ISSUE

17

Ecosystem for Growth

"As we think about 2018…I’m convinced that discussions and centering our efforts around leadership in command will be absolutely essential."

"And there emerges from that effort to build in a sustainable way a deep commitment to one another. A bond that can really only be described as an affection that can’t be duplicated anywhere else."
(ADM Richardson, CNO)

Commands or social units of any size share a set of common values that ultimately drive the organization toward a purpose and mission. However, sharing of values alone, while a very critical concept, will not be enough to support true learning, growth, and wholeness that are essential for participants to continuously perform at or near their theoretical limits. Our learning strategies must create the experiences our learners need in order to change.

"The organizations that will truly excel in the future will be the organizations that discover how to tap people’s commitment and capacity to learn at all levels in an organization." (Peter Senge, The Fifth Discipline)

Leaders operating at increasingly accelerating speed are left frenetically searching for opportunities and adequate space required for true growth and human flourishing. It is more important than ever for command leaders to understand the structures, systems, patterns in their organizations and the underlying assumptions and beliefs that ultimately drive them. The way leaders manage meaning in their organizations and keenly understand the context in which they perform their tasks is fundamental. This must be done consistently in a day’s work where a climate of knowledge-sharing and risk-taking are crucial to success. And it must be aligned and integrated with critical talent processes with intentional leader development efforts.

An ecosystem for growth readily generates deliberately orchestrated work processes, decision making, and collaborative initiatives in a way that enhances operational outcomes and results in a higher percentage of leaders with critical leadership capabilities. Mastery of building learning infrastructures is the keystone for which a "nothing extra" approach to leader development rests.

"A developmental perspective means understanding that, messy and time-consuming as it might seem, learning designs that do not get to the constraints of participants’ mindsets are relatively powerless to transform the way that work is done. It means, not forgetting that people bring their humanity to work with them every single day, and that until we find a way to engage the emotional life of the workplace, we will not succeed in meeting our most important goals." (Kegan and Lahey, Immunity to Change, pg 318)

New Mindsets = New Results


Offerings this week:

Deloitte Review: "Better Pond, Bigger Fish: Five Ways to Nurture Developing Leaders In A Ecosystem For Growth"

American Sociological Review: "The Small Warship" by George C. Homans

"Teaching Smart People How to Learn" (every company faces a learning dilemma: the smartest people find it hardest to learn) by Chris Argyris