leadership- the opium that clouds our minds

8/13/2019 Leadership- The Opium That Clouds Our Minds

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Leadership: the opium that clouds our mindsRicardo I. Guido-Lavalle,PgMP, PMP

Most of our assumptions have outlived their uselessness.

Marshall McLuhan

Talking on Skype last week with y colleague and !riend"ailash #wation certain anageent topics he told e $...nothing of all this is new, Ricardo!%. Icopleented $yes, and &ishop 'erkeleyand his to be is to be perceivedwith his!alling trees in the wild was conteporary o! Sir Isaac(ewton. )e all ree&er (ewton and our inds are(ewtonian in shape. )ho ree&ers 'erkeley now*%.

That+s it. There+s little actually newknowledge showing up these last decades, other thaniggs+ &osos, &ig-&ang theory, genetic discoveries,new aterials developent andsweet piain Rio de

aneiro.This article is not against Leadership. In !act we

need true leaders !or the new ties. It is a&out the arketing o! it that delays theanswers we all need to key /uestions in anageent and value delivery. Please!ollow e in the ne0t pages.

I+ aaed reading Thinking, 1ast and Low, &y the (o&el Prie 2aniel"ohnean. e &rings to e a key insight I need to add to an assertion I ade in aprevious article3

There4s a &ias well ingrained in in our inds a!ter Isaac (ewton4ssuccess, that I1 we do our part, T5( things will happen !ollowing acontrolla&le casual !ashion. 'ut cople0ity, being causal, behaves like it4s

not. #t all practical purposes, ost &ig challenges have any, anydegrees o! !reedo, any stakeholders, -any pieces, and the pro&a&ilityo! !ailure increases 6ust &ecause o! this cople0ity. 7ou cannot siply8control8 your progra3 you at ost can govern it.

"ohnean deonstrated that huan &eings autoatically &uild causal storieso! non-causally linked events, and that characteristic is natural, ost pro&a&ly anevolutionary adaptation9:; way o! thinking regarding pro&les and organiations is !arore coplicated than initially thought. It sees that systeic thinking is not natural,and re/uires an e0tra ental e!!ort !ew people is willing to do.

Take !or instance the !ollowing sentence !ro Peter 2rucker I picked

alost at rando3

1 The dark side of this impressive study is that we no longer need Evil Geniuses to deceive people. Kohneman's discoveriessuggests that marketers and not-too brilliant people can grab a book and eecute mass-manipulation devices. Taking advantage

of the natural human bias to build causal histories by using few! unreliable data! communications people can prime minds and

induce erroneous conclusions. "nce the mass buys an idea! it's hard for anyone to rollback it from minds.

# $egarding the previous comment. Today % open the newspaper and read that &resident "bama says that the ( is in risk to beas une)ual as *rgentina. The fact is that *rgentina has a little better ine)uality Gini inde! and is the best performer in +atin

*merica! as you can easily check in the ,%* actbook. eelings count in communications! not knowledge.

Even more/ %na previous blog post% commented on a (oftware actory % worked at! whose historicalrecords! showed 100-00slippage in cost and 0-#02 slippage in time! even for small engagements. *nd that would never influence the cost-timeestimates of further pro3ects/

4 *nd more/ or George (tinney! 14 5you read it right! 14 years old6! the 3ury took some 10 minutes to condemn him to the chairin 1744! based 3ust in a police declaration about a supposed self-incriminating confession by the boy. $acism is great part of the

