organizational transformation’’, in Gozdz, K. (Ed.), Community-Building: Renewing Spirit and Learning in Business, New Leaders Press/ Vision Nest, available at: www.vision-nest.com/btbc/cb/

The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available at http://www.emeraldinsight.com/0953-4814.htm

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Reflections: Chaos in organizational change Laurie A. Fitzgerald

402 Submitted June 2001 Revised September 2001 Accepted January 2002

The Consultancy, Denver Colorado, USA, and

Frans M. van Eijnatten Faculty of Technology Management, Eindhoven University of Technology, Eindhoven, The Netherlands Keywords Chaos, Methapors, Organizational change Abstract In this concluding article the guest editors take a reflective stand with respect to this special issue of the Journal of Organizational Change Management dedicated to exploring the ways in which Chaos is made applicable to and actionable in organizations. This summation chronicles a search for common ground as well as differences between the individual contributions. In addition, we respond to a number of issues we believe to be pertinent to the advancement of Chaos as a metapraxis of organizational change, concluding with a few suggestions for future research.

Journal of Organizational Change Management, Vol. 15 No. 4, 2002, pp. 402-411. # MCB UP Limited, 0953-4814 DOI 10.1108/09534810210433700

Reflections on a theme Each contribution to this special issue of the Journal of Organizational Change Management has been built on the central theme of Chaos with an eye toward the application of this emerging cosmological perspective to the complex, dynamical, non-linear, far-from-equilibrium system we know as the business enterprise. Working diligently to apprehend the organization as it may appear through the lens of Chaos, the authors have succeeded in painting a picture of enterprise that is categorically distinct from what is perceived by those who still cling to conventional ways of seeing. The purpose of this concluding article is to permit the guest editors of this journal to reflect on the content of each contribution: we hope to explore in some detail a number of issues pertinent to the interests of our readers that have come to light as we have reviewed our work and that of our contributors time and again over the last two years. The primary intent of the opening article written by guest editor Laurie A. Fitzgerald has been to set the conceptual stage so to speak, for the entire issue. In it, she has attempted to grind a powerful and far-reaching lens that will enable the reader to regard the organization as a system of exceedingly greater complexity than the conventional model of the ‘‘clockwork’’ enterprise. Through the intentional act of donning that lens, one is able to readily grasp the significance of the core properties marking a chaordic system: Consciousness, Connectivity, Indeterminacy, Emergence, and Dissipation. Fitzgerald explores each in sufficient detail to enable the reader to comprehend how the quintet comprises the cosmological perspective known as Chaos. In spite of the value of such a perspective, one must keep in mind the fact that Chaos is nevertheless a lens and not the ‘‘thing’’ of organizational reality

itself: it cannot tell one what is to be seen, only how one can see it as clearly as has ever been possible. The complex patterns of behavior comprising the organizational whole is yet to be identified, interpreted, experienced, and only then submitted to one’s highest mind before they can be fully grasped. In the common sense of the terms, Chaos is neither a model nor a theory. Rather, it is essentially a metapraxis – a fundamental way of seeing, thinking, knowing and being in the world. Managers and practitioners will not fully appreciate its value unless and until it is clearly understood that Chaos is prior to the development of theory and models. The second contribution explores the role of ethics in the organizational context. Lisa Irvin has defined an ethic or ethical system as an emergent property of a system bearing distinguishing cultural and historical roots. Organizational ethics manifest in patterns of behavior that portend to ensure the survival of the system. She explains how and why the ‘‘ethic of selfpreservation’’ has arisen from the increasingly narcissistic petri dish of contemporary culture. Via her thorough appraisal of the extent to which the disturbing imperative of ‘‘me first, last and always’’ has pervaded Western business, she succeeds in discrediting it without leaving the reader in a moral vacuum. Rather, Irvin concludes her penetrating treatment of organizational ethics by proposing a new code of behavior . . . one informed by and completely congruent with the principles of Chaos: an ‘‘ethic of Connectivity’’ she suggests, is exceedingly more likely to ensure the ongoing vitality of the system than is any egoist notion of self-interest or self-perpetuation. The third paper sets forth the practical steps of an innovative process of organizational design called the ‘‘network multilogue’’ – a conference method based on Russian open gaming. Dutch practitioners Anne-Marie Poorthuis and Lieke Hoogerwerf were inspired to create this promising methodology by the certain but largely untapped advantages of the ‘‘networking organization’’. Featured in their description of the method and its conceptual underpinnings are the specific principles of Chaos deemed Consciousness, Connectivity and Indeterminacy. The fourth article in the series narrates the extraordinary story of a Dutch capital equipment manufacturer that set out to transform its fundamental identity and subsequently its entire form, in spite of the fact that it already enjoyed an enviable market position and more than satisfactory profitability. The most relevant feature bar none, of the firm’s continuing progress in bringing about profound whole-system change has been that the entire initiative has proceeded from the conscious decision of top management to embrace Chaos. Guest editor Frans van Eijnatten along with associate Maarten van Galen thus offer the reader a case study in the application of chaordic systems thinking in the ‘‘real’’ world of business. Further inquiry It has been our hope that each of the articles composing this special issue has to some extent disturbed the reader – and we mean ‘‘disturbed’’ as opposed to merely satisfying, intriguing or at the very worst, entertaining – raising

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questions to be pursued long after this journal has been set aside. We have become convinced through our personal efforts to become chaordic systems thinkers that it is a perturbed mind and not a placid one that characterizes the authentic learner whether that be an individual or an organization. Even so, we recognize that proof of our success in shaking up a mind or two among you will be ‘‘in the pudding’’ of our readership. In the meantime, we would like to share with you a number of questions that have been prompted by the turbulence in our own minds as a result of our editorial meanderings through the whole cloth of this special issue of the Journal of Organizational Change Management. As stated above, the purpose of Fitzgerald’s lead article was to establish a conceptual framework on which rests the primary theme of this journal, i.e. applications of Chaos in organizations. Included among the several queries provoked by this piece are: what is the current status of the ‘‘new science’’ among the community of managers and practitioners? Has its direct application in the organizational context produced any ‘‘success stories’’ worth mentioning? And what relationship do Chaos-informed initiatives have if any, to the vast range of contemporary organizational change methodologies being touted in the marketplace? Irvin’s article addressing the philosophy of organizational ethics tends to primarily elicit questions of the scope of our primary topic: can Chaos inform an authentic and sustainable code of ethics? How far-reaching can it be in terms of its application beyond the organization and into the grander realms of society? What would an ‘‘ethic of Connectivity’’ mean in terms of the duration of the socialization process? In other words, how long would it take before this emerging behavioral code takes hold as a moral imperative for a critical mass of civilization? Finally, should managers and practitioners be concerned with or take action regarding personal ethics? The network multilogue methodology presented by Poorthuis and Hoogerwerf urges practitioners to take a more active role in guiding the process of organizational design in apparent contradiction to the Chaos principle of Emergence that assures us that a chaordic system is fully capable of evolving to higher orders of being without the assistance of external intelligence. Therefore, several questions come to mind: is it possible to intentionally plan and carry out the networking process? Is the practice of any form of organizational design essentially redundant in the creation of a complex business enterprise? Are the ‘‘steps’’ of the network multilogue prescriptive or merely descriptive? The case study in Chaos-informed whole-system transformation described by van Eijnatten and van Galen has pointed to a whole new direction for organizational change, to wit from the ‘‘inside out’’ thus confronting the reader with a basic dilemma: to what extent can that which is by definition ‘‘within’’ be conveyed in word form to those who do not participate in the shared meaning of the system? And is it even possible for one to comprehend the content of a system’s interior from the outside? In summary then, we realize full well that the case for Chaos and its applications in the setting of the complex, dynamical non-linear organization

will not soon be closed. Each contributor to this special issue of the Journal of Organizational Change Management has not only provided valuable ‘‘grist for the mill’’ of thought and practice, but also raised some penetrating questions worthy of further research. Should the reader be inspired to take up further inquiry into any or all of the questions raised by the work of our contributors, we would be more than pleased. However and in the meantime, we must now turn to a number of issues that have been raised during the process of creating this journal. Chaos vs complexity We would consider ourselves remiss in our duties as guest editors of this special issue on Chaos if we should draw to a close without addressing an increasingly fractious issue that has been growing among practitioners who have been awakened to the potential of the ‘‘new science’’ in bringing about organizational change. From our perspective, the bone of contention basically boils down to whether the Chaos encompasses what we believe to be the case, what is known by some as ‘‘complexity theory’’, or vice versa. Throughout the duration of the call for papers to be included in this special edition, we received numerous abstracts that either sidestepped the issue altogether using the terms interchangeably, or repeating ‘‘chaos and complexity’’ like a mantra in an effort to be inclusive. We also reviewed several proposals that never once mentioned the term chaos in any way other than its common connotation of disorder, mayhem and mess. In our desire to come to terms with this unfortunate fragmentation of the ‘‘new science’’ and at the same time, to produce a journal addressing Chaos as a metapraxis that transcends the scientific theory for which it was named, we have consulted the work of a number of ‘‘experts’’ in the field: even so we were consistently foiled by students of the ‘‘new science’’ who have sought to contrast our primary subject matter with the concepts falling under the banner of complexity, only to demonstrate a proclivity for invoking the common connotation of chaos (note the lower case). Nevertheless, it may be useful to examine the work of two such theorists (Goldberg and Marko´czy, 2000), although we urge the reader to bear this unfortunate tendency in mind. In the meantime, we will attempt a contrast and comparison of our own (see Table I). To begin with, the historical roots of each are entirely distinct: the chaos theory was originated by a multi-disciplinary assembly of post-graduate students in the sciences at the University of California at Santa Cruz in the late 1970s. On discovering their mutual interest in a heretofore ignored scientific ‘‘niche’’ known as non-linear dynamics, they set out to discover the secrets of what many of their peers dismissed as anomalous phenomena. Repeatedly throughout this journal and in our practices as well, we have used a term coined by Hock (1999) to name the genre of complex, dynamical, non-linear system that captured the attention of the consortium at U of C. In our opinion, ‘‘chaordic’’ is the most precise word we know of to describe the quintessential nature of these compelling entities. By definition (see ‘‘Chaos speak: a glossary of Chaordic terms and phrases’’ in this special issue), a chaordic system is one

