scarcity/possibility: an either/org dialogue
with Tania Anaissie and Kristi McFarland
Tania Anaissie is the Founder and CEO of Beytna Design and a Founding Creator of Liberatory Design, a new practice of human-centered design that incorporates complexity theory and equity practice to drive innovation towards liberation.
Kristi McFarland is the Founder of Purpose and Practice where she works with purpose-driven companies in times of change, drawing on her experience as a senior leader in strategy, brand, and culture.
We met one afternoon to talk about what’s drawn us to the either/org project, the challenges we see in our work today, how our own learning edges are shifting, and what we hope for the either/org community. Here are some highlights of that discussion.
Kristi: “What brought you to the either/org community?”
Tania: “The organization is an organism, living within a system, living within an ideology. The way I view it is, can we create an invitation to operate differently? I’m not here to think that I’ll fix the whole system, but can we try some experiments in safe-to-fail ways and encourage people to see that there are alternatives?”
Kristi: “Tell me more about liberatory design. What does that mean to you?”
Tania: “The intention of it is to shift us from autopilot into intentional decision making. When people say, what is design thinking, I would say it’s an alternative way to make decisions that’s rooted in talking to the people that are impacted, before you start making decisions about what the problem even is. So you are going in with an open mind. And then make some hypotheses and experiments and interventions to see what could work. That’s standard design thinking. In my own practice, there were a lot of power dynamics that constrained thinking. It started to feel transactional.
I met with other practitioners, it was around 2016, we were all sort of having these doubts. So we came together as a group and did a monthly Show-and-Tell to explore what we were working on. There were colleagues at the National Equity project. And then some of my former colleagues from the D school (Stanford design school). And we came together to say, there has to be something in the intersection of design and equity because equity work is so powerful at seeing and naming and changing beliefs. And design is the flip side, right? So initially, it was just for a passion for how these could be powerful together. And then later, it also became a business case and a way to help our clients. Because they’re facing some real complicated stuff that was not in the handbooks.”
Kristi: “You mentioned the monthly Show-and-Tells. There’s something in me that just wants to prove to people there are other ways. You can show them and talk about it. It’s not about replicating in your own organization but knowing it’s possible. What are you holding on to so desperately that you don’t even know you’re holding on to it? There are so many base operating assumptions we have that go unquestioned. That people don’t realize they are editing and inhibiting the outcomes they could get.”
Tania: “That’s what makes me sad.”
Kristi: “But it’s possible. We can do this. We can actually create spaces where people thrive and where the outcomes are good for the community, for customers, for your whole stakeholder group. We can do this. If you keep looking through the same lens you’re going to get the same outcomes.”
Tania: ‘You know, sometimes you need to see it without everything falling apart. Especially for our for-profit clients. They are accountable to their leadership. Yeah, that would be nice, but how do I make a case that we’ll make more money by doing the right thing? And there are all the arguments that you’ll do well because you have a healthy brand and a healthy culture. Your people will be more innovative because you take care of them. And they are like, cool, theoretically.”
Kristi: “Why are we so afraid to do something if somebody else hasn’t done it first?”
Tania: “ Yeah. Scarcity is so deeply part of our system. When I first started my business, the first question I always got was, how big are you? Are you pleased? How big was the measure of how well you were doing. I remember thinking, so that’s what people value. Growth, and numbers and scale. I don’t know if that’s what I want in my life. I started this business out of a passion, and to be free from all this unhealthy org design.”
Kristi: “Growth is not a measure of health. Especially unbounded growth. Look at what’s happened to our planet. Just growing, just more, is not good. That’s one of the things that has brought me to this work as well.
My last company was a B Corp and had really strong values around being multi-stakeholder. We ran the business with a multi-stakeholder model thinking of customers, vendors, staff, community partners and investors all the time and trying to make decisions that way. That’s possible and that’s real. At the same time, I think B Corp, ESG metrics, they are a report card on whether or not you are making measurable change on those valents, but it’s not actually changing the internal mechanisms that much. We’ve got an impact scorecard, it’s not just about profit, right. Yet in every leadership team meeting you are staring at a P&L and that’s the primary conversation. We’re trying to get someplace different but still operating in a top down, mechanistic, hierarchical, break-everybody-onto-nice-boxes way.”
Tania: “I find it fascinating. Where do you think is the biggest breakdown?”
Kristi: “It’s compartmentalizing. There’s a disconnect between the “business results” and the rest. A disconnect as if it’s not all one ecosystem. If we have some hero programs or we’re showing progress in a few environmental or social areas we are doing enough. Then we’re satisfied and can redirect attention back to the real stuff of the business. I don’t want to work that way anymore. I can’t.”
