The Natural Order in Organizations
“We are free to choose our actions, but we are not free to choose the consequences of these actions.”
Stephen R. Covey
Nature has at its very core intelligent design. Nothing in nature exists for itself. Everything is in a permanent interdependent relationship with other elements from the eco-system. The fine balance that supports life as we know it is maintained by a set of invisible laws. Moment by moment these forces call for the organic adaptation of systems (take the weather for example).
The “what” that we observe about systems are the dynamic movements that maintain wholeness and balance.
When observing these dynamics, we start noticing that living systems have two innate directions of movement — one is towards Preservation / Survival and one is towards Evolution / Individuation. The movements living systems make towards “preservation” and “evolution” are immune to morality, to our socially constructed ideas of right or wrong. The system dynamics are governed by principles that maintain wholeness and balance at whatever the cost. Peter M. Senge has the most beautiful quote to reflect this: “We are neither victims nor perpetrators; we are simply human beings controlled by forces that we have yet to understand”.
Why should this matter to us as leaders? Whenever we use personal morality or organizational norms of belonging as reference systems, we sometimes take decisions that artificially separate the world in “what is right” / “what is allowed” and “what is not right” /”what is not allowed”. The split in the field of collective consciousness triggers further imbalances — repeating patterns and difficult dynamics. Symptoms like the high turnover of employees, burnouts, conflicts are signposts of the system maintaining wholeness and balance at whatever the cost.
Probably the highest hidden cost in organizations is motivation. Difficult dynamics undermine the sense of a safe belonging and people’s energy will be drawn towards Survival patterns. When that happens, we are less able to observe new data, process it and make decisions that support a healthy adaptation of our organization to the reason it exists in the first place — to serve something outside of itself.
What’s at stake? Organizational health is the cost for “systems ignorance” — the organizations become more fragile as we are less able to develop useful ways of acting as a response to change. The less we can foster environments that spark synergies that serve the purpose, the more we are at risk of becoming obsolete.
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