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Table I. Differences between Chaos and complexity

Chaos

Complexity

How complex things arise from simply systems

How simple things arise from complex systems

Simple non-linear systems lead to extremely complicated behavior

Simple interactions of many things (often repeated) lead to higher-level patterns

How to recognize, describe and make meaningful predictions from systems that exhibit that property

How a system that is complicated can lead to surprising patterns when the system is looked at as a whole

Uses reductionist analysis, explaining phenomena in terms of simpler entities or things already explained and the interactions between them

Uses reductionist analysis explaining macrolevel phenomena directly in terms of the most basic elements without resource to intermediate levels

Source: After Goldberg and Marko´czy (2000)

in which nothing ever happens quite the same twice, and yet everything happens in an orderly enough way to preclude complete and utter mess. Today, thanks to the work of the Chaos Cabal, we now know chaordic systems to be the rule in the universe rather than its exception. For those of you whose attention was captured by the provocative moniker adopted by these young mavericks, it may be instructive to consider the words of Gharajedaghi (1999, p. 283) who commented about the human tendency to ‘‘. . . see the world as increasingly more complex and chaotic because we use inadequate concepts to explain it’’. In other words, when we fail to grasp the dynamical pattern inherent in a situation, we’re highly likely to dismiss it as chaos . . . as if that got rid of it. Although no one will ever know if the Cabal was inspired by this insight into the omnipresence of order (patterns) throughout nature from the very start of their explorations or if it came to them along the way, it really does not matter. The fact is that the formulation they named after themselves . . . the chaos theory was the their major contribution to the world. The theory of chaos that eventually served as the catalytic agent for the metapraxis we now refer to as Chaos (note uppercase), was intended for use in predicting stochastic patterns in Nature’s most intractable systems, the weather for instance. In contrast, what is often called ‘‘complexity theory’’ cannot be attributed to the research of any individual or scientific institution nor can the date of its formulation be confirmed. Further, if its claims have been verified with mathematical tests, we have found no evidence to that effect. Consequently, due to its failure to meet these basic criteria for acknowledgement as a scientific theory, we are compelled to consider what is claimed under the complexity banner as an eclectic collection of concepts, premises and notions, many of which have been borrowed from various branches of science including the chaos theory. Nevertheless, there is no argument that the great majority of managers and practitioners are more

readily conversant with its content than they would be with the highly technical esoterica comprising the chaos theory, not to mention more comfortable with the term itself. For many, the very mention of ‘‘chaos’’ brings to mind discomfiting images of anarchy, mayhem and confusion. Our purpose in pointing out these distinctions is to disparage neither complexity nor the chaos theory. Rather, given that the intent of this journal is to treat the topic of Chaos (not chaos) in its organizational applications, the term complexity has been used herein in the more general sense of an attribute of a phenomenon, specifically that of the chaordic system. We recognize that this position deviates significantly from that of a number of organizational theorists who argue that complexity should be accorded the status of a science in its own right. For instance, Lissack and Roos (1999, p. 10) define complexity as ‘‘. . . the collection of scientific disciplines . . . concerned with finding patterns among collections of behaviors or phenomena . . . across a multitude of scales in an effort to detect their ‘laws’ of pattern generation or ‘rules’ that explain the patterns observed.’’ Well as that may be, no evidence has been offered to support the tacit contention that complexity has emerged from its original status as a characteristic of system behavior into a metapraxis comparable to Chaos. Although complexity may indeed help explain the rules governing our reality, Chaos is the lens through which we see that reality. Nonetheless, since complexity is built on the same set of organizing principles, we believe the findings of most complexity research will fit extremely well in the Chaos framework as put forth by Fitzgerald in the introductory article. For that reason, we cannot second Cilliers (1998, p. 26) assertion that chaos and complexity ‘‘have little to do with each other.’’ While his statement may be accurate for chaos and complexity when viewed as disparate theories or fields, it does not apply when Chaos is embraced as a super-lens on reality. We are convinced that Chaos enables the development of a rich array of models and theories including one aptly named complexity. In addition, we question the claim by Goldberg and Marko´czy (2000, p. 94) that chaos ‘‘. . . is not a challenge to traditional science, but instead constitutes analytical tools allowing traditional science and modeling to be extended to domains that were previously too difficult.’’ Again, that may well be the fact as far as the chaos theory is concerned. However, since Chaos is not and has never been something one ‘‘does’’ but rather a principle-informed way of thinking, seeing, knowing and being in the world, to regard it as a mere mathematical ‘‘tool’’ is to miss the point. Furthermore, we must take issue with the theorists’ defense of traditional science: no matter how far it extends the boundaries of its domain, it will remain forever partial of its scope: as powerful as it is, conventional science deals exclusively with the material realm. It can never transcend physical reality and still remain ‘‘traditional’’ science. And finally, because the essence of Chaos lies in the fundamental precepts of Consciousness, Connectivity, Indeterminacy, Emergence and Dissipation, we are convinced that by donning the Chaos lens one can realize the benefit of integrated knowledge about integral wholes – rather than the fragmented ‘‘facts’’ of isolated parts.

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The dilemma of mind Unsurprisingly, the most difficult of the five properties of a chaordic system (Consciousness, Connectivity, Indeterminacy, Emergence and Dissipation) to grasp turned out to be the first. We received several commentaries, some extensive, from those who struggled to conceive of Consciousness as anything other than a quality that humans and only humans turn on in the morning and off again when they drift off to sleep at night. One can imagine how scientists, practitioners and managers who remain captive of conventional reality might be shocked by our assertion that ‘‘mind’’ is not a unique possession of the human species, but rather an intrinsic property of the universe and every chaordic system contained therein. Nonetheless, those who seek to attain any degree of competence in CST must grasp the fact that the nature of the difference in Consciousness between a human being and for instance an ant colony is a matter of degree rather than kind: while both possess (are) Consciousness, as far as we know the latter has less of it than do people. With respect to the issue of mind, we take to task theorists who claim to be committed to addressing their subject matter ‘‘holistically’’ and yet appear to avoid scrupulously any mention of the mental and/or psychological nature of the enterprise. But for the rather modest exception of a publication by Juarrero (1999), the systematic study of organizational Consciousness is virtually lacking in the literature portending to address the system as a whole. We find this apparent neglect and/or ignorance of Consciousness to be remarkable, and not only because Chaos has shown it to be the very fundament of organizational reality. More importantly it is because the reality of mind if only in its personal form, is so self-evident. In an effort to close the long-standing gap between matter and mind – what he calls respectively ‘‘sense and soul’’ – we consult one of the most quoted authorities in this journal. Wilber (1998) has demonstrated eloquently how any and every object one can imagine possesses not only an exterior or a surface structure that can be apprehended with the senses, but also an interiority that cannot. Clearly an authentically holistic stance must take both the realms of the within and the without into account. Unless and until managers and practitioners evince an appreciation for the system’s intangible within, the creation of optimally sustainable whole systems will remain a dream. Metaphors, analogies and abstractions No sooner had we issued the call for papers for this volume that we became aware that the revolutionary discoveries being made on the leading edge of science had sparked a growing controversy over the use of metaphors, analogies and abstractions (Lissack et al., 2000). In our view, the purist position on this issue, i.e. the assertion that only those propositions that can be empirically verified are true, appears to be based on a narrow and delimiting interpretation of the scientific method. Unfortunately, as Wilber (1996) has so eloquently pointed out ‘‘. . . that proposition itself cannot be empirically verified.’’ Therefore, it appears that those who insist on sticking with scientifically verifiable models

are actually practitioners of ‘‘scientism’’ and not science per se. It is our opinion that true science demands only that any knowledge claim be grounded in directly apprehended experience. Although direct apprehension is indeed what is meant by the term ‘‘empirical’’, scientism’s proponents make the serious mistake of reducing the vast realm of experience to the very tiny sliver of reality accessible by the senses. Obviously, the self-contradictory nature of their claim is not apparent to them. Case in point: Newton’s ‘‘laws of motion’’ which have been accepted by empirical-analytical science without question. According to scientism, they simply cannot be true since they are founded in pure mathematics and therefore not accessible to the senses. The term ‘‘metaphor’’ arises from both the Greek and the Latin and implies the transfer or bearing of meaning. By definition, a metaphor is ‘‘a figure of speech in which a word or phrase literally denoting one kind of object or idea is used in place of another to suggest a likeness or analogy between them.’’ In fact, virtually every word uttered is in some sense metaphorical since the map (word) is not the territory – the thing in itself. The fact remains that all speech is figurative or metaphorical in its essence. It is especially important to grasp this point if one intends to comprehend Chaos given that the more complex the meaning, the more useful are the metaphors and analogies employed to convey it. Managers and practitioners will find the ‘‘new science’’ so much easier to comprehend if afforded a rich reservoir of metaphorical terminology. Of course, that is not to say that formal scientific models and theoretical concepts have no place in the exhilarating process of transferring the meaning of Chaos to the organizational community. The power of CST A second issue in need of clarification concerns the differences in approach to the prospect of organizational change evidenced between those who remain unaware of the rapidly emerging cosmology of Chaos and therefore, under the hypnotic trance of conventional wisdom, and the growing numbers who are choosing to don its lens. Chaordic systems thinking (CST) is the title we have bestowed on the invaluable competencies demonstrated by the latter. We have found that by employing this term, the negative connotation that often arises from the very mention of the c-word is diffused. More importantly, we believe it more clearly conveys the central value of this powerful way of conceptualizing reality. Managers and practitioners can gain enormously from case studies in transformational change brought about through the direct application of CST (see the van Eijnatten and van Galen article.) In order to comprehend fully what CST is, one must grasp the nature of a chaord. By definition (see ‘‘Chaos speak: a glossary of Chaordic terms and phrases’’ in this special issue), a chaordic system is a ‘‘complex and dynamical arrangement of connections between elements forming a unified whole, the behavior of which is both unpredictable (chaotic) and patterned (orderly) . . . simultaneously.’’ Accordingly, virtually every system in the universe ranging from the complex to the simple can be considered chaordic. However, the term