Tania: “A lot of folks who call us really want to do equity. And they also have these other responsibilities, and things they’ve tried that didn’t work, and they’re scared because they are accountable. I wonder if that’s a similarity with either/org. People coming together who crave this future, even if they are not there or even close, but just the intention is a start. When they see examples from others, the risk goes down. I love the idea of people being able to share.
Kristi: “What have you seen that helps get an organization to the tipping point where the fear goes down. Or where scarcity isn’t the top note anymore?”
Tanie: “Little question! We can talk about equity all day long, but when they go and start connecting with community members, whether that’s clients, internal stakeholders, investors. When they get to have even 30 or 40 minutes for an honest conversation about what’s not working, they come back fired up. It’s not an abstract exercise. They know exactly how this policy is causing some BIPOC staff to leave. They get into the interviews and it breaks their heart and they know it’s just not acceptable. Then they want to focus on a solution. The implementation, that’s the less glamorous part.”
“Same question, what do you see that helps people transition past fear?”
Kristi: “Intentionality. Leaders intentionally creating more safety and being vulnerable about their own experiences. I messed up here. This is what I learned from it. It wasn’t the end of the world, and it won’t be the end of the world if you mess up. We’re in this together. I think a strong mission or purpose helps give people something to ground in. For me that’s been an important piece of the puzzle. If you can connect a lot of voices then there’s momentum. A center of gravity. It starts to be self-reinforcing and people at all levels start to question or call things out.”
Tania: “We always tell our clients it’s safe to fail. Especially as an equity-centered firm. I really believe in experimenting. And sometimes experiments come at a high cost emotionally. We don’t want to be creating harm, so we have to find that balance too.”
Kristi: “What do you hope this either/org community can do together? Imagine it’s two years down the road. What might we be able to create?”
Tania: “One dream is that we surface so much that is not on Forbes and Fast Company — both for the benefit of everyone diving into it to learn and absorb and be inspired — and also for the benefit of the people who are doing such creative stuff off the radar and their expertise is needed right now. We are so hungry for it. Elevating them as well. That’s more about the database. In terms of the community, I hope it becomes a movement. I’d like to say this in a more positive way, but the way it’s coming to mind is it becomes so powerful and so enticing and so delicious that other orgs feel like they are falling behind if they are not a part of it.
Kristi: “I love that. Wow.”
Tania: “It becomes like, hey — we don’t want to be obsolete! We’re out here with these standard policies and look at that rainbow dream, I want to be part of that! What about you?”
Kristi: “Something similar. I’d like there to be enough momentum that people start to look to what we are offering as alternatives and say “oh, I want some of that in my own organization. I want to try some of that. I can see that there’s a possibility here.” I mentioned the B Corp community before and I’ve seen a lot of really good work come out of that community. People coalescing around the idea that your business can be a force for good and there’s a way to assess that from a multi-stakeholder perspective. I think what we’re doing is along the same lines and could become a movement as well. But I think it’s much more open-ended. It’s not the same as “hit this standard and you’re doing good.” It’s to learn from each other and collaborate. We haven’t even seen what really good could look like yet. We don’t even know what’s possible. Let’s see if we can just keep moving towards what’s possible instead of saying if you hit these five things and get a score of 100 and whatever you are good.”
Tania:”That’s exciting. I feel that way often when reading the database. 4 day work week, wow! And then you sit back and think, “is that that revolutionary?”. If that’s what amazes me and gets me excited, then we are in a drought over here.
Kristi: “Yes, there’s a lot more to go! We don’t even know yet. I think that by getting these thinkers in the room it will start to show itself. Things that none of us are carrying individually will emerge in the middle.”
Just for fun we wrapped up our dialogue with a little rapid-fire either/or…
Kristi: Alright, let’s do some rapid fire. Mountains or ocean?
Tania: Ocean
Kristi: Red or white?
Tania: White
Kristi: Jazz or Punk?
Tania: Punk
Kristi: Nice! Aliens or ancients?
Tania: Ancients.
Kristi: Lovely.
Tania: Alright I have to get some ready for you. Cats or dogs?
Kristi: Dogs
Tania: Mondays or Fridays?
Kristi: Fridays
Tania: Too easy. Taking a train or taking a plane?
Kristi: Train.
Tania: Oooh, OK. Orange or Banana?
Kristi: Orange.
Tania: Sitting under a tree or sitting under a boulder?
Kristi: Tree
Tania: I don’t know where that one came from! One more. Sunflowers or peonies?
Kristi: Peonies are my favorite! That was fun. I really enjoyed this hour, thank you.
Tania: So grateful. I learned a ton. I’m going to go write in my journal now.
