Dr. Kathy Allen of Kathleen Allen & Associates and I explore the fascinating relationship between systems thinking, nature, and leadership. We discuss practical tips for people interested in developing their knowledge, skills, and abilities. We also explore considerations for leadership educators and program architects. The insights Kathy shares will keep your mind full and your priorities oriented toward a generative place.
Quotes from This Episode
Resources/Links to Discussion Topics:
Dr. Kathy Allen of Kathleen Allen & Associates and I explore the fascinating relationship between systems thinking, nature, and leadership. We discuss practical tips for people interested in developing their knowledge, skills, and abilities. We also explore considerations for leadership educators and program architects. The insights Kathy shares will keep your mind full and your priorities oriented toward a generative place.
Quotes from This Episode
Resources/Links to Discussion Topics:
spk_0: 0:10
practical wisdom. Scott Allen.
spk_1: 0:13
Hello. I am Scott Allen. And thanks to my daughter, Kate, for developing the intro to the practical wisdom for Leaders Podcast, where we offer a smart, fast paced discussion in all things leadership. My guests help us explore timely topics and incorporate practical tips to help you make a difference in how you lead and live. If you haven't done so, please click. Subscribe. So you automatically seamlessly stay in the know when we publish new episodes. Likewise, please provide me with feedback. What do you like? What do you dislike? And what else would you like to know? And now, today's show. So good afternoon, everybody. This is Scott Allen, and I am excited to have my guest today. This is Kathy Allen from Kathleen Allen and associates. And Kathy, I don't even think I told you that I was going to do this. But I'm about to and so get ready.
spk_0: 1:08
Thanks for no warning. Yeah, exactly. Exactly.
spk_1: 1:12
So when I think of you, you wrote an article. Gosh, it must be 15 years ago now. That was my favorite article for so many years. And I The title of the article was energy optimization and the role of the leader. It was an article that you actually co authored and that that has just stuck with me for so many years. And so for each guest that I have on, I have three words that when I think of you or I think of the guest and so for you, I've chosen systems, I've chosen nature and I've chosen leadership.
spk_0: 1:48
Oh, how cool,
spk_1: 1:50
Because when I when I think of your work, at least much of the work that I've read it incorporates these three topics that some people might think to be completely not connected. But they are. And so I want to start today by just getting into a little bit about you. How did you kind of get to where you are today? And then let's jump into a discussion about systems, nature and leadership. Does that sound
spk_0: 2:21
okay? That sounds great. So I think I've ah always been fascinated by seeing how things connect. And once you go down that path, it's easy to start experimenting with systems. And, you know, if we lifted up a sheet of paper playing sheet of paper and he said, took your class and asked them to divide into groups and name all the different things processes and people that touched this to get to a plain sheet of paper in your hand. Yeah, some people might start at the sawmill, right? Yes, yeah, Some people might start with the the forest that the raw materials coming from some people might go to distribution. You know, some people might go to marketing. Some people might say, Well, I picked it up at this store. Yes, I've always kind of kept going back upstream to try to see all of the connections. And the and systems in A in a very simple way are It's about people who see who are able to see all the different parts of something, and then they connect them together. And then as soon as they connect them together there in this world of systems, they start saying, Oh, well, there are patterns to this. All of these connections, there's the the growing and the harvesting of trees. There's the getting them to the sawmill down the river. There's the doing this all male and turn it into pulp on. There's, uh than the process. And then there's the turning it into paper, and then there's the marketing and distribution, and then there's the store that you pick it up and then you could begin to see all of the different parts. For me, systems thinking is really something relatively obvious. First of all, you try to name all the parts you can. Then you try to figure out, OK, are there themes or patterns in the system? Then your strategy and understanding of the system comes from the themes and the patterns. And then if you bring those together, you begin to see the interdependence of everything. So that's kind of what drew me into systems. And then nature has always played a huge role in my life. I've always loved the outdoors, a spent a lot of time growing up, going to camp and doing canoe trips and stuff
spk_1: 5:03
like, You're right, you're in the right state for that, right? Minnesota and, ah, you're in your most recent book leading from the roots. Eso Even. There's a there's a ah theme there,
spk_0: 5:16
correct. There is. And so I've been fascinated since for about 20 years now, with being more intentional, looking at nature and nature's design. I kind of from a leadership perspective, I think that we're we need it. We're working with people and we're trying to teach leadership and develop leadership so that people can go out and lead complex, dynamic, interdependent systems. Yes, organizations, communities doesn't matter, and the systems framework is important. But nature is a complex, interdependent, dynamic system. Yes, and I don't think much of our traditional management and leadership books actually fully get how leadership is different in a complex system.
