Hospice Worker or Midwife?
CEOs: In your organisation, are you Hospice Worker or Midwife?
We’re now in Lockdown 3.0. The WHO says Covid might not even be the worst virus humankind experiences over the next few years. But there’s light at the end of the tunnel - vaccines for all who live in developed countries by the end of 2021. So, we’ll be back to a very (very) different normal for the way society works, and the way the economy operates, by 2022, more or less.
I could talk about the 2020s being the thousand-year decade (i.e. the amount of change we see in this decade will be greater than the change experienced in the last 1,000 years). Or I could talk about how Covid-19 accelerated many mega-trends that were already happening. Deloitte Consulting, for example, reckon that fully 40% of all work can be done from home, permanently.
No, instead, I want to ask you a question: Are you, as a leader of your organisation, operating as a Hospice Worker, or a Midwife?
Let me explain. There's a theory of organisational change, which I believe feels about right, which was introduced to me at a Purpose Disruptors event. It was first noticed by Meg Wheatley and Deborah Frieze from the Berkana Institute. Their theory noticed a phenomenon that seems to explain what society and the economy, and therefore the market you operate in, is going through. They called it The Two Loop Theory of Organizational Change and if want to find out more read their paper, “Using Emergence to Take Social Innovation to Scale” …link
They noticed that change emerges in human systems out of multiple, often disparate, series of actions, that spontaneously link together organically and purposefully to develop new networks of interdependence based on mutual interest.
Sounds a bit complicated, but ponder the words, and consider, what if this is right?
What if we are experiencing a global economic and social transformation, as fundamental as the shift from the agricultural age to the industrial age? What if we’re now shifting again to a new age? A new epoch that will emerge in the 2020s.
They observed that there were two forces at play during the changeover period. A period where systems, and entities within systems including companies and other organisations, are simultaneously dying and being re-born. Or to be more accurate, have the opportunity to die or the opportunity to be re-born.
Hence the question: as a leader of your organisation are you operating as a Hospice Worker or a Midwife?
Most people who work in organisations are used to the living part of this transformational model, and most organisational change models focus on ideas around innovation, birth and growth.
But they miss the other side of the coin. That effort for birth and growth in one part of the system, necessitates the decline and death of something else.
That for effective and successful transformation of a organisation in this new market that's emerging, leaders will need to address, and strategically plan for what they want to birth, and what they want to allow to die.
Put another way: what aspects of your processes, your culture, how you’re positioned in the market, how you engage your clients, how you hire your future talent, are a legacy of the past way of being successful?
And think about how much more successful and useful your organisation can be if these are considerately managed down, to release energy, time and money into the new?
And how much better if this helps create a new market position for your organisation that is positive for people, planet and profit?
So I guess the truth is, to be a really successful leader, you need to be both Hospice Worker and Midwife.
David Atter
GoodWork.Company operates as the Marketing Team, part-time, for organisations to deliver a positive return for people, planet, profit.