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is used herein in reference to the organizational system that has been intentionally designed to sustain itself in an optimal dynamical balance in what Chaos refers to as ‘‘far-from-equilibrium’’ (FFE) conditions. In this light, CST then is a way of thinking and subsequently, an approach to designing a complex organizational system that recognizes the enterprise not as a fixed structure, but as ‘‘flow’’ – a dynamical process of change in which the system passes from one attractor basin to the next in its incessant journey toward the ‘‘edge of chaos’’. The problem with systems thinking One final issue we will address albeit briefly before wrapping up this special issue of the JOCM has to do with the predecessor to what we have termed ‘‘chaordic systems thinking’’ – the conceptual approach to organizational development and change known widely as ‘‘systems thinking’’ (ST). Although in our view ST represents an enormous improvement in the way managers and practitioners conceive of their organizations when compared to the view fostered by conventional wisdom, we must nevertheless concur with Stacey et al. (2000, p. 58) who note the tendency of systems thinkers to conceive of a ‘‘. . . choosing manager (practitioner, researcher, or decision-maker as the case may be) from whom the organization is split off as a ‘’thing’’ to be . . . explained and operated on . . . regarded as an objective phenomenon’’ existing separate and apart from the one who chooses’’. If this is indeed the case, as we believe it to be, the potential value of ST as a step in the right direction toward the mainstreaming of CST is diminished. No matter how honorable their intentions, those seeking to change a system they conceive of as a mere object subject to the control of intentional individual who are free to impose their choices on it, stand in violation of the fundamental principles of Chaos, most relevantly the principle of Consciousness (failure to recognize the intrinsic intelligence of the system) and perhaps more to the point, the principle of Connectivity (dismissal of the inexorable oneness of observer and observed.) Avenues for research As the foundation for a true metapraxis of profound change, Chaos has only just begun to emerge from its infancy. As has been the case with previous paradigmatic stances, it should take quite some time before this ‘‘new science’’ gains a foothold in mainstream managerial thought. Nonetheless, it is a virtual certainty that managers and practitioners, at least those who make it known that their efforts to design and transform the enterprise are founded on and shaped by the principles of Chaos, will be carefully watched and often castigated for their ‘‘foolishness’’ as they proceed with what appears to the conventional thinker as radical and risky initiatives. Nevertheless, and in spite of the derision they must bear, when (not if) they succeed in the creation of complex, dynamical systems that not only survive but also thrive in the turbulence and flux of the global marketplace, they will

have paved the way for a veritable influx of emulators. Consequently, theorists, researchers and practitioners must prepare to greet them and to offer assistance in their quest to adopt chaordic systems thinking. It appears to us that there is no better time than the present to proceed in the exploration of Chaos applications in organizations we have initiated in this journal. If we are to grasp sufficiently the dynamical complexity of the chaordic enterprise, tools and methodologies that allow us to simulate its evolution as well as to model its interactions in the context of environmental turbulence (FFE) must be devised. Furthermore, if we are to advance in our efforts to establish such extraordinary systems in the ‘‘real world’’, organizations that have already made the ‘‘leap’’ to CST must be identified so that all can share their stories. While it is certain that such prototypical organizations exist, whether they became that way through an intentional initiative or merely by chance is not yet known. Finally, future research should examine the range of concepts comprising CST with a sustained focus on the five planks of the Chaos platform, namely the principles of Consciousness, Connectivity, Indeterminacy, Emergence and Dissipation. This would necessarily include the in-depth study of holons and the evolution of holarchies both social and technical; fractal patterns and the process of fractalization in social institutions; the attractors bounding human behavior; and, of course, the provocative notion of the ‘‘orgmind’’. References Cilliers, P. (1998), Complexity and Postmodernism, Routledge, London. Gharajedaghi, J. (1999), Systems Thinking: Managing Chaos and Complexity – A Platform for Designing Business Architecture, Butterworth-Heinemann, Boston, MA. Goldberg, J. and Marko´czy, L. (2000), ‘‘Complex rhetoric and simple games’’, Emergence, Vol. 2 No. 1, pp. 72-100. Hock, D. (1999), Birth of the Chaordic Age, Berrett-Koehler, San Francisco, CA. Juarrero, A. (1999), Dynamics in Action: Intentional Behavior as a Complex System, The MIT Press, Cambridge, MA. Lissack, M. and Roos, J. (1999), The Next Common Sense: Mastering Corporate Complexity through Coherence, Nicholas Brealey, London. Lissack, M., Boisot, M., McKelvey, B., Rivkin, J., Dooley, K. and Cohen, M. (2000), ‘‘Past/future, research/practice, science/metaphor: does research add value to management practice? – The complexity perspective’’, panel paper, Academy of Management, Toronto, 8 August. Stacey, R.D., Griffin, D. and Shaw, P. (2000), Complexity and Management: Fad or Radical Challenge to Systems Thinking?, Routledge, London. Wilber, K. (1996), A Brief History of Everything, Newleaf, Dublin. Wilber, K. (1998), The Marriage Between Sense and Soul: Integrating Science and Religion, Broadway Books, New York, NY.

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Chaos speak: a glossary of chaordic terms and phrases Laurie A. Fitzgerald

412 Submitted June 2001 Revised September 2001 Accepted January 2002

The Consultancy, Denver, Colorado, USA, and

Frans M. van Eijnatten Faculty of Technology Management, Eindhoven University of Technology, Eindhoven, The Netherlands Keywords Chaos, Terms of reference Abstract The following represents an attempt to define and clarify the evolving patois of chaos using the language managers and practitioners find most familiar. The convention of italicizing and making bold words and phrases defined elsewhere in the glossary has been employed to facilitate the reader’s grasp of the terms.

Given that an emergent feature of every new science is its own lexicon, we conclude this special issue of the Journal of Organizational Change Management by acknowledging that Chaos is no exception. Although this ‘‘new science’’ has been framed as a metapraxis that transcends and simultaneously includes the knowledge accumulated by all the various disciplines and branches of science per se, an idiosyncratic language, which may be regarded as jargon to the newcomer to its study, continues to grow consonant with its emergence. The following represents an attempt to define and clarify the evolving patois of Chaos using the language managers and practitioners find most familiar. The convention of italicizing words and phrases defined elsewhere in the glossary has been employed to facilitate the reader’s grasp of the terms.

Journal of Organizational Change Management, Vol. 15 No. 4, 2002, pp. 412-423. # MCB UP Limited, 0953-4814 DOI 10.1108/09534810210433719

Attractor (basin) An idea, belief, value or ethic of sufficient stability and diffusion to capture a system’s ‘‘attention’’ causing it to produce an iterative pattern of behavior. The analogy to a river basin is instructive here: as water representing the system flows in a river bed, from time to time it will fall into a trough wherein it appears to repeat itself in for example a whirlpool, until it builds up enough momentum to escape the attracting basin. Organizational systems can find themselves captive of several kinds of attractors distinguished by the relative degree of predictability they entail. These range from the highly predictable fixed-point attractor rarely if ever found in human systems, to the slightly more complex limit cycle variety. Still predictable in general terms but much less so with respect to individual behavior is the torus attractor, characteristic of most contemporary organizations. Then there’s the fearsome chaotic attractor which can best be explained by bringing to mind once again the image of a river, only this time picture the Niagara or the Zambezi or some other that terminates in a great fall of water – the chaotic attractor.

There’s one more attractor genre that deserves mention, and not only because it is the one most people associate with new science jargon. The strange attractor is the most complex of the lot, and consequently it produces behavior that is highly unpredictable and yet exquisitely orderly at the same time. Its location on the river of organization is as far-from-equilibrium as the system can get before it topples into the oblivion of the falls. In spite of the bad rap it has gotten from managers and practitioners who prefer to stay upstream and away from the edge of chaos, the basin of the strange attractor represents a window of opportunity for extraordinary creativity, innovation and transformation. Autopoiesis Loosely translated, this amalgam of the Greek terms auto for self and poiesis meaning creation or production refers to the self-making or self-sustaining capacity intrinsic to the chaordic system. Coined by biologist Humburto Maturana, the term connotes the dynamic by which a complex system via intrinsic processes of production is able to maintain its own organizational pattern. Such a system is constitutively emergent from the interactivity of its members rather that an a priori abstract unit. Primary autopoietic capacities include self-organization, self-reference and self-iteration. Bifurcation The point at which a system manages to escape from its current attractor basin and subsequently ‘‘leap’’ to another. Using water once again in analogy, consider the common knowledge that one experiences it in one of three apparently different forms: gas, liquid, or solid. As the temperature drops, H2O in its liquid state for instance, approaches the point of bifurcation where its form albeit not its constitution . . . its still two parts hydrogen and one part oxygen . . . will abruptly change to the solidity of ice. The same process repeats itself for transitions from water vapor to rain and from snow to a mud puddle. However, unlike H2O that has little choice in the matter, the human members of complex systems do. On finding themselves poised at the boundary between the status quo and a whole new way of being, far too many of them choose to retreat into their current attractor rather than take advantage of the window of opportunity that opens to them at the point of bifurcation. Butterfly effect A metaphor suggested by meteorologist Edward Lorenz to explain how the sensitive dependency of a chaordic system on tiny fluctuations in its initial conditions can lead to enormous effects over time. As his story goes, the flapping of a single butterfly’s wings in Hong Kong can initiate a perturbation in its local environment which then amplifies over time and space until it results in a change in London’s weather that wouldn’t have happened if only it had remained grounded.