spk_1: 6:10
Say more about that, Cathy. So? So how would you see? Leadership is being different in that context, I mean that it's a really, really cool conversation. What are some hallmarks, or what are some things that you think about her you're thinking about right now? Because again, we've touched on all three of those words really quickly, which I love systems, nature, leadership. So what are those connections you're making?
spk_0: 6:35
So I think most of our management, conventional wisdom is, was really good in closed systems that you can control. So the manufacturing plant door. So our whole hierarchical framework of leadership assumes that people at the top direction is required from people at the top that's what we call leadership on and that people should be able to know everything and they should be able to control everything underneath, um, in the hierarchy. And that's not our world anymore. You know, an open system, which takes problems that we have tried to understand through a complicated lens to a complex lance. So in a complicated lens, your job is to analyze the parts, break the system down, figure out what parts not working, kind of like when your car is not going, you know, working so and then figure out, fix the part and then rebuild the system, and then you have your solution. So we've taught people in our management and leadership courses how to analyse things, how to go down into the parts to figure out how to fix a broken system. But it's not a real good fit for a world that's an open system where systems bump into each other, where there's a higher degree of interdependence. So there's more disruption just naturally in the system, and so we have to start teaching people how to lead from a complex framework, and that requires a totally different strategy. So instead of going down into the parts. You actually have to go up to the balcony to see the pattern. Okay. And then your strategy comes from the meadow view. Not the detail view.
spk_1: 8:26
Okay. Example you owed for sure. We're not in control, right? I mean, as soon as we become a global interdependent, as you said, complex system. So take me through that were on the balcony. And do you have an example that comes to mind for you? That that you could share with listeners of that process of getting on the balcony and leading from this totally different perspective?
spk_0: 8:53
So the Corbett 19 virus pandemic. There's been a huge lessons on leadership. Ah, and observing people who are doing leadership in this unique time. And, uh, the virus itself is a complex, interdependent, highly disruptive and dynamic kind of event in our lives. Yes. So what it's done is it's reminded us that we're connected. Yes, and it's a
spk_1: 9:23
very riel, substantial, tangible way right there, right from Wuhan, China. We're connected here in in Ohio or in Minnesota, and very it's almost scary to think
spk_0: 9:36
about things. Travel was affected by global traveling and mobility were connected our economic, our public health are our emotional responses are community dynamics. You know, we're connected in all kinds of ways. So you have people who are trying to go down into the parts of the virus response and say, But we have to figure out this or we have to figure out this. But then you have your public health officials. They tend to look for patterns. Okay, what's the pattern of infection? What's the pattern off? When is that this kind of pattern of infection going to overwhelm or not overwhelm our hospital systems? What are the criteria that we need to tell us that it's safe to go out and resume our normal everyday pattern? And one of the things that's popped up in our conversations about that is how many unknowns there are in the in the response to the Corona virus and how many unknowns there are and how we're gonna individually respond after we come out of shelter in place. And you can see that some people are comfortable with the unknowns and how, even though there, some of whom are quite big unknowns and then you can also see how some leaders are trying to force certainty into the note and make unknowns. Intern Allen's yes, and
spk_1: 11:15
they're feeling pressure to do so, right?
spk_0: 11:18
Right. That's the old teaching of leadership. So we're supposed to know and we're and so and one of the beautiful things as well as the frustrating things about systems that are connected, is that there are always time delays. And this isn't so. You have a feedback loop, their whole slew. There are a whole lot of feedback loops that are floating through our system now on the virus and our response to the virus. So in the US, we were slow to get testing up and running. We're still slow to get testing up and running. The consequences of that are going to continue to unfold over time. So we're used to This is again the old traditional teaching of leadership is that time delays air very short. So you say we're going to go here and then everybody's supposed to follow, almost like a an engineer. You know, an engine in a train and the caboose wherever the engine goes, the goose coz in nicely, tightly coupled system. But the in growing your garden there's always time delays between tilling the soil, planting the seed, allowing the sea to German ate the green shoot comes up with a time delay. It grows over the season also with time delays, it blossoms, brings fruit and then we harvest it. But there's all this time in between that doesn't have that direct. You know, we have to have faith that things were germinating well in the Corona virus. Corbett 19 We have a bunch of things that are still unfolding in this system. So the connectivity that I talked about earlier and systems can't just be connecting various parts. It's also connecting time. Hmm. So how do our past actions create our present agenda of problems and how to are a response to our current problems, create the future agenda of problems or challenges or mitigates thinks in the future?
