How to Build a Disruptive Organization: Part 1 (of 3): The Disruptive Mindset Demystified
I’ve presented and spoke about disruption a number of times now. Each time I ask the audience the following two questions:
- Who thinks it’s important to be disruptive?
- Who thinks their organisation is disruptive enough?
The answers are almost always the same: Almost everyone thinks being disruptive is important and almost everyone thinks their organization is NOT disruptive enough!
The main problem is that it’s difficult to define the elements of disruption and disruptiveness. Is it some activity that can be completed? Is it a personality or culture trait of the organization? Or is it the way things are done that unleash the full disruptive potential of an organization?
My answer is that disruptiveness is increased dramatically when we understand and cultivate the following three elements:
- Disruptive Mindset
- Disruptive Strategy
- Disruptive Leadership
In this, Part 1 of 3 articles, I will discuss the 7 elements of a Disruptive Mindset and how some people and teams are wired for high levels of disruption.
1. DISRUPTIVE MINDSET
It’s common for people to identify mindset as being either the key challenge or component of success. All too often, no detail is provided as to how a so called “mindset” operates and therefore what to develop, eliminate or amplify for success. I’m going to break this tradition and talk directly about the 7 critical elements of the Disruptive Mindset and how they can be leveraged to increase disruptive potential.
Our mindset is made of patterns of thinking that are shaped by the meta-programs we run in our minds. As their name implies, meta-programs are like microservices — small pieces of software that run at a meta level in the brain, creating a frame of mind.
Each meta-program colours the way we perceive the external world as we recreate it in the mind, and each is context specific. Michael Hall’s neurosemantics work and in particular, his book Figuring Out People, identifies and describes the different meta-programs that we all run.
If you have ever taken a Myers-Briggs personality assessment, you would have gotten a four-letter result such as ENTF or INTJ. These four letters represent Myers-Briggs’ idea (not
mine) of the pivotal meta-programs that describe people. (I won’t go into why I dislike the Myers-Briggs profile here. If you want to know my thoughts, send me an email or check out chapter 9 of the book.)
The Myers-Briggs assessment confusingly returns one letter for each meta-program that denotes which end of that meta-program continuum they have determined your personality to be at. The first of the four letters are either an “I” or an “E” and indicates whether we have been classified as an introvert or extrovert. Introvert and extrovert are actually the opposite ends of the Rejuvenation meta-program, as shown in Figure 1.
Meta-programs are a continuous spectrum, not a binary choice. In the Rejuvenation meta-program example, an Ambivert (someone who is both introverted and extroverted) would likely get a different letter each time they took the assessment.
Meta-programs are configured by our repeated thoughts and emotions and our mental states that we habituate over time. A lot of these meta-programs are set up early on in our lives and become key attributes of our personality. The great news is that meta-programs are re-programmable! Like habits, they take time and effort, but we can change them. Sometimes they change on their own without any conscious effort from us. Sometimes they take real focus, determination, and time to shift.
The 7 Meta-Programs of the Disruptive Mindset
Our brains run 60 different meta-programs all of which influence how we think and perceive reality. Whilst all 60 meta-programs have the potential to impact our disruptiveness, there are 7 key meta-programs that are most influential:
1. Time Zone
The Time Zone meta-program (Figure 2) determines where we focus our attention on time. For those of us that focus more on the past, we recall memories (positive and negative) and reflect back on past occurrences in order to understand the world. Others focus on the future, on what might be or could be. Sometimes, this brings about anxiety (a fear of what might go wrong in the future) or excitement (the potential of what might go right in the future). The final group of people are focused more on the present, the current time and place and what is happening, where they are and who they are with.
As you might imagine it’s hard to be disruptive if you are constantly focusing on the past or the present. The Disruptive Mindset is able to learn from the past but spends more of its time focusing on the FUTURE. It looks at the trends in the organisation, industry, technology, and society to create and respond to disruption.
2. Change Adapter
The Change Adapter meta-program (Figure 3) is probably the closest to what we might call the “innovator meta-program”. It dictates whether we have a preference for early adoption, medium or late adoption when change happens. Early adapters embrace change and are energised by it, late adopters fight and resist change. This meta-program is usually configured by our beliefs about change which are developed through our specific experience of the changes we have been through. Thus, if we hold the belief that change is painful and any changes we make will revert back over time, then we are likely to be a late adapter of change and resist, if not fight any change we experience.
The Disruptive Mindset is held by people who are EARLY adapters to change. They hold a positive view of change and enjoy the process of change. They thrive on change and are often bored by the lack of change, by normality.
3. Authority Source
The Authority Source meta-program (Figure 4) deals with where we look for authority or permission to do things. When we have an internal source of authority, we look within ourselves and determine if we are “allowed” to do something or if something is the “right” thing to do. If we have a strong external authority configuration we look to others such as Thought Leaders, more senior leaders and figures who demonstrate confidence and a sense of power or authority.
The Disruptive Mindset is fuelled by the INTERNAL source of authority. Often disruption means doing something new and innovative where it isn’t possible to seek guidance and authority for others. A strong sense of internal authority looks to others like confidence in our actions and decisions. It often leads us to work hard on activities that others would have waited for guidance or permission to undertake.