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Cartesian schism Engendered by the pronouncement of influential seventeenth century philosopher Rene´ Descartes Cogito, ergo sum – Latin for ‘‘I think, therefore I am.’’ Although it was not the Frenchman’s intention to do so, the instant acceptance of his philosophical dictate by an aggressive science of the time resulted in the sundering of reality into the domain of mind and matter. Ever since, the two realms have been presumed to be separate and discrete, in spite of Einstein’s proof of their equivalence via the familiar equation E = mc2. Chaord(ic) An amalgamation of the terms ‘‘chaos’’ and ‘‘order’’ signifying the fact that the two seemingly disparate properties of experience are so thoroughly interpenetrated that neither can exist without the other. The complex, dynamical, non-linear, co-creative, far-from-equilibrium system we know of as the organization is chaordic in its essence, that is both chaotic and orderly at the same time – an entity in which nothing ever happens quite the same twice, yet enough happens in a tidy enough way to preclude complete anarchy. Chaordic systems thinking (CST) A framework for thinking, seeing and interpreting organizational patterns anchored in the metapraxis of Chaos; and subsequently an approach to designing a complex, dynamical, non-linear, co-creative, far-from-equilibrium system that recognizes the enterprise not as a fixed structure, but as ‘‘flow’’ – a dynamical process through which the system passes from one attractor basin to the next in its incessant journey away from equilibrium. The perspective of chaordic systems thinkers is informed by the fundamental principles of Consciousness, Connectivity, Indeterminacy, Emergence and Dissipation. chaos (note lowercase) As commonly connoted, a condition of disarray, discord, confusion, upheaval, bedlam, and utter mess arising from the complete absence of order. As it turns out, a ‘‘complete absence of order’’ is both a logical and a factual impossibility demonstrated beyond doubt by Chaos and its progenitor, the chaos theory. Chaos (note uppercase) The umbrella term covering the extraordinary synthesis of the continuous stream of scientific discoveries about the nature of the universe into the cosmology serving as the primary focus of this journal; the most powerful metapraxis ever available to managers and practitioners who seek to transform the chaordic system into an optimally sustainable enterprise. However you slice it, Chaos is not something one does to an organization. Rather, it’s a most powerful way to see, think, know and be in the world. Chaos theory A mathematical equation based on the twentieth century discovery that chaos and order are not as we’ve always thought them to be – opposites from which

to choose. Rather, they’re complementary aspects of a singular reality. The chaos theory has performed flawlessly since its formulation in the late 1970s assisting scientists in describing and explaining the behavior of the complex, dynamical, non-linear, co-creative, far-from-equilibrium systems, essentially chaordic systems which have been proven the rule and not its exception in the universal scheme of things. Complexity A constitutional hallmark of the chaordic system indicative of the fact that it consists of a multiplicity of interacting components. The greater the degree of complexity, the less the behavior of the system is amenable to prediction. Not the same as complicated, although the two attributes are often confused. Connectivity The Chaos principle addressing the non-local connectedness of every ‘‘thing’’ with each and every other ‘‘thing’’ at some positive value of entanglement even though it may be infinitesimally small. Although all particles are absolutely connected in one vast tapestry of reality, the degree of relationship between any two will always be relative to the extent of their given level of interactivity; that is to say that connectivity is strengthened through interaction, and diminished by a lack thereof, although the connection can never reach the null value. Consciousness The Chaos principle attesting to the universal primacy of Mind as groundstate, essence and omega of existence. Note use of the uppercase as a tool for distinguishing one’s personal mind and/or brain from the metaphysical reality of universal intelligence – the fundamental source of all that exists ranging from mental objects, e.g. thoughts, theories, beliefs, emotions, etc. to every manner of physical object from rocks and refrigerators. Conservatism The philosophical doctrine holding that objects and systems can be sustained only as long as they are maintained in the context of equilibrium and unwavering stability. Through the lens of conventional reality, conservative practices are regarded as the answer to avoiding the terrifying fate called for by the infamous Second Law of Thermodynamics. Conventional reality The common conceptualization of reality experienced by the vast majority of the denizens of Western civilization. CR has been built for the most part on the fundamental assumptions of modern science that got its start in the sixteenth century with the discoveries of Copernicus et al. Together these form the framework for the philosophical perspectives of Materialism, Reductionism, Determinism, Mechanism and Conservatism.

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Determinism The philosophy underpinning conventional reality so falsely assuring its advocates that the ability to predict the future with utmost precision is within the grasp of science. All a manager needs to do is identify the system’s primary initial conditions and plug them into to a linear cause-effect equation – another name for the strategic planning process. Voila`! Perfect knowledge of what lies ahead on the business horizon is ours. Dialogue From the Greek roots dia and logos: Where dia means ‘‘through, between or among,’’ logos refers to ‘‘words’’ or more to the point, the ‘‘meaning’’ of words, dialogue is essentially a mode of communication in which meaning flows among the participants as if they were one. Conversations in which meaning flows freely are best understood when contrasted to discussion, the predominant mode of communication in the organizational setting as well as in just about every form of interaction in the West. Discussion A term derived from the Latin discutere which translates as ‘‘breaking to pieces’’: that is precisely the effect most discussion has on the meaning intrinsic in human communication – the whole it starts out as is quickly shattered in to a myriad pieces including ‘‘my’’ opinion and ‘‘your’’ opinion and ‘‘their’’ opinion. Dissipation The Chaos principle referring to the capacity of a chaordic system in Far-FromEquilibrium (FFE) conditions to ‘‘fall apart’’ structurally while simultaneously maintaining the integrity of its core identity. Consider the whirlpool one sees hovering over a bathtub drain: in spite of being in the midst of constant change, it is able to preserve its basic form . . . that is until the water runs out. Although the vast majority of dissipation occurs from moment to moment and imperceptibly in an organization, a time will come when the system reaches its bifurcation when it will be afforded the invaluable opportunity to dissipate intentionally . . . that is to leap through the window of opportunity rather than to risk the ultimate catastrophe of ‘‘maximum fatal chaos’’ (see Second Law of Thermodynamics.) Dynamical To be in continuous although not necessarily rhythmic motion: a dynamical system constantly, albeit mostly imperceptibly, changes in contrast to the institutional proponents of the conventional reality struggle to keep in the stasis and unwavering stability of equilibrium. Emergence The Chaos principle attesting to the sudden appearance of higher-order system qualities. While these properties originate from the dynamical interaction of the system’s components, they are neither found in nor are they directly deducible from them. An emergent is a novel, typically unanticipated quality of the ‘‘whole’’ not possessed by or found in its individual parts.

Entanglement A measure of the connectivity of any two particles: since connectedness is absolute throughout the universe, all ‘‘things’’ are entangled with all other ‘‘things’’, the only difference being the relative strength of their bond. Equilibrium (E) New science jargon for death in its absolute form: whenever a system is protected from perturbation by closing off its interaction with the greater environment, it quickly settles into an equilibrial stasis – a context in which the Second Law of Thermodynamics reigns. On the other hand, a non-equilibrial system will flow from one attractor basin to the next as it strives to get as farfrom-equilibrium (FFE) as possible without going over the edge of chaos. Although it strikes advocates of conventional reality as counterintuitive, the vitality, sustainability and complexity of a chaordic system grows rather than diminishes with distance from the equilibrium attractor. Exterior A term referring to features of a chaordic system that can be apprehended with the senses. To avowed materialists, the tangible and concrete surface is all there is to a system. Although the exterior is certainly an important consideration for those who desire to lead, manage and change an enterprise, those who are so preoccupied with the system’s particular manifestation to the exclusion of the imperceptible interior in its waveform are destined to fail in their quest. Far-from-equilibrium (FFE) The dynamical context existing at the edge of chaos to which the chaordic system strives in order to escape the stagnancy and eventual death of its equilibrium attractor. FFE is the realm of the strange attractor from which novel new properties emerge one after the other as the system arises to everhigher orders of complexity. Fractal A self-similar form or system in which a part will approximate the whole when magnified on an ascending scale. For example, one can easily see how a single stem of broccoli strongly resembles an entire stalk of the common vegetable. As the chaordic system wends its way from the equilibrium attractor to the ultimate bifurcation at the edge of chaos, it undergoes an internally generated process of self-iteration or ‘‘fractalization’’ through which it advances to a higher plane of complexity. Holarchy A hierarchy of holons composed of multiple levels of increasing wholeness each of which includes all lower levels. From the Chaos perspective, the essentially holarchical nature of the chaordic system is obvious.