spk_1: 13:27
Well, in something that we're witnessing here in Ohio, I have not paid close attention to Minnesota, so maybe maybe we could kind of juxtaposed the two experiences, but we have a head of our Department of Health. Her name is Doctor Amy act in, and our governor DeWine, who have you know, been recognized by the BBC for their efforts. They were. They were quick. They were early. They acted fairly strongly. They got ahead of things and by many, many accounts for those in the in the middle of the average individual. They've done a really great job regardless of where you are, what side of the aisle you're on. They've done a nice job, and and But they are facing this faction of people who are are very pressure pressure if they're feeling pressure from these individuals who want those answers quickly, right? And so they're they're these two competing commitments between How do we do what's right? How do we ensure safety with how do we provide people hope? And so I think it's this week that we're going to get some announcements, and so I think they're almost pressured to give us little nuggets of hope. Do you know what I'm saying? And to your point, this can't be rushed. I mean, there's some fundamentals that are not in place yet for us even to be able to kind of re enter society in a safe manner, it'll be really interesting to watch this play out. I don't know if you saw the footage. You told me that you want on a news diet yesterday that maybe you didn't see that, but I think it was. The governor of Florida opened up the beaches and
spk_0: 15:13
I saw that,
spk_1: 15:14
and social distancing was not a thing,
spk_0: 15:16
so this would be an example of time, delays and feedback. You open up a beach and nobody gets sick that day. But the right and
spk_1: 15:25
I'm fine.
spk_0: 15:26
They might get infected that day, and then they might go home and get other people infected. And then those people who also are out there not thinking about social distancing, we'll get other people infected. That's the nature of a pandemic on a highly infectious disease. You can't see it, so you don't know. You have it until you get sick, and and so then they're going to be consequences. Over time, it might overwhelm the health system, depending on how many people gets it. But this tension is what's, I think, really interesting. The tension between what people expected leaders to protect them from, ah, threat to tell them what to do to be knowledgeable and give hope, even if hope is not a realistic frame, it's a or it's not a guarantee without active collaboration with you. So one of the things that happens in a more distributive leadership model or network leadership model is you have more people self organizing around a higher purpose, and that's what's kind of intriguing. Tow watch also is the each state and the people in the state have a different sense of how they need to show up. And there's no apathy in social distancing. There's either you do it or you don't. And if you do it, we're depending on people showing up in a different way. So our old management literature struggled with things like creating dependency between the manager and the employees, you know? So it was like a drug deal like, Okay, you have to explain this one, So I will give you safety insecurity if you do what I ask you to do. Basically, that's the deal. And what that can
spk_1: 17:22
engine reward from, You know, the baseline expectations. Yeah,
spk_0: 17:26
for sure. Yeah, And so what? That creates his dependency. And you don't think for yourself after a while and so but nature. This is why I love nature. Is nature is filled with self organization. And that's really how it There's no CEO telling nature what do for There's a deep, important purpose, which is to create conditions conducive to the life a future generations and then every plant and every species. And every ecology is designed to do just that so that it's self organize without needing direction to move forward.
spk_1: 18:06
So where humans different?
spk_0: 18:09
We have two things that are different from nature. We're still part of nature, so we still have this adaptive self organizing capacity in us. But we also have consciousness and we have emotions. So if we don't manage our emotions well and we're afraid of certain information, then we don't listen to feedback. So the monarch butterflies aren't waiting for Congress to agree that we have climate change there. Just so you know, they know if they know, but they're operating on instinct, so they just change their migration patterns just like a whole slew of other species and animals and trees air doing. But we have a world view, and if the facts don't fit into our world view, and if we can't manage our emotions than our emotions of fear or our overriding beliefs will cause it's not to listen to certain data points. Switch gets to another leadership question, which is, What's the developmental responsibility leaders have to the people that they're serving? Oh, hey, more about that. So I think that one of the under stated responsibility it's a leadership is to develop people.
spk_1: 19:28
Sure, yeah, and and not create that kind of transactional parent child fry authority figure subordinate relationship but were actually developing the capacity and facilitating growth. Yes, that's that's a two way street if done well,
spk_0: 19:46
yes, absolutely. Because no leader is infallible. Everybody has hubris, and the smart ones surround themselves with people who can brings assets and strengths and gifts and talent to the things that they're weakened. That that's what great creates a great team. But we should be helping people see interdependence in our system. Even if their worldview is one of separation. We should be helping people build their emotional intelligence so that they are aware of the emotions and how they're shaping the way they think and act and behave. And we need to develop organizational, collective emotional intelligence. So that's a whole additional kind of thing that has to happen in a complex world.
