Dear Organlearners,
David Birren <BirreD@mail01.dnr.state.wi.us> writes:
>A better paradigm is to think of the environment simply as the
>context within which an organization exists. It has no inherent
>value - only that which we assign. And, of course, as the
>particulars of our experience change, the same environmental
>factors that were once friendly can become hostile, and vice versa.
>
>I think it's best to avoid judging and try to see the world clearly,
>accepting it as it is.
Greetings Dave,
I have followed on this thread with interest, wondering where it will lead
to.
I find it somewhat amusing that you say that you "avoid judging", yet you
speak of "better paradigm"! My experience is that it is futile to convince
people of good, better and best when it concerns paradigms. Why? It may
be very difficult for a person to transform his/her paradigm. Also, the
ranking "good, better and best" may not apply to paradigms. As a
consequence I have stopped judging paradigms. In this sense I agree with
you.
The paradigm which I have been using since 1971 is to consider both the
organisation as a system and the environment as another system. This came
as a result of my research into the chemistry and physics of soils. The
dynamics of a soil is very complex and it depends on the dynamics of
whatever it is in contact with which is also complex. Realising that
complexity is on both sides of the border (the organisation and its
environment) forced me to accept that both should be treated as systems.
Whatever system dynamics I then make use of, has to apply to both these
two systems.
This not a simple paradigm, even though it might appear so. A philosopher
once said to me that it is the most serious case of hyper reductionism he
has ever encountered! The worst was that I could not argue with him
because I had very little to stand upon. Telling him that a complex
noosphere (world of thoughts) which tries to understand a complex soil
interacting with a complex atmosphere and a complex biosphere forced me to
do so was futile.
Today, after many ups and downs, I have learnt to love working with this
paradigm. It is like living with my wife. I love it -- that she is a good,
better or best woman has nothing to do with it. Which of the two of them
is the more complex, I cannot say.
A very important question to answer is where the systems thinker should
operate: in the organisation or in the environment? The idea of
objectivity entails that the systems thinker should operate in the
environment. But when both the organisation and the environment are
considered as systems, the idea of objectivity becomes a ghost. We look
and what we see is riddle in a mirror.
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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