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Værker af Jennifer Garvey Berger

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Will probably need to read this another half dozen times over the next 10 years. Mind changing.
 
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emmby | 1 anden anmeldelse | Oct 4, 2023 |
The world is increasingly complex, ambiguous, volatile, and uncertain. How do we as leaders deal with that? The book is part business novel, part standard non-fiction. It explores tools that we can use to get a handle on these complexities. To be honest, I mostly ignored the business narrative part of it. It was useful for illustrating the concepts, but not more than traditional examples and case studies would have been.

Determine what's predictable and what's not, and lean in to leading in unpredictable settings. We evolved to handle mostly simple problems. Sitting around looking for shades of gray was more likely to get us killed than to get the right solution. The problems we need to address today — at least the hard ones — tend to be more nuanced. We need to resist our tendencies to ignore complexity and look for simple solutions.

One way we can embrace complexity is by resisting our tendency to jump to the solutions. Create spaces where people spend time talking about the problem. Focus on curious inquiry. If people start thinking about solutions, have them note them down and save them for later. Asking different questions helps us better understand the problem and the situation that's emerging. This can get us unstuck from solutions that might have worked in the past.

Create a feedback rich organization in which you and others can constantly learn about what needs to change. Most organizations give too little feedback and give it badly. Building a culture of continual feedback can create conditions for healthy organizations. Feedback helps organizations to react more quickly in the face of change. Feedback should separate out the situation from our internal story about the situation and clearly state the data that led to the feedback, the feelings that we had in response, and the impact of the action. E.g., move from "X is argumentative and disruptive" to "When X disagrees with others, they interrupt and raise their voice (data), this makes me uncomfortable (feelings), which makes me less willing to bring up challenging issues when they are in the room (impact)".

Leaders can talk about the ways feedback shapes the organization and change systems to support giving feedback. Feedback systems need to include feedback about what is going well in addition to what needs improvement. There's a tendency to believe only negative feedback is constructive, but feedback given well is constructive feedback whether it is positive or negative.

We can take the time to share the positive impact that feedback has had so that people are encouraged to give feedback to others. We can make feedback of regular part of the work day. In addition to performance reviews we can utilize forums like operating reviews and other meetings.

Choose a direction and build guardrails. The balance between alignment and directional diversity is a polarity that can only be managed — never fully resolved. Leaders can help manage this polarity by setting a direction and defining guardrails for safe experimentation. The direction and guardrails should be relatively stable. Change them if they're not working, but don't change them frequently or arbitrarily. A lot of the substance of the book revolves around how to effectively implement safe-to-fail experiments.

Examine the present and look for attractors. Leaders have traditionally been called upon to create a vision of the future. However, in a world of complexity, ambiguity, uncertainty, and volatility we also need to spend more time understanding the present. Leaders need to fight the temptation to focus on solutions. Instead, they need to look for patterns in the space. What are the attractors that feed into broader behavioral patterns? How can we clump together related but different ideas rather than reducing to a singular root cause? By looking at the present and at how the conditions of the present create the outcomes of the present we can find ways to change that are more effective than pointing to a future that does not take the present into account.

Experiment and learn. Organizations in complex environments need to focus on experimentation and learning. This can be hard for leaders who have been successful through problem solving and execution. Experimentation means giving up control. One type of organizational problem solving that often indicates failure is reorganizations. Reorgs can be useful, but most do not deliver what was promised. Instead, the authors suggest creating change through a number of smaller experiments. These experiments can shift the culture in the desired direction. Some experiments will fail. That can be hard to accept when we assume that the reorg would have succeeded. However, given the track record of reorgs, a mix of smaller failures and successes is likely better than one large failure that creates a bunch of disruption and ruins productivity in the meantime.

Communicate clearly in uncertain times. Communicating clearly means something different in complex times than it does in more orderly times. We need to communicate a mindset shift as well as a direction. We need to emphasize experimentation and adaptability. We need to call on both logic and emotions to communicate the change we want to enact. We need to listen carefully to people so we can hear the concerns underneath their words. Listening closely also helps us understand the types of stories that we can communicate to help make change successful. Where can we find past stories of experimentation and of change within the organization? Listening deeply will help us connect to others and learn.

All the while, develop a growth mindset in yourself and others. At the root of all of this, at the root of dealing with complexity, uncertainty, volatility, and ambiguity, is a reminder that we need to see ourselves as capable of growth. We need to move beyond our very human desire for clarity and simplicity, for straightforward cause and effect. We need to replace it with a mindset which helps us see the beauty of new perspectives, see what we know we're not previously able to see in systems, and ask questions which unlock doors that we didn't even know existed.

Learning needs to be seen not as something that is separate from the day-to-day work of getting things done but instead is integrated into daily productivity via effective feedback, problem solving focused peer coaching, and meetings which focus on learning and problem solving rather than status updates.