spk_1: 20:37
Where do we begin to better understand some of the fundamental concepts kind of embedded and how you see the
spk_0: 20:45
world the way nature has infected My thinking about systems is that it has brought a concept of living systems to my framework. Okay, so as a human being were very in touch with, we don't know it was consciously understand this. But as a one individual, we are a living system. Inside are the skins of the skin of our body. We have a relation system and ah, a nervous system and ah ah, auto immune system and a circulation system and a neural science system kind of yes. And there are a whole
spk_1: 21:25
colony of microbiota and and right, right are dependent upon us.
spk_0: 21:30
So we think it's a big mystery, and it's it is kind of, but we're actually a living system individually and collectively. So when you think about living systems, there are certain characteristics to them and anybody that enjoys kind of reflecting on how did create change in the system can learn certain kind of general characteristics of living systems and use them to help change. So these air, this one's that air on my radar. Living systems are interdependent, so they're all connected.
spk_1: 22:06
Something that's like saying we're not going to be alive if we don't have a respiratory system, right? If we go back to the human analogy,
spk_0: 22:14
yes. And in fact, that's one of the second ones, which is they're always in movement. So we breathe. If we put our hand in our heart by our heart, we hear our heartbeat. Blood rushes through our system, the neurons fire in our brains. And if any of those things stop, we stop. Yeah, So how do we think about change in a system that is always changing? Mm. So most of us think about change is something that we have to start up. But if we going back to that optimizing energy article, it's it thinks about changes, something that's already present. There's already movement. So our job is to transform the energy that's already in the system, the movement that's already in the system towards a higher purpose.
spk_1: 23:07
You just made me think about sustainability. Most people understand that humans have had an impact on the earth. Correct and most logical, reasonable people would agree that that's the case most individuals would logically then understand that if we continue on the course that were on, we are altering the system in a way that we may not recover from and actually passing that along to the future generations.
spk_0: 23:38
This is a time delay on steroids.
spk_1: 23:40
So So that's what I was going to say is, Why is it so difficult for us as human beings to? Because ultimately what we're doing here is we're shifting the system so that we're getting new results were shifting the system so not as much. Co two is emitted into the atmosphere. We're shifting the system, and so why is it so difficult for us to be proactive in that shift again? It could be the emotions piece of it. It could be so many competing commitments that that that notion is competing with capitalism or that that notion is competing with any number of other elements in the system. But how do you think about an issue like that?
spk_0: 24:20
We're hard time DeLay of our actions 10 years ago, 40 years ago, 80 years ago, 100 years ago are manifesting over time. We drop pollutants into a stream because it's cheaper in our manufacturing plant not to do something with them that either choose the products or those chemistry that is biodegradable because it's cheaper to get it. Most other source, that's that's damaging. But we have a time delay between when we start putting pollutants upstream and when people start getting sick downstream. And because we haven't learned to close that loop faster or to see the actions at a distance and how they didn't break the system, we haven't had any really good feedback loops that drop that help us correct our behavior. I'm sick currently thinking about this from a systems framework is that conventional wisdom in leadership management? What we count is ethical and legal behavior and whatnot has basically now delivered to us a degenerative system, a system that has less vitality, then great. It used to have less resilience than it used to have. It does more damage, and behind that is a way of thinking. So people think that extraction is okay. Then exploitation is okay that you can be a leader of a company. You can extract talent from your employees, you can make corporate profit, you can distribute that unequally, and then you can turn that corporate profit into private wealth. That's a degenerative system, But there are 13 13 thinking patterns that are attached to that short term profit optimized one part of the system in this case, generally it's about profit, and then that gives you reasons to extract and exploit because you're making money, right? So it's a way of thinking. Now. What's really scary is that all of our systems have a version of optimizing one part of the system over everything else. Our health, our health system optimizes the money exchange. Whether it's a good business model, they don't really work for the whole person in the whole system. Thea, even education is focusing on more of a part of the system rather than the whole system.
spk_1: 27:00
Would you talk about that for a second, Kathy.
spk_0: 27:03
So I came out of high red, and one of the things that would always I would always struggle with is that we would prioritize teaching above the neck instead of teaching the whole person.
spk_1: 27:15
Okay. Oh, so say more about that.
