The power of a leader to shape and limit the capability of an organisation has fascinated me since I did my masters thesis.
I have always tried to shy away from the “Great enemy” theory. I suspect there really are incredibly few Hitlers in this world. Most people, especially leaders are trying to do good and truly desire a better world. Leading is hard.
But if that is true then how can good leaders preside over organisations where so many people report terrible experiences? My answer is “Little foxes” - small mindsets, viewpoints and behaviours that subtly communicate limiting cultural norms to others that are then amplified and reinforced through networks. As a leader I am considering some of my own little foxes this weekend after news that the great James Lovelock passed away yesterday aged 103 (if you use a microwave oven or care about the hole in the Ozone layer then you may wish to share a little prayer of thanks for his amazing life and the amazing Gaia theory).
For the leader it’s a tiny bit of narrative control “Let’s focus on the positive and keep everybody’s hopes up”, but for every person present it sends a clarion call that this place is not safe for innovation and improvement.
From early childhood we all learned to “read between the lines”; to learn what is apparently acceptable (or not) whenever we see people's language not matching reality. One terrible example of this is when sports clubs exhibit normally distressing (and sometimes illegal) behaviours during initiation rituals. New players don’t speak up because a coach who would normally be calling the police is sitting with a beer in hand saying “just don’t tell me the details” or worse “it’s just boys having fun, we have all gone through this, it’s what makes a team bond.” These indicators of "special exceptions" create a situation where "we don't talk about it when it happens like this".
One amazing example from the Knowledge space is when a leader simply denies that a problem exists in their organisation. For the leader it’s a tiny bit of narrative control “Let’s focus on the positive and keep everybody’s hopes up”, but for every person present it sends a clarion call that this place is not safe for innovation and improvement. To offer a fix for something is to risk making an enemy of the person who declared the issue null and void, and who would risk their voice, influence or career just to possibly make a 2% efficiency improvement?
If you are a leader in your organisation, thank you for all you do and for the great visionary things you have achieved for your customers, stakeholders and employees. If you have read this far, please understand that you also have the potential to greatly limit what your people are capable of through the little things done and not done. And whether you see it or not, the vast sum of improvement comes from the thousands of individual efforts done in the shadow of your visionary projects and changes.
Vale, James Ephraim Lovelock 1919-2022. May we honour you by acknowledging the problems and acting on the insights you have left behind.
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