There is an interesting--to me--phenomenon at work in the discussion of
whether organizations are alive.
A number of discussants insist that the question of no interest and
importance--and then go on to discuss it at great length, exactly as if it
were of interest and importance.
Consider this from Fred Nickols:
>To ask if organizations are "alive" is only
>part of the issue and not necessarily the interesting part. Far more
>interesting, to me, is whether or not organizations can be said to
>possess qualities such as self-awareness, intelligence, and the ability
>to learn.
The answer to the "interesting" issue seems to depend on the answer to the
less interesting issue, for only if organizations are alive does it make
sense to endow them with intelligence and the ability to learn: to
personify them.
And then Fred goes on to repeat the usual analogies: the organization has
a "brain" (but where is that brain, now that we've discarded command
control and there no longer is a single "head" that contains the
organizational "brain"?), and intelligence, and the individuals are cells,
etcetera.
And then Fred asks a crucial question:
>What's wrong with this picture?
I would like t o answer that question--for myself.
I am a practitioner, like most here.
The "living organism" thesis is a mental model.
We cannot do without mental models.
A model, a map, a metaphor is not true or false in any absolute sense. It
is useful or not useful.
I do not find the "living organism" metaphor useful. I find that it raises
more questions than it answers, and the questions it raises are not
productive.
To illustrate, I give you the case of the organization known as a football
team.
Where is the "brain"? In the coach? The quarterback? The playbook? The
collective known as the "team"?
If the players are "cells", how do I detect cancerous cells, and how do I
treat them? Surgery? Chemotherapy? Meditation?
Are the opposing teams also alive? And is the collectivity known as the
"league" also alive?
Again: I take it that for most of us the value of a metaphor lies in its
tool value: the extension and enrichment of the skill and insight we bring
to our work.
I find that I am not a better coach when I use the "living organism"
metaphor: that the directions it gives me are confused and mischievous.
Steve Eskow
Dr. Steve Eskow
President, The Electronic University Network
288 Stone Island Road
Enterprise, Florida 32725
Phone: 407-321-8770; Fax: 407-321-4861
email: dreskow@magicnet.net
--"Dr. Steve Eskow" <dreskow@magicnet.net>
Learning-org -- Hosted by Rick Karash <rkarash@karash.com> Public Dialog on Learning Organizations -- <http://www.learning-org.com>