Report from the Field

Last week I learned something important at a much deeper level. I attended Otto Scharmer’s Leading Profound Innovation training in Toronto, and flew directly into the mix at the company where I now work. What a juxtaposition. From the safe warm confines of working with 50 other folks who where all dedicated to the concept of developing group consciousness in the world of business to the harsh reality of working within an unconscious group.

This isn’t going to go where you think it might. It is awfully popular to rail against the machine, to blame the system and to be indignant about “the man.” That I won’t do. That wasn’t the learning, anyway. The problem is not the company I work for, not the unconscious behavior, and not the people who are acting unconsciously. That isn’t a problem. That’s just the situation.

There are four people at the top–the CEO, the President (CEO’s right hand guy), and to other senior execs. Each one, a good, likeable man. Each one quite skilled and successful. The problem? They won’t have the tough conversations required at that level. They keep things just squiggly enough between them that each can jiggle enough to do whatever they want. But that show isn’t going to work any longer. They’ve grown too big, too fast and the current business opportunities and challenges are simply too great.

When I was simply consulting, I tried to help them work on that dynamic. But, do you want to know something? With the best of intentions, I actually ended up supporting the continuation of the craziness. When problems bubbled up from this dysfunction, I’d help them “solve” the issues. Solve the face value of the issues we did, but the root kept going deeper and deeper. The tree kept growing higher and higher. And here I am. Me and my tree.

So there I was, a little jet-lagged and tired, sitting in my first meeting at the company down south after learning about leading profound innovation up north, and I think to my self, “Oh, shit.” At first, I didn’t know why I thought that. Then, I had to check to make certain I didn’t actually say it out loud. (Good news, I hadn’t.) It was not “oh, shit” in terms of “why in the world did I commit to this company and this craziness,” but the kind of “oh, shit” that comes up with you see the writing on the wall regarding your own behavior and culpability.

Mind you, I’ve had family, friends and mentors who love to rail against the system. And I’ve joined them. But that is an old, worn-out record isn’t it? It is for me. So there I sat, with a very sinking feeling. My ego, very much wanting to see myself as being separate from the system, merely a witness to the insanity, possessing such high emotional intelligence that I could be there in it and not have it stick to me. But then, the one, crystaline “bing” rings into consciousness. 

I am not separate from this system: I must change.

Listen. Like you, I’ve read the whole Gandhi “be the change you want to see in the world” quotation. Yes, I got that intellectually. Yes, I’ve quoted it. But you can wax mentally on that notion all you want, but just wait until it nails you between the eyes. When the intellectual delight turns into your fingers going cold.

It is not whether the system changes as a result of me changing, either. If my motive is to change the system through changing myself, I will get whacked sixteen ways to Sunday. I took on this responsibility to learn about myself, to become a leader.

It is about me becoming the very best Otis I can be. If I do that, the system may change, the system may no longer affect me, the system may cough me up and spit me out, or I may become clear that I’ve taken all from it I can and it is time to go. But it comes down to this, I guess.

It is just as impossible to become a leader by subrogating to the system as it is to rail against it. So there lies the middle way. To simply become the best Otis I can be, to become the leader I know in my heart I am capable of becoming, and to accept the consequences–”good” or “bad”–of doing so. It is a fool’s game to see myself as outside of the system. It is a fool’s game to lose myself in the political games within it. It is a fool’s game to assume that if I do it well, then my reward is I’ll get my way.

So here I am. The System. And Not The System. And I am getting a feeling for what that means. I am getting a feeling for the way forward. I find that a very exciting possibility. Now. To do. Me and my tree.