eplanation! but reason in this case was absolutely overwhelmed by the anger that came from the crime characteristics! insteadthan by the evidence.
http://br.linkedin.com/in/riglav/http://br.linkedin.com/in/riglav/http://www.linkedin.com/pub/kailash-awati/11/7a7/351http://www.linkedin.com/pub/kailash-awati/11/7a7/351http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Berkeleyhttps://www.google.com.br/search?q=pizza+doce+images&espv=210&es_sm=93&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&sa=X&ei=B-CfUtyAL_DNsQTRmID4Ag&ved=0CC0QsAQ&biw=1185&bih=568&dpr=0.9https://www.google.com.br/search?q=pizza+doce+images&espv=210&es_sm=93&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&sa=X&ei=B-CfUtyAL_DNsQTRmID4Ag&ved=0CC0QsAQ&biw=1185&bih=568&dpr=0.9http://www.amazon.com/Thinking-Fast-Slow-Daniel-Kahneman-ebook/dp/B00555X8OA/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1386250484&sr=8-1&keywords=thinking,+fast+and+lowhttp://gbdelivery.blogspot.com.br/2013/10/gap-based-delivery-and-program.htmlhttp://gbdelivery.blogspot.com.br/2013/10/gap-based-delivery-and-program.htmlhttp://gbdelivery.blogspot.com.br/2013/11/off-topica-heroes-story-project.htmlhttp://gbdelivery.blogspot.com.br/2013/11/off-topica-heroes-story-project.htmlhttp://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/nov/09/george-stinney-retrial-south-carolina-executed-murderhttp://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/nov/09/george-stinney-retrial-south-carolina-executed-murderhttp://www.linkedin.com/pub/kailash-awati/11/7a7/351http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Berkeleyhttps://www.google.com.br/search?q=pizza+doce+images&espv=210&es_sm=93&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&sa=X&ei=B-CfUtyAL_DNsQTRmID4Ag&ved=0CC0QsAQ&biw=1185&bih=568&dpr=0.9http://gbdelivery.blogspot.com.br/2013/10/gap-based-delivery-and-program.htmlhttp://www.amazon.com/Thinking-Fast-Slow-Daniel-Kahneman-ebook/dp/B00555X8OA/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1386250484&sr=8-1&keywords=thinking,+fast+and+lowhttp://gbdelivery.blogspot.com.br/2013/11/off-topica-heroes-story-project.htmlhttp://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/nov/09/george-stinney-retrial-south-carolina-executed-murderhttp://br.linkedin.com/in/riglav/


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2id you think those ideas a&out epowerent were new* 2rucker pu&lishedhis Manageentin 9?@


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This picture has alost the sae structure as the classical control loop !oundin ost &ooks3

Fig 2. The simplest control loop's diagram

)e are used to the idea o! top anagers anaging iddle-anagers, andiddle-anagers anaging $actual working% people. Let e odel a very sipleorganiational structure with the onitor and control loops, each anager dealingwith ; people3

Fig. 3. A 3x3 organizational chart with control and feedac! lines

5asy seeing, even with a very siple control !eed&ack loop, the syste/uickly evolves into non-linear. # non-linear syste is one that cannot &e solved &ysegenting it, solving its coponents and then adding up the di!!erent solutions =yes,that a&out the whole is more than the sum of its parts). #s you can easily derive,there+s a great chance that the anager either wrongly coands, isreads the!eed&ack loop, wrongly ad6usts the coands to the people under hi and poorlyrecords organiational learning. 7ou surely witnessed it already.

It+s &ecause o! this cople0ity that so e0pensive tools and so any people=R, CMMI en!orcers, PMDs, Consultants, Coaches, etc> are &rought to solve thiskind o! anageent systes+ draw&acks. In !act, lots o! consultancy !irs ake aliving 6ust &y easing the anager+s control loops. I+ one o! those consultants. 7ouare.

The new nae !or managementis now Leadership. It sees that anagers

showed too uch attention to their careers and to old idols like Control andMonitoring, so they are now &eing evolved into leaders. Leaders will &e a&le to deal


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with the new challenges cople0ity poses to organiations. They are going to &ettertake in account huan issues. So I read every orning under $Motivation andLeadereship%-like !eeds.

I 6ust ran Google !or $myths about leadership%. Read care!ully3 out o! &arely adoen articles on leadership yths, onl" onedoes notention $leaders are born

leaders%. I don+t really care whether leaders &ring leadership in the 2(#, were ilkedwith (an !or Leaders or they need to pay !or a leadership training course. The !actthat the vast a6ority o! entries even entions the /uestion strongly suggests that ourpriary concern is not a&out leadership, &ut a&out whetherwe will have a place inthe new order.

(ow, I have a /uestion !or you3 wh"do we need leaders* 2o we needleaders* Take your tie, it deserves. Meanwhile I invite you to check one o! theanswers I !ound in the we&3

Fig. #e need leadership ecause it's important to do what managers alread" tr" to

$o "ou need a tuxedo%

May&e you do. #re you attending a pro, a party in the 'elgian 5&assy, oryour own arriage* 7ou need a tu0edo.