spk_0: 27:17
So when we teach, above the neck were all only in the brain. We're not teaching emotional intelligence. We're not teaching people to grow their their sense of purpose, their sense of service to the world were not mean how to integrate their physical, social, spiritually mental into one whole person. We're not optimizing the whole person. We're optimizing a part of this person.
spk_1: 27:44
I love it. And you just made me think. Have you ever read Miriam and Catarella is learning in adulthood. Have you ever read now for another one? Okay, so it's in its third edition now, and I'll put it in the show notes so so people can can can find it. But they do a beautiful job. There's one table that just fundamentally shifted. How I think about about leadership and leadership education. They basically highlight five different paradigms of learning. So they discuss cognitive ism, which is, you know, the stuff knowing this stuff. And they and they discuss behaviorism, which is, you know, skill based. And then they discussed the humanistic version, humanism and then social learning, and then Constructivism, you know, making meaning of experience. And if we want to develop a leader in most colleges of business, which is where I I sit, we might kind of download a bunch of theories to your point. The head. We stay there and we do that fairly well. But do you have a leader at the end of that endeavor? No. You have an individual who knows some leadership theory, right? And and so it's almost equivalent to If we wanted to create a surgeon, they need to have a certain set of knowledge. They need to have skill. They need to hopefully know about themselves, which we could probably you and I agree that that medical education falters in that humanistic domain most right, right? And then we have the mentors, and then we have the learning from experience. So what you're saying resonates for me because I think you're exactly right. The Jesuits have a term which is a corrupt person. Alice. I teach at a Jesuit institution, and that's, you know, developing the whole person, right? Yes. And so and so I think all too often we're focused on one domain, and in my mind, that's limiting.
spk_0: 29:41
Not only is it limiting, but from a systems point of view, there certain criteria for helping us understand how to lead from a system's frame. The first is that you have to optimize the whole person. Okay, You can't optimize or the whole system. You can't make decisions by optimizing the part. The more you optimize apart, like the intellectual domain in higher ed, the less you optimize the whole person. Wow. Think about that for a moment.
spk_1: 30:11
I love it.
spk_0: 30:12
So when we look at how world leaders are making decisions around the Corona virus, the ones that I think whose countries they're going to come out of this better economically and every other way are the people who are making decisions from a hole perspective, whole system perspective. The second is that you have to have data, so systems to understand systems, you have to have aggregated curated whole systems data. So in higher education, going back to the domain of the head versus the rest of the person. Sure, that would mean that we would need to be assessing and tracking holistic development. Yes, instead of academic achievement in the classroom only right, and then the third is that you have to reward cooperation, which is a nature design principle. It banks on diversity. It rewards cooperation because that's how information gets spread and so you can aggregate the whole, it's that you have to be in relationship with each other. You have ableto actively cooperate with each other because information sits in different places. So going back to the degenerative, what's the alternative? If you don't want to participate and lead or contribute to a degenerative system, then you have to move the way you think in the way you practice leadership towards a restored, sustainable, restorative and regenerative framework. So my thinking is we kind of have to then start looking at every single one of our theories that we teach for you and say, Is there a parts bias in this theory? Okay, that's this theory reinforce one way of thinking at the expense of an integrated understanding of the system. So E reinforce profit over the health of the whole system. You know, there, if we don't see nature as a primary stakeholder in our decision making, for example, or if we don't see in equity as that needs to be part of our decision making, then we know that our our theory is reinforcing a degenerative framework. So we have to analyze that, and then we go up to getting a little better as we become more conscious and eventually we get to sustainability, which is doing no harm going forward. But it doesn't restore the damage that we've already done. Yes, so then the So I see degenerative. It's like a minus 100. Sustainability is like a zero or not doing better, but we're not doing were somewhat better, but we're not doing worse. So we're so it's like, do no harm going forward. But we still have high pollution and other kinds of things. Then you have to get to restore it tive, which is how do we restore the balance in our system? Eventually you get that's like a plus 50 and then eventually you get to regenerative So nature. This is why I love nature as a teacher is that it is a highly regenerative system. Nature has gone through five mass extinctions in the 3.8 billion years of history on this Earth, and it has regenerated every single time as we are living examples off Pretty amazing, really. And so what is the design from nature that can teach us to reject, create regenerative organizations and I don't see you know it's starting to pop up, there's Ah, Christopher Wald wrote a book on designing regenerative cultures of multi, kind of look at an integrated way to think. And I think our leadership needs to kind of bring more complexity into it. Needs to move towards this teaching regenerative design, not exploitive of design, because higher ed has colluded in the exploitation. Interesting, you know, and look at all the management books that have been touted, Let's say, over the last 20 to 30 years and how those leaders have been certain leaders have been lifted up as great leaders because they destroyed companies because it made more profit. That's not away toe help the world evolve. And that's that's basically the criteria that nature uses. If nature we're gonna define profit, it would be that profited. Nature's defined. It's the evolution of the whole system.