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Holon A term coined by Hungarian journalist Arthur Koestler to acknowledge the fact that every entity in existence is a whole in its own right as well as a part of some greater whole . . . simultaneously and in perpetuity. In other words, every ‘‘thing’’ is a holon including the chaordic system we know as the organization. Furthermore, via the dynamical process of emergence, every holon no matter how lowly or how grand, is capable of rising to a higher plane in the holarchy of existence. Holonic capacity Referring to the relative degree of ‘‘wholeness’’ attained by a holon on the universal holarchy of consciousness. The higher a chaordic system such as the enterprise rises through the twin processes of differentiation (becoming more diverse in its parts) and integration (synthesis of the parts into greater wholeness), the greater its ability to self-organize, self-reference and self-iterate in increasingly complex forms. Indeterminacy The Chaos principle attesting to the non-linearity of cause and effect: while every effect is indeed caused or determined, the complexity of the universe renders the accuracy of a specific prediction of an outcome both logically and factually impossible. Metaphorically speaking, we are all subject to the butterfly effect. Every event is the result of the accumulation of all prior events, not just one. In fact, this principle exposes the common perception of distinct blocks of time we call ‘‘past’’ and ‘‘future’’ as an illusion. Past, future and present for that matter, are all tied up in the moment of now. Interior The essence of the chaordic system in its waveform. Because the organizational ‘‘within’’, actually its orgmind, lies behind and beneath the surface structures, it can only be accessed dialogically whereas the exterior features of the enterprise are readily apparent under the monological gaze. In other words, observer and system become one within which meaning can flow. Interventionism (see conservatism) A mistaken notion of conventional reality that fosters hyper-vigilance – an incessant monitoring of circumstances so that order can be imposed at the first sign of chaos thus preventing the situation from raging out of control. Of course, the unfortunate misinterpretation of the Second Law of Thermodynamics has only served to exacerbate the interventionist paranoia of those responsible for the maintenance of the chaordic system, e.g. managers and practitioners. Law of limits Corollary to the Second Law of Thermodynamics, which has established the unassailable fact that the level of disorder (entropy) in closed systems will continue to increase until it reaches the level of ‘‘maximum fatal chaos’’.

Through the Law of Limits, the inevitability of dissipation is extended to those that are open as well; no chaordic system can continue to expand indefinitely since, over time, the conditions that once fostered its growth change. On reaching its bifurcation, an enterprise collides with these limits where it faces the choice that is a ‘‘no brainer’’ for those who have adopted the Chaos lens: Either leap to a higher order on the holarchy of enterprise, or suffer the terrible fate of the organizational form of ‘‘thermodynamic’’ equilibrium. Materialism An axiomatic presupposition of conventional reality also known as empiricism. The materialist proposition is that only that which is accessible to the human senses or their instrumental extensions can be regarded as primary reality. However, given the intrinsic non-materiality of the materialism – it’s a philosophy wholly deficient of substance – the materialist claim must be rejected as unreal. Matter Although it may appear as some ‘‘thing’’ hard, solid, inert and purposeless, Einstein proved with a celebrated equation that physical material is in fact nonsubstantial energy manifesting in a particularly dense form. Chaos ups the ante on E = mc2 by demonstrating that in both its substantive and energetic forms, matter is equivalent to mind, and that both are enfolded in the greater holon of consciousness. Mechanism The prescription inherent in conventional reality that one must interpret the Cartesian metaphor of the ‘‘clockwork universe’’ literally. Organizational mechanists are prone to regard their chaordic systems as essentially simple, static, linear instruments of production. Conceiving of themselves as the source of the external intelligence required to ‘‘engineer’’ the enterprise in the first place, it is no surprise that managers and practitioners have so warmly embraced the popular intervention known as ‘‘re-engineering’’ even in the face of its dismal history of failure. Metapraxis A principle-informed practice of seeing, thinking, knowing and participating in the world of chaordic systems that transcends and includes all systems of thought and being preceding it. For example, the metapraxis of organizational change founded on the five integral precepts of Chaos goes far beyond the myriad exercises, drills, initiatives, programs, interventions, etc., currently and/ or previously available in the marketplace of such ‘‘solutions’’ to our organizational woes. And yet at the same time, what works in each is abstracted and subsequently incorporated into the greater whole. Managers and practitioners who adopt the Chaos metapraxis are said to be chaordic systems thinkers.

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Mindfulness The degree to which a chaordic system, be it an individual, a group or an entire organization, is aware of what it thinks as it is being thought. In other words, mindfulness is a measure of attention to and awareness of the content of the interior.

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(Non)-linearity A linear system is one in which the chain of cause and effect can be easily ascertained. In contrast, the non-linear systems display complex patterns of behavior that are not proportional to their multiple causes. To illustrate, simple machines are typically linear in their nature while the chaordic system we know as the organization is inherently subject to the Butterfly effect and is therefore non-linear in its very essence. Non-locality The ability of one particular form to ‘‘communicate’’ instantaneously with another even though the two appear to be separated by space and time. Nonlocal phenomena occur in abundance albeit in apparent violation of the Einsteinian limitation on the speed of signal exchange. To advocates of conventional reality, the prevalence of what is also known as ‘‘action at a distance’’ is rather like the functional equivalent of voodoo. Orgmind An amalgamation of the terms organization and mind pointing to the collective mentality of an enterprise . . . its shared interiority. Although managers and practitioners acting under the influence of conventional reality and its philosophy of materialism have become so compulsively preoccupied with their system’s exterior, they are oblivious to the fact this dynamical realm fully and finally determines the very destiny of their enterprise. To ignore the orgmind is to choose the demise of the system. Perturbation A relatively small change, variation or disturbance in the regular motion, course, arrangement, or location of a chaordic system with respect to its equilibrium attractor. Perturbations are the essential precursors to the eventual emergence of the system. Quantum As in ‘‘quantum mechanics’’ the discoveries of which underpin the chaos theory and subsequently Chaos itself, a term connoting an amount used in the lexicon of science to define the smallest amount of some ‘‘thing’’ which can be regarded as a unit. For example, quantum theory sets forth the idea that energy radiates and/or is absorbed discontinuously in discrete ‘‘packets’’ each of which is a multiple of indivisible units or quanta.

Quantum wave function The QWF (pronounced quiff) formulated by Erwin Schro¨edinger, the renowned father of quantum physics, demonstrates that the nature of an object prior to its manifestation in particular form as some ‘‘thing’’ one can apprehend with the senses, is in its essence a wave of pure potential wholly lacking in substance, mass, or dimensions of any kind. Reductionism The idea fostered by conventional reality that a complex object can be best understood by employing the analytical process of reducing it to its component parts. Even though this inherently ‘‘bottom-up’’ approach to comprehending reality inevitably fails, reductionists persist in their attempts to predict higherorder complexity on the basis of lower-level details. Re-formation According to conventional reality, reformation is the process of ‘‘rescuing’’ a system from error and its inevitable dissipation by regressing to a previous course or state of being. Although it has become fashionable to refer to organizational change initiatives as transformation, the great bulk of them are aimed at systemic correction, improvement and/or betterment that can be enjoyed without having to undergo any change in the system’s infrastructure. Certainly, there is nothing wrong with reformation – in most circumstances, it is more than sufficient to extend the life of an enterprise. So why not call it what it is? Relativity The Einsteinian precept proving there is no such thing as a one and only correct and absolute frame of reference. Since every view of reality is relative to every other, any statement of a universal law must be formulated to fit all frames of reference and to hold as valid in each. The Second Law of Thermodynamics serves as an example: no matter how you slice it, any system that has been closed off from its environment will eventually disintegrate. Scientism The philosophy resulting from the persistent conviction that the assumptions and presuppositions of science are correct and true universally, and are therefore not subject to questioning or further exploration. Second Law of Thermodynamics An inviolable law of nature assuring us that closed systems, e.g. a clock, will wind down over time. Given the presumption of conventional reality that the universe is essentially a clockwork chock full of lesser mechanisms, an organization for instance, the prospect of disintegration, decay and ultimately what science refers to as ‘‘maximum fatal chaos’’ awaiting us in the future has

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transformed the philosophy of conservatism into the bedrock of managerial thinking.

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Self-iteration One of three autopoietic capacities intrinsic to a chaordic system that when unsuppressed, allows the enterprise to reproduce or fractalize itself in a series of self-similar albeit increasingly complex forms. Self-organization One of three autopoietic capacities inherent in a chaordic system that when unobstructed permits the enterprise to form spontaneously a higher-order structure or function that emerges through the dynamical interactivity of its lower-level components. Self-organization is, simply put, nature’s way of driving everything toward increasingly exquisite complexity. Self-reference One of three autopoietic capacities inborn to a chaordic system that when uninhibited enables the enterprise and all its agents to individually and severally consult the content of their own interiors for guidance in action. Unbeknown to proponents of conventional reality, the (org)mind contains all the instructions the system will ever need to do what it does as well as to emerge to ever-higher orders of being. Sensitive dependency . . . on initial conditions An attribute that renders a chaordic system susceptible to dramatic changes consequent to the relatively small perturbations constantly impinging on it. The fact of sensitive dependency gives rise to the so-called butterfly effect in which minor fluctuations amplify across space and time into major changes in the whole, thus rendering long-term predictions of systemic behavior unreliable. Sustainability The degree to which a chaordic system is capable of maintaining its interiority or its core identity in the face of environmental turbulence and flux, and the ongoing process of structural dissipation. Synchronicity A term referring to the state or fact of non-local co-incidence: the simultaneous occurrence of meaningfully related, for instance when two often strongly entangled individuals act on similar inclinations such as phoning each other in the same instant and both reaching a busy signal. Another example of synchronicity is the mental image one has of an unexpected event before it happens, although advocates of conventional reality would be certain to dismiss the experience as fortune-telling. The crucial fact establishing the reality of

synchronicity is that these eerie co-incidents cannot be explained by any known mechanism of causality. Trans-formation The process of bringing about radical change in the core identity or nature of a chaordic system; a metamorphosis from one form of being to another that is wholly disparate from the prior entity. The hallmark of transformation that so thoroughly distinguishes it from the more common process of reformation is the fact that the direction of change is from the interior out as opposed to the proclivity of managers and practitioners bound by conventional reality to focus on making alterations in the system’s exterior, more often than not to the exclusion of the within altogether. Wave/particle duality The discovery that put an end once and for all to the long-standing debate about whether light emits in a continuous wave or in a multitude of discrete particles known as photons. Einstein succeeded in demonstrating that the only logical answer to the question is ‘‘yes’’ – light manifests in wavelike, i.e. spread out all over space, as well as particular forms localized in discrete packets of energy. The complementarity of wave and particle holds true for not only light but also every holon in existence. Although it is easy to imagine light behaving as a wave due to the fact that its quanta are infinitesimally small, one is stumped by the suggestion that a refrigerator for instance, can do so. However, the fact that the quantum wave function of the ‘‘icebox’’ moves so slowly renders its wave-nature virtually impossible to detect. Window of opportunity Refers to the most favorable combination of circumstances a chaordic system attains just prior to an encounter with its limits to growth. Having reached the heights of robustness, vitality, and abundance, there is no better time than this ultimate bifurcation point for managers and practitioners to relinquish their grip on the status quo no matter how sustainable it may appear to be, and to ‘‘leap’’ through the window in a courageous act of intentional dissipation.