I think this article in 1or&escan &etter e0plain what I suggest3

Thus, in the vast anageent literature, there are calls !ororganiations to &ecoe $ore purpose!ul%, $ore strategic%, $ore client!ocused% or $ore arket oriented%, along with pleas !or ore $intrinsicotivation%, $ore epowerent%, $&etter e0ecution%, $stronger leadership%,$servant leadership%, $strengths-&ased leadership% or $prial leadership%.The list goes on.

These ideas have all have &een tried, soeties with good results.'ut none has led to a reinvention o! anageent. ThatEs partly &ecausesingle-!i0 solutions cannot address the cople0 array o! pro&les thatanageent now !aces. 5ach idea !ocuses on a particular su&set o!anageent challenges without tackling the cople0 systeic change thatis needed.

(ow, why do we need leaders* Let e answer in the !ollowing indirect way3

Traditional anageent cannot cope with cople0, wickedendeavors. So I guess that in order to challenge the tradition and the &asicassuptions on control and anageent, we could work it out &y usingsoe sort o! deviantanagers that would take in account the whole picture,would use lateral thinking and would ake people teawork in ways wecould not accoplish &y using the traditional anageent ways and skills.Let+s call the people that ena&les such &ehavior, Leaders.
http://www.leadergrow.com/articles/69-six-great-myths-about-leadershiphttp://www.forbes.com/sites/stevedenning/2011/05/12/reinventing-management-requires-systemic-change/http://eight2late.wordpress.com/2013/07/19/wickedness-undecidability-and-the-metaphysics-of-decision-making-in-organisations/http://eight2late.wordpress.com/2013/07/19/wickedness-undecidability-and-the-metaphysics-of-decision-making-in-organisations/http://www.leadergrow.com/articles/69-six-great-myths-about-leadershiphttp://www.forbes.com/sites/stevedenning/2011/05/12/reinventing-management-requires-systemic-change/http://eight2late.wordpress.com/2013/07/19/wickedness-undecidability-and-the-metaphysics-of-decision-making-in-organisations/http://eight2late.wordpress.com/2013/07/19/wickedness-undecidability-and-the-metaphysics-of-decision-making-in-organisations/


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This is the very root cause o! so any leadership courses, i.e. the perceptionthat soething is &loodily wrong in organiations. The apparent need !or leaders ispart of an implementation of a management strategy or model, not a silver &ullet.Meanwhile, leadership is a &est seller, and I could not avoid entioning it, like I didwith#gile.

The ost agreed-upon origin o! these trou&les is a&out cople0ity, non-linearpro&les, the ipossi&ility o! actually herding cats. )hether this characteriation i!!inal or not, no&ody knows, &ut it has any &elievers =&ut traditional anageent hasuch ore !ollowers>.

Traditional anageent did !ine !or aking 1ord-Ts and running ancientloos. This kind o! anageent is a co!ort one, and to develop careers in thatold is pretty straight!orward3 step on them all and climb. In turn, current approachestalk a&out distri&uted power and responsi&ility, &rand-new value systes and 5thics,teawork, openness and transparency.

)e need, however, a change in organiations, and the answer to the whyisdeceptively siple and power!ul3 We need a change in organiations facing wickedchallenges because they evidently cannot deliver results and benefits as epected atvisioning time, along with a better alignment with environmental factors, and nostrategy based on current management models could solve this very gap between"ision and #ecution.

&uch ado aout nothing

2ear reader, please !orgive e !or the &lur& a&ove. #s I put it, and taking inaccount "ohnean research, I know it is not easy thing to change your ind withthese cray concepts. 1or they are cray indeedA Cople0ity and non-linear thinkingare actually a&solutely counter-intuitive, our &rains will always look !or cause ane!!ect, regardless o! our volition. I look at the Curiosity space progra in Mars,certainly as non-linear challenge, and I autoatically ap it to a sipler, linear

challenge. # purposed act is needed to not succu& to y !irst intuitive thought.)hen I applied soe concepts a&out Gap-'ased 2elivery I was seen like a

ad guy. )eren+t &y the !act I was doing !airly well, I would have &een hung &y theneck on the spot.

