Replying to LO25627 --
Dear Organlearners,
Doc Holloway <learnshops@thresholds.com> writes:
>I'm not so certain that I understand your meaning
>of control and its' relevance to leadership or stewardship.
>Leadership is about change, and developing the capacity
>to change successfully. Stewardship is about conservation
>(of values, trust, energy). Sometimes stewardship and
>leadership may seem to conflict, though they both may be
>manifested in one person.
Greetings Doc,
Thank you very much for getting into the LO-dialogue on this topic.
Thank you also for giving such crisp summaries of your understanding of
leadership and stewardship. I hope to use them (rather than to misuse
them) to help you understand Winfried's question.
I do not think the misunderstanding it was intended by Winfried in his
response, but I got the impression that somehow the point which I tried to
make in my original comment, got deformed. This is quite possible since my
mother tongue is Afrikaans while Winfried's is German. Since we both have
to write in English, what we think and what gets on the screen can get
deformed. Leo have commented on this in the LO-dialogue which he initiated
under the topic "Dialogue, Language and Learning".
One of the themes which I tried to focus on in the topic "Work and Free
Energy -- the dance of LEP on LEC" is that what happens within a system SY
is intimately connected to what happens outside that system in all the
systems surrounding it, taken together as the complex system SU
(surroundings). One of the worst things we can do in our Systems Thinking
is to assume that whatever happens in the system SY also has to happen in
the surroundings SU. We rather ought to assume that whatever happens in
SY, something else happens in SU. For example, whatever happens in the
USA, something else is happening in the rest of the world.
It is in this sense that I have written that when a person is a leader in
the system SY, the "action of that person with respect to SY" (which I
identified as "leadership") has to be different to the "action of that
person with respect to SU" (which I identified as "stewardship") rather
than be the same. In other words, a leader has to act with "leadership"
with respect to the system SY to which that leader belongs, but has to act
with "stewardship" with respect to the surrounding systems SU of that
system.
Let me use your crisp descriptions of leadership and stewardship to
explain the difference. I know that very few people would understand the
thesis that "no change is possible without entropy production". But let
us assume that "any change is the result of a change in entropy". Should a
leader want to change the system SY which he/she leads, then the leader
has to change also increase the entropy of that system. This can be done
(see again Jon Krispen's response to "Work and Free Energy") by "importing
entropy reversibly" (the /_\S(e) of Jon) AND/OR by "producing entropy
irreversibly within" (the /_\S(i) of Jon).
By importing /_\S(e), the entropy of the surrondings SU becomes less with
an equal amount. This happens, for example, when a country imports "raw
materials" from another country. By producing self the entropy /_\(i)S,
the country adds value (order and even chaos) to its own "raw materials".
Some or even all of this may then be exported so that the surroundings SU
now have to cope with the /_\(i)S too. When a country looses /_\(e)S by
exporting "raw materials" and then gains that /_\(i)S, but now as a
/_\(e)S, by importing "raw materials to which value has been added", it
puts considerable pressure on that country. All the third world countries
and their gradual demise can serve as example of such pressure. Should
they be subjected to less pressure of imported /_\(i)S as /_\(e)S and
rather produce their won /_\(i)S so as to add some value to their own "raw
materials" before exporting them, then the demise would not have been so
much, or may even become reverted into a progress.
LEP is the acronym for Law of Entropy Production whereas LEC stands for
Law of Energy Conservation. Assume that system SY, whenever that system
produces entropy as a result of leadership, the system confines the bulk
of that entropy PRODUCTION to itself . Thus little of the entropy will
reach the surroundings SU. In other words, with respect to that leadership
itself (but not other actions), the entropy of the surroundings SU will
not change. What remains is the energy of the surroundings SU which is
CONSERVED according to LEC. Thus, with respect to his/her own system, the
leader PRODUCES change (see your "leadership" description), but with
respect to the surroundings SU, the leader CONSERVES change (see your
"stewardship" decription).
>Leaders like the two of you spend much of your time
>developing the capacity for power (and autonomy) in
>others, while also acting as stewards for those young
>hearts and minds you are giving back to those who
>entrusted you with them.
Thank you. When enacting "stewardship", I paint rich pictures. Immense
entropy production /_\(i)S goes into these rich pictures. They become so
complex that nobody following rote learning (importing /_\(e)S ) will be
interested in them and thus import them, except perhaps to take pot shots
at them as "Humpty Dumpties". This leaves the entropy status of the rote
learner unchanged. But when enacting "leadership", I paint stark outlines,
usually by short stories or authentic questions. The learner imports them
as a minor /_\(e)S so that I try to conserve the personality of the
learner. But hopefully these stark outlines will help the learner to
produce self entropy immensely /_\(i)S. Unfortunately, my efforts often
become astray because of Mental Models which I did not or could not make
provision of.
>But, I still don't grok control in this context.
I think Winfried wanted us to focus in this topic the LO-dialogue on "Who
should control the entropy production". But I also think it will be better
if he speaks for himself.
Doc, should my explanation of the meaning of control and its' relevance to
leadership or stewardship still be inadequate to you, please say so and I
will try again. I know that to bring in LEP and LEC makes the issue
difficult, but this happens in any business large enough for it to have
both accountants (methapor for LEC) and economists (metaphor for LEP).
Accountants enact typically "stewardship" while economists enact typically
"leadership" -- or am I now confusing the picture once again ;-)?
Please bear in mind that not all of us live in a first world country. A
leader of a first world country may enact "leadership" in that country,
but should that leader "force" any third world country to follow in the
steps of his/her country, is that leader actually enacting "stewardship"
or is that leader merely extending his/her leadership outside its
confines? I use "force" here because the subtility of this "forcing" by
either promissing or withholding monetary and technolgical aid can escape
the attention of the unweary.
With care and best wishes
--At de Lange <amdelange@gold.up.ac.za> Snailmail: A M de Lange Gold Fields Computer Centre Faculty of Science - University of Pretoria Pretoria 0001 - Rep of South Africa
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