4. Relationship Comparison
The Relationship Comparison meta-program (Figure 5) determines the relationship we have with new information received. Do we match it with what we already know and look for how it’s the same or do we look to see how it differs from what we already know? People wired for matching will first identify the similarities in products, commercial models, technologies etc. Mismatchers will immediately identify the differences between the two options.
Whilst seeing the similarities can be great for building teams and cultures, it often hinders our ability to be disruptive. Disruption and innovation by definition is about doing things differently and creating new and different organisations and products, that MISMATCH the current status quo.
“Everything we do, we believe in challenging the status quo. We believe in thinking differently. The way we challenge the status quo is by making our products beautifully designed, simple to use and user friendly. We just happen to make great computers. Want to buy one?”
Simon Sinek’s quote about how Apple communicate taken from his 2009 TED Talk: How Great Leaders Inspire Action
5. Scenario Type
The Scenario Type meta-program (Figure 6) impacts how we believe a scenario will play out — are we optimistic about the future and think that all will go well? Or are we pessimistic, processing what might or will go wrong? Socially, optimists are more positively regarded; they are upbeat and engaging people to be around. What most people don’t understand is that optimists can make highly ineffective leaders. People who are overly optimistic take bigger risks, tend not to plan as much, and may not take action when it’s needed, because they think all will be okay.
However, the Disruptive Mindset has a strong sense of OPTIMISM that the person can change and disrupt the future in a positive way. Without this optimism, people don’t try new things or don’t fully commit their efforts to be successful, instead just going through a process that ends in failure, because that’s what they expected.
6. Conventional
The Conventional meta-program (Figure 7) deals with how we think about “fitting in” with others, our team, organisation, industry and society. Conformists want to fit in, be liked and be part of the group and seek group approval. Non-conformists don’t care for the norms and processes and can sometimes be considered as not being “team players”. Non-conformists are often creative and innovative and often identify lots of new and interesting options and alternatives to normality.
The Disruptive Mindset is underpinned by the NON-CONFORMIST end of this meta-program. It’s almost impossible to be disruptive if your meta-program is currently configured with a strong conformist preference.
7. Risk Taking
The Risk Taking meta-program (Figure 8) influences how we respond to new things, new experiences and situations that may be potentially dangerous to our reputation, success or career. Specifically, the Risk Taking meta-program influences what we feel when we perceive risk. Are we generally fearful of the outcomes, or generally excited about the potential upside of the outcome? Most individuals and leaders like to think that they are disruptive and embrace risk in their roles, however, most are not as embracing as they think they are.
Feeling some fear does not necessarily prevent us from being disruptive. However, disruptive individuals and teams feel more EXCITEMENT about the potential outcome than they fear the risks. Disruption is a risky business. Fearing risk holds us back from being truly disruptive and can (like the pessimist scenario type) see us undertaking projects that we label as disruptive but, which are actually quite safe and non-disruptive in reality.
The Disruptive Mindset
The Disruptive Mindset consists of preference for one end of these 7 meta-programs as shown in Figure 9. It’s important to remember that meta-programs are both context specific and re-programmable with effort. That is, there may be scenario’s where an individual exhibits a highly disruptive mindset (say at work with technology) and others (say with their finances at home) where they don’t.
Take the Self-Assessment Yourself
How disruptive do you think your mindset is currently? How disruptive do you need to be in your role or in your future aspirational roles? Take some time to reflect on how you operate and how your 7 meta-programs are configured for or against disruption. You can download the Disruptive Mindset Self-Assessment HERE to help with your reflections.
Disruptive Teams
The disruptive potential of a team comes from the number of individuals in the team that have disruptive mindsets. The best teams are diverse teams. A team of non-disruptive mindsets is going to struggle to be innovative and disruptive, instead searching for stability, conformity and safer modes of operation. Equally, a team of highly disruptive mindsets can create a significant disturbance within an organisation — It’s in their very mindset to not conform, to mismatch people, teams and standards and where possible break convention. Organisations usually need a blend of both disruptive and non-disruptive teams that create disruption and stability in the appropriate manner.
If you are looking to create a disruptive team then you need to have a higher percentage of individuals on the team that holds a disruptive mindset. You can use the 7 meta-programs and the Disruptive Mindset Self-Assessment to get a better understand of how disruptive an individual’s mindset is and create a team that you feel has the right balance for your context.
If, however, you have an existing team (that you cannot modify) and want to increase their disruption level, I highly recommend the facilitation of a disruption workshop, where the team talks about the concept of the Disruptive Mindset and it’s 7 meta-programs, rates their own mindset as a group and has a shared conversation about disruption and what it means for success of the product or service they are delivering within the organization.
In Part 2: Disruptive Strategy
In Part 2, I explore the second component of Disruptive Organisations — Disruptive Strategy and the important role it plays in driving innovation and culture.
Note: The concepts presented in this article are based on the Human Full Stack model in my book Evolving Digital Leadership, Apress, 2018. More information can be found here: https://evolvingdigitalleadership.com/
For more information on the models and the book please check out: https://evolvingdigitalleadership.com/
Find me on twitter https://twitter.com/JamesCuriously
Linked-in: https://www.linkedin.com/in/james-brett/
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