)hat is in all this !or Gap-'ased 2elivery*

Gap-'ased 2elivery is an approach toward &ridging the gap &etween actualprogra state and !inal, e0pected state. G'2 ay or ay not evolve in a ethod, &utin any case it+s an use!ul way to unstuck progras and initiatives. 7ou will use G'2not insteado! an e0isting e0ecution strategy =&e it traditional Plan-&ased prograanageent, #gile, Mission Leadership or whatever ethod you pre!er>, &ut you+lluse it when the selected e0ecution strategy proves una&le to ake the pro6ect

succeed. G'2 assues not necessarily ore risks, &ut a very di!!erent set o! valuesand engageent rules.

#nyway soe arenas are &etter !its !or G'2 than others.

In the traditionally anaged organiation, a Gap-&ased 2elivery attitude willshow as a&solutely deviant and su&versive. G'2 -in its e0tree, un&ound!orulation- won+t respect hierarchies nor issions and !unctions3 what atters iswhat each tea e&er can &ring to the solution, no atter what hisFher place in theorganiation is. G'2 won+t care a&out careers or past history, &ut a&out the pieceseach person can &ring to &uild the &ridge toward success.

Conversely, Gap-'ased 2elivery !its like a glove in the new organiation+sarchitecture, assuptions and dynaics. In a great uni!ication workStephen

2enning, author o!The Leader+s Guide to Radical anageent, proposes !ive keyshi!t organiations need to e0ecute3
http://gbdelivery.blogspot.com.br/2013/11/agile-methods-and-gap-based-delivery.htmlhttp://gbdelivery.blogspot.com.br/2013/11/agile-methods-and-gap-based-delivery.htmlhttp://gbdelivery.blogspot.com.br/2013/10/gap-based-approaches-toward-program.htmlhttp://gbdelivery.blogspot.com.br/2013/10/ethics-in-gap-based-delivery.htmlhttp://eight2late.wordpress.com/2013/07/19/wickedness-undecidability-and-the-metaphysics-of-decision-making-in-organisations/http://gbdelivery.blogspot.com.br/2013/11/ultimate-4-conditions-to-stand-chance.htmlhttp://gbdelivery.blogspot.com.br/2013/11/ultimate-4-conditions-to-stand-chance.htmlhttp://stevedenning.typepad.com/steve_denning/2010/11/the-deathand-reinventionof-management-a-draft-synthesis.htmlhttp://www.amazon.com/dp/0470548681?tag=stevdenndotco-20&camp=213381&creative=390973&linkCode=as4&creativeASIN=0470548681&adid=12HHN5GF9S4A99VCP95K&&ref-refURL=http://stevedenning.typepad.com/steve_denning/2010/11/the-deathand-reinventionof-management-a-draft-synthesis.htmlhttp://www.amazon.com/dp/0470548681?tag=stevdenndotco-20&camp=213381&creative=390973&linkCode=as4&creativeASIN=0470548681&adid=12HHN5GF9S4A99VCP95K&&ref-refURL=http://stevedenning.typepad.com/steve_denning/2010/11/the-deathand-reinventionof-management-a-draft-synthesis.htmlhttp://gbdelivery.blogspot.com.br/2013/10/gap-based-approaches-toward-program.htmlhttp://eight2late.wordpress.com/2013/07/19/wickedness-undecidability-and-the-metaphysics-of-decision-making-in-organisations/http://gbdelivery.blogspot.com.br/2013/11/agile-methods-and-gap-based-delivery.htmlhttp://gbdelivery.blogspot.com.br/2013/10/ethics-in-gap-based-delivery.htmlhttp://gbdelivery.blogspot.com.br/2013/11/ultimate-4-conditions-to-stand-chance.htmlhttp://gbdelivery.blogspot.com.br/2013/11/ultimate-4-conditions-to-stand-chance.htmlhttp://stevedenning.typepad.com/steve_denning/2010/11/the-deathand-reinventionof-management-a-draft-synthesis.htmlhttp://www.amazon.com/dp/0470548681?tag=stevdenndotco-20&camp=213381&creative=390973&linkCode=as4&creativeASIN=0470548681&adid=12HHN5GF9S4A99VCP95K&&ref-refURL=http://stevedenning.typepad.com/steve_denning/2010/11/the-deathand-reinventionof-management-a-draft-synthesis.html


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9. The !irst shi!t stes !ro a onuental transition in the power&alance &etween seller and &uyer3 to anageent+s astonishent, the&uyer is now in the driverEs seat. #s a result, the !irEs goal has to shi!t toone o! delighting clients3 i.e. a shi!t !ro inside-out =$7ou take what weake%> to outside-in =$)e seek to understand your pro&les and willsurprise you &y solving the%>.