spk_1: 35:03
I got to think about that. For a moment. Profit would be defined as evolution of the whole system. Uh huh. And when you think about the time that it takes to regenerate that whole system, any human being would go insane. But that's the time it genuinely takes to regenerate
spk_0: 35:28
well, except for the fact that if its moment in time. So one of one of the things I'm noticing at my coaching clients as their processing and trying to make sense of this code 19 and what their organizations are gonna look like on the other side, there are three levels of decision making that they're doing. One is kind of immediate, either. How do we keep the doors open? How do we keep being able to pay our paychecks? And, ah, what kind of essential programs are we doing? Who do we need to lay off because we can't? We can't financially keep paying them anymore, given what's changed and or sheltering in place or whatever. So there there's one face, so they first start to try to figure out Okay, what do we need to do toe eventually on the other end? Keep the doors open, then keep the purpose of the mission running. Second phase is what are the new partnerships or combinations and collaborations and cooperations that we could be in cooperative partnership with so that we come out of it with a different design and a different duration. But perhaps with a more resilient model and then the third conversation is about deep redesign. So they're basically saying, Well, what if you know so one foundation that I work with has been doing leadership development in a cohort face to face away for 30 years with extraordinary results in community leadership. But they're looking at this and saying, What if we can't do that going forward? And how do we do this work? And so they're saying Maybe our job goes back to old time philanthropy and we build trusted partnerships with people in community who are living, sleeping and working there, and that they are joining they are creating and designing with are partnership finances and knowledge to actually do the work. And so it changes their staffing pattern and it raises questions all over the place about who are they going to become?
spk_1: 37:52
Yep. And can they thrive at a different level? Right. You know, I had I had Ah, a client that I've worked with Say to me her question was, What I'm reflecting on now is how we use this as an opportunity to thrive and to tiu. She didn't use the word redesign, but it was It was how can we? What questions? We need to be asking now to help us thrive on the other end of this and in some ways kind of modernize. So I go back to your comment about education, right? There's so much opportunity in education right now, potentially, if people see it as a potential opportunity, I don't I'm not saying to be opportunistic, but there's opportunity to facilitate change. L am probably update of an outdated system that would likely be attractive, transformational, and it's learned it's a potential to facilitate learning in our students, right? Really hit all five of those different dimensions versus one or two that we currently kind of dio.
spk_0: 38:59
So, for example, I've often thought that our educational system generally is designed to reinforce dependency. Trains and faculty member. Yes, the expectation of a student in a classroom is that the factory member should be initiating an organizing their learning. But if this was from a nature perspective, nature would say, every single person in that space has to initiate and organize their own ability to learn. I should be demonstrating it on their own without depending on the teacher, to reinforce direction or evaluation of what we're doing Internet. So in that way, this is a different way. Higher ed collude with traditional management and traditional leadership is that we're training people toe look to people in authority to tell them what to dio. One of the promises of online education is that when I've taught online courses, I've found that that relationship changes because the only way online education works is if each individual who's in the class is initiating and organizing their own learning process and what that is.
spk_1: 40:20
Yes, I mean, it's fundamentally shifts everything. Yeah, really. And and it gets back to your article, the energy optimization article where the energy is there. So we unleashing the energy right or we stuffing, you're
spk_0: 40:38
going to get, you know, yes, you know, it's raises totally different leadership questions. I think I was talking to one of my coaching clients. She was working in a secondary education role, and her her whole thing is kind of driving a Career Pathways program to hook students, teachers and community businesses together into, ah, a more integrated whole systems frame, right? But on her last call, she said, this was herbs observation coming out of Cove in 19. Why are we trying so hard? to hold on to the old normal instead of running as fast as we can towards the new
spk_1: 41:24
wow, that is beautiful. So I got chills when I think about
spk_0: 41:29
I know why are we trying toe so hard to hold onto the old normal instead of running as fast as we can towards the new? That's really the possibility coming out of Corbett 19 is that we do have the possibility, in a high level of disruption, to start bringing more regenerative principles into the way we think or designer organizations going forward
spk_1: 41:53
or designer classes. Right?