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Book reviews Effective Top Management Teams Patrick Flood, Sarah MacCurtain and Michael West Blackhall Dublin 2001 124 pp. (paperback) ISBN 1 842180 17 7 IrL 17.95 Keywords Top management, Teams, Leadership, Conflict, Power If you are the JOCM reader who wants a detailed, well-researched, readable, and prescriptive account of top management team building, then this is your book. Conversely, if you are the JOCM reader searching for a critical engagement of top management team activities and consequences, then you need to look elsewhere. The authors promise a thorough and innovative book on team building, and they certainly deliver. Effective Top Management Teams is about how to build successful executive teams – nothing more, nothing less. Flood, MacCurtain and West have assembled an impressively comprehensive yet concise account of the intricacies of executive team building. I was particularly impressed with their ability to work through power issues in these teams. Their first chapter deals with the appropriateness of ‘‘top management teams’’ as a concept and helps us to see the difference between groupness and teamness and to understand the essential characteristics of and contexts necessary for executive teams. Next comes a series of five chapters that explore these characteristics and contexts in detail, beginning with top team selection (Chapter 2). The reader will quickly notice the conceptual depth, practical orientation and attention to detail of the authors. These chapters are filled with figures and charts that summarize the key issues under discussion, making them readily accessible for the reader. The selection chapter covers identifying potential team members, figuring out who selects members, and working through fit issues such as personality and performance. Personally, I would have liked more on searching for complementary team skills, but the chapter is certainly comprehensive in identifying the issues that must be addressed in selection. Chapter 3 addresses executive team building and takes a ‘‘FAQ sheet’’ approach by listing a series of questions with answers that cover key developmental issues. The reader will notice many tools, such as the ‘‘Team observation reflexivity rating sheet’’ that are at a higher level of sophistication than the tools we commonly see in today’s practitioner literature. Chapter 4 covers team leadership and with a focus on the common areas of leadership types, but adds several interesting turns on trust, motivation, and culture. I found the examples in this chapter to be particularly useful. Chapter 5 is a very current but highly prescriptive discussion of team conflict. However, Chapter 6 really caught my interest with the authors’ discussion of

power. I rather liked this chapter as the authors articulate power and power issues much better than common treatments. The chapter is conceptually first rate yet easy for the practitioner to understand. This chapter’s examples are especially useful. Chapter 7 is a summary that concludes with another quasiFAQ sheet-like listing of key issues for teaming executives to consider. I have two concerns with the book. The first is rather petty on my part, but I found the book to be much ‘‘Americanized.’’ Except for the occasional ‘‘s’’ instead of ‘‘z’’ and a few phrases such as ‘‘get on with’’ rather than ‘‘get along with,’’ the reader would have difficulty discerning the book’s European origin. I understand that the publisher desires Irish, British, and US audiences. And, I understand the authors’ concentration on the necessarily antiseptic prescriptions for top team success. But I miss that certain European flavor and flair found in such books as Tony Watson’s In Search of Management. My second concern is more practical. Having worked in teams prior to becoming an academic, I believe that Flood, MacCurtain and West’s book is so comprehensive, prescriptive, and, yet, concise, that it would be overwhelming for the average top team member. The book has a lot of good material, but it is a lot of good material tightly packaged. Thus, I believe that the book will find its most valuable audience in consultants who are developing training programs for top management teams. Flood, MacCurtain and West have delivered a well-researched and accessible reference book on executive team development. The book is a highly prescriptive account, but that is what the authors promise – no more, no less. If such is what you want as a reader, then this book will certainly work for you. While no book could ever capture the necessary ‘‘art’’ of complementary personalities, natural social abilities, capacity for ambiguity, and sense of timing that separate the merely good teams from the highly functional teams, Flood, MacCurtain and West have captured just about all the current science available on building top management teams. James R. Barker Department of Management US Air Force Academy, USA

Organisational Culture: Organisational Change? Peter Elsmore Gower Aldershot 2001 251 pp. ISBN 0 7546 1230 9, Recommended retail £42.50 (US $74.94) (hardback only). Keywords Organizational change, Organizational culture, Interpretative sociology, Interpretive sociology Peter Elsmore completed his PhD and decided to publish some of that work as a book that has the curious title Organisational Culture: Organisational

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Change?. We all know that the rate of conversion of PhD work into any published form is abysmal. This said, a PhD does not always convert well to a book for a variety of reasons. On this occasion, Elsmore needs to be congratulated on not only converting his PhD into a published form, but also producing a volume that gives a fine-grain view of organisational cultural and organisational change. In undertaking any review, whether it be a manuscript submitted for a journal or that of a published book, reviewers tend to have ways in which they work. In my case I like to read the book from cover to cover noting key phrases, sentences and paragraphs as I go. I also like to seek to identify the key authors and family of thinking and research on which the author is depending for their argument. Sometimes one might try to understand the text, and prepare oneself in advance for what is expected to follow, by quickly identifying which ‘‘sacred’’ knowledge in the field is being drawn on and the type of journey the author is intending to take the reader. Of course we might expect the interesting twist in the story and, at times, also expect some departures and even ‘‘profane’’ statements along the way. In noting the key theorists and family of theory, as well as specific sentences, I usually record my ‘‘free-association’’ along the way. It has often proved useful to look back at this after I have reached the last page. In adopting this methodology with this book, it is interesting to record the impression to the first few pages of the introduction. Elsmore tells us in the preface that he is going to investigate the links between organisation culture and organisation change and to do this he will be offering us an analysis of two organisations (British Telecom and British Gas (Eastern)) that had undergone significant change, moving from a public sector organisation to an organisation that is now privatised. Elsmore declares that ‘‘this work is an empirical and theoretical investigation of the links between organisational cultures and organisational change . . . ’’ (p. vii). He says that the methodology is rooted in interpretative theory and the empirical aspect is mostly derived from interviews of 72 middle managers. The approach, amongst other things is designed ‘‘to make the voices more audible than they might otherwise have been’’ (p. vii). My free association (from now on will be referred to as FA) was basically that I can understand the genre from which this journey is to be taken. Chapter 1 now beckons and is entitled ‘‘A general introduction’’. The first couple of pages are as I would expect in what Adorno (1973) would describe as the ‘‘jargon of authenticity’’. Not that this work has much ‘‘jargon’’ as we would commonly understand it – this book is relatively free from that kind of jargon and inclusive of any readership, but jargon in the sense of replicating a tradition and using language in a familiar and expected manner. I now reach pages 3 and 4 and read that Elsmore is going to analyse his ‘‘soft’’ data using a computer software package (FA). Hmm, isn’t this reductionist and rationalist and profane to interpretative theory which claims to try to get a fine-grain view? Now on page 5, I am told that much of the literature on organisational change and culture comes from a tradition that is very managerialist in its intellectual orientation ‘‘and in doing so seems to miss addressing simple but significant questions. One such question is: ‘‘who

benefits from organisational cultural change?’’ (p. 5) (FA). I would certainly agree with that appraisal and he seems to be setting up for an advocacy of interpretative theory. Elsmore then starts to assemble the likely suspects of researchers/theoreticians in interpretative theory and tells us of Garfinkel, Berger and Luckmann, Schutz and Husserl (FA). Hmm, what happened to the seminal work of Strauss (1959, 1978) who emphasised individual meaning was ‘‘negotiated’’ and so wonderfully revealed how the term culture itself was a reductionist term (see Hocking and Carr, 1996). Strauss emphasised the multiple realities in organisations such that the structures are continually being redefined, although his emphasis was more on the symbolic interactionism – but, still one of the most significant members of the interpretativist family and one who focussed upon culture in work organisations. Strauss is not in the author list either! I am now on pages 8 and 9 and Elsmore now invokes the work of Edgar Schein and seems to give praise to his work (FA) Oh no! Schein’s concept of culture is very much a cognitivist and structural-functionalist view that is very much in the tradition of Talcott Parsons. Schein talks about roles, norms, integration of systems and alike. Just like Parsons’ ‘‘AGIL’’ paradigm (adaptation, goal-attainment, integration and latency), Schein defines his own system in organisations in terms of recruitment, the utilisation of human resources, integration of parts of the organisation and organisation effectiveness in terms of our capacity to adapt to and manage change. Schein’s work has always reminded me of that humorous tale recited by many a psychiatrist which is ‘‘schizophrenics build castles in the air and psychiatrists play in them’’. It seems the ideological prism was created by Parsons, and like many others in organisation studies Schein has simply used that prism in understanding organisations. The whole organisation is seen, by Schein, as though it were an organism – which is the common structural-functionalist ‘‘metaphor’’. Indeed, in the same structural-functionalist myopia Schein argued that organisations should be thought of as ‘‘a complex social system which must be studied as a total system if individual behavior within it is to be truly understood’’ (1970, p. 3, italics is my added emphasis; see Carr, 1989). Such a focus would seem the antithesis of interpretative approaches. From other encounters with Elsmore’s work in journals and at conferences, I thought he was much more skeptical and self-reflexive. Perhaps I need to dump the idea of reading further and respectfully decline the invitation to review this book. Pages 10 and 11, and I now read: Schein . . . casts the idea (of organisational culture) in a peculiarly American and structural functionalist manner itself derived from the ‘‘functional prerequisites’’ of Parsons. (p. 10) . . . Schein’s thinking seems ambiguous. On the one hand he seems to adopt an interpretivist set of opening premises, that individual organisation members create their own social world. He then seems to reify his expression of culture by arguing that it is the social institutions that shape individual behaviour. Of course these appear mutually exclusive (pp. 10 and 11).