Overall, this book is full of valuable insights and practical takeaways. Despite the only semi-successful business novel elements, it's well worth the read.
… (mere)
 
Markeret
eri_kars | 1 anden anmeldelse | Jul 10, 2022 |
This book applies concepts from adult development theory to developing individuals, especially leaders, within a work context. The motivation is two-fold. First, by using a lens of adult development theory, it helps ground different development needs in a useful framework. Second, by placing development within a work context, it is possible to create sustainable change rather than the sort of change that happens in a class but is forgotten when someone goes back to the pressures and habits of their day-to-day environment.

Chapter 1 introduces adult development theory and the four forms of mind: self-sovereign, socialized, self-authored, and self-transforming. As we grow, how we make sense of the world changes. The theory presented in this book, taking largely from the work of Robert Kegan, identifies adult development stages with respect to perspective taking and beliefs about the origin of authority. Although I will not go into the four stages in depth, I do want to cover them briefly since they are so central to understanding the book.

The self-sovereign form of mind can only take on perspective, their own. Authority is externalized in rules and power relationships. About 13% of adults are in this stage of mind. It is often seen as immature.

The socialized form of mind is marked by adherence to an ideology. A person can take a wider perspective and is able to see things from the perspective of groups or ideologies they adhere to even when those perspectives differ from their own. Authority is found in the values of the group or ideology. This is the most common adult form of mind. About 46% of adults are in this form of mind.

The self-authored form of mind is marked by the creation of an internal belief system. A person can take the perspectives of others, those they agree with and disagree with (although disagreeable perspectives are often used to strengthen one's own perspectives). Authority is found in the internal system they have built. This is the second most common form of mind, about 41% of adults. This is the most common form of mind among leaders since their roles often demand the broader perspective taking that characterizes this form of mind.

The self-transforming form of mind is marked by a sense that no single perspective can hold the full truth. A person in this form of mind almost automatically considers the perspectives of others and uses them to influence their own. Authority is fluid and shared. One's own value system may not always be best.

Chapter 2 contains a more detailed discussion of the forms of mind, including delving into the strengths, blind spots, and areas of growth for each form of mind. Chapter 3 is one of the most useful chapters in the book. It gives a high-level view of how researchers and theorists assess forms of mind and provides tools for helping to start probe for forms of mind yourself. It comes with the important caveat that really assessing these requires extensive training.

Chapter 4 starts part 2 of the book, "Helping Others Grow." It mostly discusses coaching tips for coachees at different forms of mind. Some elements are applicable to anyone who has coaching as part of their role. Other parts are not. Chapter 5 explores how to make group learning situations more open to multiple forms of mind. This chapter is more applicable to those working in professional development than to leaders.

Chapter 6 is a chapter that is useful to anyone who helps develop people. It defines the key habits of mind to generate curiosity and support development: ask different questions, take multiple perspectives, and see the system. It provides examples of what this looks like at each form of mind.

Part 3 consists of two chapters about helping people change within the context of work. Chapter 7 describes the three key elements of a leader's job: set vision, inspire and motivate people, and connect tasks to people and purpose. As a leader's scope and scale increases, each of these areas shifts in nature. Also describes the paradoxes of leadership: leaders need to both set direction and be open to change. They feel like they have less control as they are seen as having more control. The chapter looks through these elements through the lens of each form of mind. The chapter then shares some specific ways to help leaders grow.

Chapter 8 expands the ideas about growth in the workplace from leaders to everyone in a company and sets forth a vision where companies are just as much about human development as produces, services, or shareholder value. It also contains some really solid advice about good meetings.

Overall, this book was a worthwhile use of my time. The adult development theory presented is a valuable lens for thinking about ways to help people grow. The primary downside of the book is that the structure is rather repetitive. By the end of the book, I almost didn't need to read how each concept applied to different forms of mind. This made actually reading it tedious at times. Despite this, the book had enough good ideas and substance to be worth reading the whole thing, and not a summary for those who are responsible for developing others.
… (mere)
 
Markeret
eri_kars | 2 andre anmeldelser | Jul 10, 2022 |
This book explains four level of self awareness that distinguish how people interact with each other and grow to their own potential. The initial level is very child-like, seeing the world from a fixed lens centered around the self. The most advanced level, the transformative, describes a self-aware, intentionally evolving person who can prompt the same in others. I found the book hard to read, in part because the concepts were so clear that they didn’t need as much explanation as was given. What I appreciate most is the ideas have kept returning to me over the past few days, which is always an indicator to me that I found the ideas valuable and thought provoking. If there’s one useful take-away I would share, it’s that the growth edge includes helping others by “Ask questions in such a way that helps someone (your or someone else) bump up against the edges of his understanding.”… (mere)
 
Markeret
jpsnow | 2 andre anmeldelser | Jun 23, 2019 |

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Værker
5
Medlemmer
133
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#152,660
Vurdering
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ISBN
10

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