spk_0: 41:56
What's a regenerative classroom look like?
spk_1: 41:59
No, I love
spk_0: 41:59
it. Wow,
spk_1: 42:00
you've seen if you are people writing about that?
spk_0: 42:02
No, not that I know that's were steeped. You know, we have, ah, over what, 102 100 years of conventional wisdom floating around in our our world views and then our deep background assumptions, which is one of the things we have to get. We have to start teaching people how to recognize what's the background assumption that we're holding on to what, What is no longer fitting the purpose and of the or fitting the world in the environment? that we're leading in. Yeah, which I think one of the reasons why you don't see everybody solving the code of 19 from a complex framework open system framework we see. Still see people trying to piece mail it. I was talking to another colleague in Hong Kong last week, and he was telling me how I asked him how how they were approaching the whole virus. Are they sheltering in place, etcetera, etcetera, he said No, we're everything to open businesses usual. But that said, we're testing 350 million people. Small Island city state. We flower. We have a huge testing program and a huge contact tracing program that's very, very robust and everybody is wearing face masks. But restaurants are open, the economy is open for business. People are going to the office. Everybody's wearing face masks, everybody's washing hands. You know the whole community. The whole population is fundamentally working with data, sophisticated science to protect the whole system
spk_1: 43:44
and cooperating
spk_0: 43:45
and cooperative. Yes, yes, so you know, thes air. Some of the questions I have for higher ed and for businesses is how do we teach each other how to think in this way. And I personally think nature is a beautiful way to do that because it is the system that we're living in. And that's pretty much why I wrote the book is I wanted to give people a roadmap for using nature's design and living system frameworks to redesign their teens and their organizations and give them language because a lot of people are already intuitively doing this.
spk_1: 44:25
Yeah, well, and so we're close on time. What are some practical tips you have for educators on helping them to incorporate this content in their work? Two part question educators. What do they have to have on their radar? How can they develop their skills to have this topic as an important piece of their work and then learners?
spk_0: 44:51
So let me start with learners because that floated to the top first. Should I think as learners stop giving away your personal responsibility and power to initiate and organize your own learning?
spk_1: 45:05
I love it.
spk_0: 45:06
So we we come from nature. We're not apart from nature. And honestly, if a squirrel or a snail or an ant consult organized all the time, we're certainly capable of it. So what, we're gonna Dio, you know, Are we going to choose to operate? We have this adaptive capacity and this self organizing capacity. It's deeply embedded in who we are. But we have has been kind of squeezed out of us for one reason or whether it's through kindergarten and first grade and junior high and high school. So by the time we get the college, we keep defaulting to the teacher at the front of the room. Or, you know, so I would say if it was just one thing start initiated organizing. You're learning in the same way you do with your social life,
spk_1: 45:59
Hmm. And just your passions that you mean way. We're all learning all of the time.
spk_0: 46:06
We are
spk_1: 46:06
that space, right? It's very natural and easy. But then we're putting this this kind of fictitious context where all of us, into your point, its authority subordinate.
spk_0: 46:17
It won't deserve you. It's the secret sauce for work, for ah, success in life is your ability to self organize. So that's what I would say the learnings and then for teachers. I have a couple of thoughts. One is to use your own energy as a diagnostic for when you're taking on too much responsibility for other people's learning. So
spk_1: 46:42
if you're doing all the
spk_0: 46:43
work, your energy is going to show it. You're gonna have less energy, less passion, less excitement going into the classroom because you're carrying the burden of everybody else's learning.
spk_1: 46:56
Well, why I had I had a friend of mine, a colleague once. Ah, he I said, I'm so drained after class because I feel like I'm on for 2.5 hours and and he said to me, it was one of those moments where I just I almost wanted to cry. But he said, Why are you taking on the responsibility for their experience?
spk_0: 47:17
One e? And then I think the other thing that I would say Teoh Teachers is to do an audit of the theories that they're teaching and see whether there whole system frameworks or whether there teaching from us a single sector of the whole, the larger system, and then start searching for other content that might evolve the whole instead of a part of the system. Anything. Any theory that implies that you can control the outcome probably is a theory whose time has passed.
spk_1: 47:59
Okay, I love it. So we're gonna finish with a quick speed round. I have four questions for you. What are you streaming right now or listening to?
spk_0: 48:10
I tend to learn more through reading rather than streaming. So that's
spk_1: 48:17
Kathy Allen. Have you ever watched Planet Earth?
spk_0: 48:19
I haven't.