(FA) Wow, we are now seeing how a fine reading of different works can lead to research openings. This is the kind of self-reflexiveness we need in this area of organisational culture and change.

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The opening chapter and my free association with it, is the kind of dynamic the reader can expect throughout the book, particularly the ‘‘theoretical’’ chapters. Elsmore nicely introduces an issue or concept and just when you wonder how this ‘‘fits’’ into an interpretativist perspective he provides a depth of scholarship and understanding of the literature that is as engaging as it is illuminating. This said, I sometimes get the feeling that Elsmore is apologetic for the subjectivist label that the social sciences seem to attract, or at least at different junctures he wishes to explain how he is addressing the positivists charge that interpretativist enquiry lacks rigour (see for example p. 14). We then find, at other points in the volume, a really well argued case of how the ‘‘social’’ in social sciences makes the ‘‘subjective’’ a potentially rich source of enquiry. In this regard he cites work very familiar to me, that of Carr and Kemmis (1996) and quotes the following: To say, for example, that ‘‘metal expands when heated’’ reflects the way that the behaviour of heated metal is endowed with meaning by the causal explanation of the scientist. It is not to say anything about the way that metal interprets its own behaviour (Carr and Kemmis, 1986, p. 88 cited by Elsmore, 2001, p. 29).

This quote and orientation is very reminiscent of the argument by one of the ‘‘Gods’’ of educational administration, Thomas Barr Greenfield. When discussing the work of Weber, Greenfield argued that Weber believed it was ‘‘impossible for the cultural sciences to penetrate behind social perception to reach objective reality. Paradoxically, this limitation on the cultural sciences is also their strength, since it permits them to do what is never possible in the physical sciences: the cultural scientist may enter into and take the viewpoint of the actor whose behaviour is to be explained’’ (Greenfield, 1993a, p. 9). Greenfield (1993b, pp. 114-15) was later to expand on his understanding of Weber in the context of the problem of meaning arguing: Weber made the distinction between knowledge that came from acts of Verstehen and those which came from acts of Erkla¨ren. The former rests on understanding, the latter on explanation. For Weber understanding arises from the viewpoint of the observer. In the natural sciences, he argues, we can do nothing else but explain behaviour from an external vantage-point . . . Natural scientists can do nothing but impose their meaning on atoms, cells, and pigeons since these entities cannot (or do not) speak for themselves.

Greenfield attacked much of the organisation theory discourse for studying organisations as though they were natural objects. Greenfield (1993a, pp. 5-6) observes ‘‘the crux of the issue is whether social reality is based upon naturally existing systems or upon human invention of social forms . . . in one perspective, organisations are natural objects – systems of being which man discovers; in the other, organisations are cultural artefacts which man shapes within limits given only by his perception and the boundaries of his life as a human animal’’. Organisations, for Greenfield (1993b, p. 103), were an ‘‘invented social reality’’ and ‘‘are essentially arbitrary definitions of reality woven in symbols and expressed in language’’ (Greenfield, 1993b, p. 109).

Elsmore’s assumptions and justification for the methodology taken in his study can be thought of as being very similar to those expressed by Greenfield, but are not as succinctly argued. Elsmore is a little more gentle with his reader and does not assume the reader is as conversant with his genre of discourse. I found this to be a very positive feature of the book as people are not ‘‘excluded’’ by what might otherwise be regarded as a ‘‘strangely’’ different language. The arguments are very accessible. Elsmore combines the use of interview, questionnaire and non-participant observation to try to grasp the sets of subjective meanings of the actions of organisational members. Using this combination of methodologies, ‘‘data’’ is gathered and subsequently analysed, in large part, through a software package called Graphics COPE. The manner in which this software package is used is beyond the scope of this review, however the key intent is to produce ‘‘cognitive maps’’ which seek to capture the responses to the questions asked of the respondents. The connection between the maps that are generated for each question into a ‘‘supermodel’’, Elsmore cheerfully admits is ‘‘the result of the researcher interpretation. There is no wish to attempt to add a gloss of scientificity to the research outcomes. That would be entirely spurious’’ (p. 95). The basic issue here is to apply ‘‘common sense’’ to a data set that is extremely large and seemingly unmanageable without the aid of some clustering technique or avenue. The focus was to ensure that the ‘‘integrity of the meaning’’ was preserved through the analytic process. The key questions to which this analysis is applied are: . How do people in your organisation learn about the senior management’s policy objectives for the organisation? . To what do the leaders of your organisation seem to pay most attention? . When things go wrong in your organisation, what happens? . When things go right in your organisation, what happened? . Who are the really influential opinion formers who work around you and who are senior to you in the organisation? . Looking at the people who work around you, who would you identify as likely to be promoted at some future stage; what would be the promotable characteristics? . Could you say anything about the day-to-day working relationships between the people you regard as promotable and their colleagues? . How are people chosen for promotion? . When a new job arises, what criteria do selectors use to make new appointments if they want to attract new people into the organisation? . In the history of your organisation, are there any really significant people whose contribution to the place is still remembered?

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. .

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Have you always worked for your organisation from this particular building? Has information technology changed your job recently? When did your part of the organisation last restructure? With what benefits . . .? . . . problems . . .? In the case of the latter, were they anticipated? What do your competitors say about your organisation?

A number of these questions are reminiscent of critical incident questions. Questions three and four in particular remind me of Herzberg et al.’s (1959) study in which motivation and hygiene factors ‘‘emerged’’. The set of questions, in Elsmore’s study, were formulated from Schein’s (1985) notions of how to make best sense of an organisational culture and, in particular, the ‘‘markers’’ assumed to be important here were: . what leaders pay most attention to; . how leaders react to crises; . the nature of any role modelling or coaching; . the criteria for allocating rewards; and . the criteria for selection and promotion. I think there would be some robust debate over whether these markers of culture, derived from the work of Schein, are indeed indicative of organisational culture. It would be nice to see how Elsmore would respond to the strident criticisms of Schein’s work by people like, for example, Trice and Beyer (1993). It may be that the volume in which Trice and Beyer performed a comprehensive demolition job on much of the past thinking on organisation culture, was not available when Elsmore worked through the literature for his study. The data were collected in 1993-1994. The complete absence of symbolism, for example, in the cultural milieu of what Schein describes is more than a small oversight. And, of course, we psychoanalytic types, have critiqued his concept of the psychological contract for being, conceptually, an issue of negotiated compliance – an unfolding interactive process of mutual influence and bargaining (see Carr, 1996). The lack of acknowledgment of the unconscious psychodynamics that are at play in employees forming an attachment to leaders and organization ideals, is a major oversight as to how culture is transmitted. To be fair to Elsmore, notwithstanding the entry point of his enquiry, he does flag important symbolic issues that figure in the data he has collected through his regime of questions. It would be nice to see such a reflexive mind, like that of Elsmore, undertake some further meta-analysis to explore how his data might be analysed using other indicators of cultural transmission and content. The ‘‘results’’ of Elsmore’s study are nicely assembled in the penultimate chapter of the book and, like interpretative studies, we do not emerge with a new recipe to more effectively achieve change in organisations. What the

chapter does, is to show the way in which interpretative work captures that which other methodologies either lead us to over-look or to place in the background. The richness of the discipline of the researcher, in using a qualitative approach, is very much on display in this and the previous chapter. The conclusions reached from the study, succinctly (and inadequately expressed in this review) are as follows: . Attempts to change corporate culture on a massive scale seem destined to failure, certainly in the short term. Deeply held attitudes and values are very resilient to change. . Organisational culture as experienced by those in organisations, is different from that currently reflected in the management texts. The study reveals that sub-cultures and sets of anti-cultures are part of a rich tapestry which is unique for these organisations and contains a large element that is more based upon ‘‘personalisation’’ than that which has been previously presumed. . Top-down attempts to change organisation culture have a number of unintended consequences, amongst which is an emotional fall-out that becomes manifested in higher rates of absenteeism. . Sub-cultures and anti-cultures can be just as potent in shaping individual behaviour as any official attempts to install an organisation culture. The field work in this study provides excellent examples of just how ‘‘jaundiced’’ aspects of the ‘‘official culture’’ can be interpreted by organisation members in lower echelons. . Members of the organisation may remain loyal to it notwithstanding how inept and difficult management and the ‘‘organisational realities’’ made life. . Non-pecuniary rewards, ‘‘part of which may be called the ‘psychological contract’’’ (p. 195), seem to have been largely overlooked in a rewardbased approach to organisation change. . Lack of promotion seemed to be attributed, by those who had not achieved promotion, to a personal failure to measure up rather than factors outside of their locus of control. Elsmore concludes this penultimate chapter with some recommendations for managers of organisation change and the very last chapter, entitled ‘‘A research endpiece’’, seeks to update the theoretical threads of the study by recognising work that has appeared since he commenced his field work in 1993. In conclusion, I would say of this book that it is a very nice transparent account of two organisations who went through organisation change. The rigour and discipline that comes through in this work is something that is a great model for research students. To those of us already in the field, the findings of this study not only provide new issues for us to research, but also remind us of the richness that can come from interpretativist approaches.