:. The second shi!t stes !ro the !irst transition, as well as theepochal transition !ro sei-skilled la&or to knowledge work. #gain toanageent+s astonishent, traditional hierarchy suddenly doesnEt workanyore. The role o! the anager has to shi!t !ro &eing a controller to an

ena&ler, so as to li&erate the energies and talents o! those doing the work and reove ipedients that are getting in the way o! work.

To support and sustain those two shi!ts, three other shi!ts arenecessary3

;. The ode o! coordination shi!ts !ro hierarchical &ureaucracy todynaic linking, i.e. to a way o! dynaically linking sel!-driven knowledge

work to the shi!ting re/uireents o! delighting clients.

o! shi!ts 9 and : clearlydisrupts the anageent hierarchy, as it &reaches the counication chains andthus su&verts hierarchies, Gap-'ased 2elivery will also strive !or such dynaicsH.

Shi!t ;, dynaic linking, is a re/uireent also !or a good Gap-&ased 2eliverydynaics, as it is !or #gile and Mission Leadership.

Shi!t < will ake things uch easier !or Gap &ased 2elivery when it is a&out

looking !or !easi&le e0ecution scenarios and desira&le outcoes. )hile it+s a&solutelygood to have the values and the vision set &e!ore engaging in e0ecution, &oth thetactical scenarios and the outstanding reality will call !or a revision o! the originalo&6ectives and the /uality o! the planned &ene!its. Things change, the world change,inds do. I dou&tGeorge Stinney, 9< would &e e0ecuted nowadays, either guilty orinnocent.

#nd this is a key concept that applies3 Gap-'ased 2elivery is a&out dynaics.)here traditional anageent sees states, G'2 sees snapshots o! evolvingstructures. Manageent will see rules as architecturally constitutive o! the very

*gile in fact goes after such kind of communications! when it brings to the team the solution's owner. % however think *gile

was timid! and ultimately bowed to traditional management8 hori9ontal communications are to be held inside the team! thus itresults in an useful patch to organi9ation's faults. % guess *gile can evolve to naturally swim in the new organi9ation's waters.

:y the way! ;patch; in this contet is not a disrespect8 we are all about solving problems! not about elegance. G:< is a patch!in fact! when applied to traditionally-managed organi9ations.
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/nov/09/george-stinney-retrial-south-carolina-executed-murderhttp://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/nov/09/george-stinney-retrial-south-carolina-executed-murderhttp://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/nov/09/george-stinney-retrial-south-carolina-executed-murder


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anagerial activity, while G'2 will see rules as part o! a tactical situation. G'2 will tryto sur! the rules and gain oentu !ro the or !ro the gaps the rules ake.)here a traditional player sees rules as constraints, Gap-'ased 2elivery sees terrainand opportunity. 5ven a &ad rule can give you haven. Rules ake sense as long asthey are use!ul to reach the ne0t organiation+s evolutionary step.

The ideal organiation -and there isn+t and there will never &e such ideal thing-is a people cople0 soothly running in sync with its environent, changing with thechanges in itsecological nicheand aintaining the harony o! its constituents. I!e0ternal rules change, the organiation ust change. I! people+s rules, e0pectationsand needs change, the organiation changes. That is the ultiate and pre!erredarena !or Gap-'ased 2elivery.

#!ter living with their dys!unctional &ehavior !or so any years=a sunk cost i! ever there was one>, people &ecoe invested in de!endingtheir dys!unctions rather than changing the.

J Marshall Goldsith

Mo6oTen years ago, Peter Senge introduced the idea o! the +learning

organiation+ (ow he says that !or &ig copanies to change, we need tostop thinking like echanics and to start acting like gardeners.

J #lan M. )e&&erLearning !or a Change

The greatest danger in ties o! tur&ulence is not the tur&ulence itis to act with yesterdayEs logic.

J Peter 2rucker

---o---

Kisitg&delivery.&logspot.co
http://www.sciencedaily.com/articles/e/ecological_niche.htmhttp://www.sciencedaily.com/articles/e/ecological_niche.htmhttp://gbdelivery.blogspot.com/http://gbdelivery.blogspot.com/http://gbdelivery.blogspot.com/http://www.sciencedaily.com/articles/e/ecological_niche.htm

leadership- the opium that clouds our minds

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