spk_1: 48:20
Please watch that planet Earth.
spk_0: 48:23
Good. Alright.
spk_1: 48:24
On Netflix, it's a BBC show and watch one strange rock. We watch these with our Children, and it is there some of the most beautiful shows you will ever experience. They're just magical. So Planet Earth. Okay, then. One strange rock. So have any favorite podcast that you listen to, um, that stand out?
spk_0: 48:45
No. Although I like Michael made a lot. Okay. He's, you know, he's one of his lovely pieces that I listened to recently was that they're in these kind of major disruptions. They're people come out of them in two different ways. They either become they come out of him as a smaller person or a bigger soul.
spk_1: 49:07
Oh, wow. I love it. Michael Mead.
spk_0: 49:11
June Holly doesn't do podcasts, but she does this network Weaver newsletter that is quite good about helping a C systems in non hierarchical ways. Okay? She's from Ohio. I'm not sure. Ah,
spk_1: 49:28
wonderful. Wonderful. And what are you working on right now? From a personal growth standpoint, we're are We are continually in process.
spk_0: 49:38
So I am, Uh I'm finding this time to be very generative, and I'm starting. I'm working on a tiny little e book on living systems and how it changes leadership. If you look at your organization as a living system,
spk_1: 49:54
I love it. I think to your point, the quote from Michael meet with smaller person or bigger soul. So you're focusing your focusing on the ladder of those to write a janitor a generative
spk_0: 50:07
time. And I think the other kind of thing that I'm thinking about is I think my observation is that the people who are coming out of this with a bigger soul are people who are much clear, who are clear about how they're here, why they're here. And who were they here to serve? So there, as a service question instead of protect self protective question. Yeah, my work serve the humanity, and they're coming out of this in a different way. More psychologically healthier. I think.
spk_1: 50:41
I agree. I agree. It's It's like the friends of ours who are focused on gratitude and what they have and how they could be of service to others, to your point and and those who are focused on what they have lost and what they have to give up. And those air two totally different frames And one is generative in a very beautiful way. Because I so that your statement resonates for sure is we started off with three words systems, nature and leadership. Did I Did I get the three words to describe Captain Alan fairly?
spk_0: 51:16
Well, I think so. I love that. That's very nice. Like,
spk_1: 51:21
uh, well, happy You have given all of us a lot to think about. And I'm so excited I cannot thank you enough for being with us today.
spk_0: 51:30
Oh, you're worried. My
spk_1: 51:32
favorite leadership thinkers. You are always at 50,000 feet looking at the whole versus the parts, which I so appreciate about you.
spk_0: 51:42
Oh, you're very welcome. Thank you so much for inviting me lots and lots of fun. We'll
spk_1: 51:49
take care and be well,
spk_0: 51:52
thank you. Well,
spk_1: 51:54
after each episode, I take a couple days to reflect and my conversation with Kathy Allen certainly gave me several items to think about. So for aspiring leaders, she said, stop giving away your personal responsibility and power to initiate an organized your own learning for leadership. Educators, she said, use your own energy as a diagnostic for when you are taking on too much responsibility for other people's learning. She also suggested that we do an audit. Do frameworks in theories that were teaching provide learners with a holistic perspective, or is there a parts bias to the theories that were teaching? She suggested that any theory that assumes that you can control the outcome is a theory whose time has passed now, a couple things that are gonna stick with me as far as big questions. So this whole notion of a parts bias in our current theories of leadership I'm gonna continue, reflect on that comment because I think it's critical that we're teaching and sharing theories that help our learners look at the whole versus the parts. And we also have this interesting segment where we discussed what a regenerative classroom could look like. Now. I don't have a clear answer to that question, but it's something that I'm gonna continue to think about in the days and weeks ahead. For those of you who would like to learn more, please pick up Kathy's book leading from the roots. I promise you she is one of the great thinkers of our time, and the way she's thinking about leadership is going to stretch your thinking to new levels. Have a great day, everybody. And as always, thanks for checking in. You have been listening to the practical wisdom for leaders podcast. If you liked what you heard, please share it with others and let him know it were up to and one last quick reminder to click. Subscribe. So you know when we publish new episodes. And, of course, we'd love to hear your feedback. You can stay in touch with me by visiting www dot scott J allen dot net or any number of social media platforms. Be well, be safe and make a difference wherever you are on this beautiful planet. And now here's Cates twin sister Emily with the out TRO.
spk_0: 54:23
Even the same two from Nieces. Practical Wisdom with Scott Allen