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A postscript to the publisher The cost of the book is not cheap – hopefully Gower will produce a paperback version to make this volume more accessible, or perhaps they could re-think the pricing of this hard cover volume. Adrian Carr University of Western Sydney, Australia

432 References Adorno, T. (1973), The Jargon of Authenticity, Northwestern University, Evanston, IL (originally, work published 1964). Carr, A. (1989), Organisational Psychology: Its Origins, Assumptions and Implications for Educational Administration, Deakin University Press, Geelong. Carr, A. (1996), ‘‘The psychology of compliance: Revisiting the notion of a psychological contract’’, in Rahim, A., Golembiewski, R. and Lundberg, C. (Eds), Current Topics in Management, Vol. 1, JAI Press, Greenwich, CT, pp. 69-83. Carr, W. and Kemmis, S. (1986), Becoming Critical: Education, Knowledge and Action Research, Deakin University Press, Geelong. Greenfield, T. (1993a), ‘‘Theory about organisation: a new perspective and its implications for schools’’, in Greenfield, T. and Ribbins, P. (Eds), Greenfield on Educational Administration, Routledge, London, pp. 1-25 (original work published 1975). Greenfield, T. (1993b), ‘‘The man who comes back through the door in the wall: discovering truth, discovering self, discovering organizations’’, in Greenfield, T. and Ribbins, P. (Eds), Greenfield on Educational Administration, Routledge, London, pp. 92-121 (original work published 1980). Herzberg, F., Mausner, B. and Snyderman, B. (1959), The Motivation to Work, John Wiley, New York, NY. Hocking, J. and Carr, A. (1996), ‘‘Culture: the search for a better organisational metaphor’’, in Oswick, C. and Grant, D. (Eds), Organisational Development: Metaphorical Explorations, Pitmans, London, pp. 73-89. Schein, E. (1985), Organizational Culture and Leadership, Jossey Bass, San Francisco, CA. Strauss, A. (1959), Mirrors and Masks, Free Press, New York, NY. Strauss, A. (1978), Negotiations, Jossey-Bass, San Francisco, CA. Trice, H. and Beyer, J. (1993), The Culture of Work Organizations, Prentice-Hall, Englewood Cliffs, NJ.

Understanding Organizational Evolution: Its Impact on Management and Performance Douglas Scott Fletcher and Ian M. Taplin Quorum Books Wesport, CT 2002 230 pp. Keywords Management theory, Organizational development, Organizational theory, Organizational change We are in a unique time in organizational development; technology is pushing the envelope of what is possible; change is the operative word; and there is a

new group of ‘‘knowledge workers’’ who are not satisfied with traditional management techniques. Interesting work, growth and upward mobility, participative decision making, and increased learning motivate this new breed of worker. In addition, the knowledge worker is part of a new transitional workforce; he or she will change jobs every two to three years and is committed to the field, not to the firm. Fletcher and Taplin’s contribution to organizational behavior and development takes on greater significance when understood within this new framework. To embrace this challenge they provide a refinement of organizational theory, present a historical overview, and offer techniques to create the participative management firm of the next century. In reviewing Understanding Organizational Evolution I will focus on its three core sections as laid out by the authors. The first, ‘‘Evolution of the organization,’’ evaluates their linear and predictive theory of development, building on Larry E. Greiner’s work and proposing ‘‘evolutionary stages that organizations go through as the size and complexity of the firm increases’’ (p. 2). The second, ‘‘Historical perspective and trends’’, summarizes their historical overview of basic organizational trends from the last century. The final section, ‘‘The functioning of performance management systems’’, assesses their techniques for incorporating participative management within a firm. Evolution of the organization Fletcher and Taplin propose a life cycle, organism model with six distinct, separate and predictive phases, taking an organization through three development stages: pre-adolescence (entrepreneurial and directive), adolescence (coordinative and delegative), and adulthood (teamwork and alliance). Each phase has a tension point between managerial control and what workers want that must be negotiated in order to advance to the next stage of development. (1) The entrepreneurial phase is characterized by start-up and survival. The leadership style encompasses a vision for the future and the technical expertise to get the job done. The major tension is between profitability and survival of the organization versus the need for employees to maintain their own creativity and the start-up mentality. (2) The directive phase is similar to the entrepreneurial phase, but the difference is focus, moving toward operational leadership rather than creative and technical leadership. The tension is between the ego of the leader and the autonomy of the employees. This phase is characterized as getting the operations under control and centralizing decisionmaking. (3) The coordination phase attempts to manage the size and complexity of the organization by instituting policies and procedures administered by a growing corporate staff. The tension point is between the red tape of the developing bureaucracy and the desire for flexibility on behalf of the workers.

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(4) The delegative phase continues the tensions between centralized versus decentralized control, with the key issue being abdication of responsibility by management and the desire for trust by the employees. This and the coordination phase are dubbed the ‘‘corridor of crisis’’ by the authors and are characterized by ‘‘cycling through systems of tight and loose controls’’ (p. 22). (5) The teamwork phase is a milestone for a company, as it has survived the corridor of crisis characteristic of adolescence and has matured to the adult stage of development. As teams develop within the company, the tension focuses on the alignment of company goals against the oftenseparate directions teams may take. (6) The alliance phase is the pinnacle of organizational evolution and is characterized by establishing outside relationships with suppliers, customers, vendors and even competitors. The tension is between collaboration for common goals and the self-interests of alliance partners. In terms of organizational theory, the evolutionary model presented falls short of the authors’ goal of establishing ‘‘the life cycle of any organizational form, be it business, the family unit, or society itself’’ (p. 44). The theory itself is not novel or overly interesting and empirical evidence presented is anecdotal at best, using selected examples without conveying the required details to make their case. Additionally, as will be seen in the next section on history, the authors often confuse technological advances with inherent characteristics of organizational development. In order to make the claim that the theory holds for all types of organizations, then the development must be distinct and separate from changes in technology. Another area of concern is the authors’ implicit assumption that firms have reached the pinnacle of organizational development with no thought as to what the future holds. Failure to address what the next phase of development may encompass leaves open the most fascinating and intriguing question. They set the stage for a predictive theory but pull back from the brink by failing to discuss the next logical step in organizational evolution. Built into any organism metaphor is the inevitable decline of organizations, which the authors fail to adequately address, suggesting that decline only occurs when an organization ‘‘loses as common purpose or direction and does not find a way to reinvent itself’’ (p. 56). This proposition has two problems: (1) organisms have the potential to live forever, which history proves is false; and (2) even if we accept the first point, then their evolutionary model fails to take into account further changes and developments beyond the alliance phase as mentioned above. While each stage is robust and well defined, the need to go through one phase before moving to the next takes the linear model too far. Organizational management may go through several phases often more than once through

their history as a company develops. The lack of a more circular, interactive approach to understanding organizations is perhaps the greatest weakness to the theory, assuming that a teamwork company will never fall back to the directive phase or that an entrepreneurial company cannot create workable alliances.

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Historical perspective and trends Fletcher and Taplin do an excellent job, albeit within limited space, in providing a cursory overview of the history of organizations in the USA over the last century. Particularly insightful was the change from craft workers to factory workers to knowledge workers and the ‘‘legacy of fear and distrust’’ (p. 84) between employees and management that fostered the development of business unionism. The book would have benefited from a more comprehensive historical account and greater detail on how the evolution of organizations mirrored their own development theory. The history and theory appeared separate rather than intertwined. Although the authors link the settlement of the West to the adolescent stage, they fail to provide the ongoing comparative analysis for each phase of their theory. Finally, the focus on technological advances actually undermines their theory of organizational evolution, confusing technological breakthroughs with inherent qualities of the theory. If taken at face value, then all other organizations in history could never have advanced beyond the adolescent stage, and it is only with today’s technology that organizations could maximize control and efficiency while still empowering workers. The alliance phase would be a novel phenomenon of the twenty-first century, brought about by enterprise resource planning software.

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The functioning of performance management systems The final chapters of the book focus on the actual techniques for creating a performance management system. Fletcher and Taplin provide a prescriptive system that includes strategic planning (where the organization is going), position planning (what the employee’s job is), period planning (what the expectations of the employee are), operations review meeting (how the organization is doing), personal performance review (how the employee is doing), and rewards systems (what is in it for the employee). As with evolutionary theory of organizational development, the techniques presented, while valuable, are not novel. Any competent off-the-shelf project management text would provide a similar framework for success. In addition, while the authors list some of the pitfalls of implementing organizational change (imposing changes from the top down, insufficient investment of time or resources, structural and cultural impediments, etc.), they do not provide a means of overcoming these objections. Finally, while they caution against establishing a management system that is too far ahead of the organization’s development level, they do not provide adequate evaluation of how and when to implement their performance management system.

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Conclusion While organizational theorists will find the text lacking, management consultants and MBA students may find the theory, history, and techniques of interest. The main issue for me was the insightful relation of change from craft workers to factory workers to knowledge workers. I would have enjoyed the text more and felt it stronger theoretically if Fletcher and Taplin had made the obvious connection between today’s knowledge workers and turn-of-thecentury craft workers, developing a more circular rather than linear approach to understanding organizations. I believe Fletcher and Taplin have more experience and empirical results to bring to the table than the text allowed. In short, the authors tried to do too much. It is perhaps too ambitious to update a development theory, provide a historical overview, and present a set of modern management techniques all in one book. In addition, the authors’ choice of language was specifically geared to appeal to both business managers and academic scholars. In the end, the book failed precisely due to its lack of focus and overly broad appeal. Craig R. Seal George Washington University, Washington, DC, USA