Leading (meaningful) Change
The Peter Drucker quote, “culture eats strategy for breakfast” has become famous worldwide – and here I want to explore why this is the case, and what people across the organisation (and formal leadership teams) can do about it.
Uncovering hidden assumptions is crucial in strategy formulation/implementation, leadership development, and understanding organisational culture – and these three processes are intertwined.
We can draw upon the work of Edgar Schein to help us understand the role of hidden assumptions and how unconscious views/attitudes create an invisible mindset that acts as a lens colouring whatever we see e.g. the cliché of ‘rose-tinted’ glasses.
Schein acknowledges that culture is complex and multifaceted, and it is influenced by various factors such as history, leadership, and external environment. His model has three layers. Artifacts and behaviours represent the visible aspects of culture, while espoused values are the stated beliefs and norms. Underlying assumptions are deeply ingrained (unconscious) beliefs that shape motivators and behaviour. The diagram below expands on these three components of culture:
Unless an organisation’s underlying assumptions are brought into the light through conscious enquiry, they will thwart efforts to drive change – the status quo will reassert itself (hence the culture eating strategy insight).
Enquiry into Underlying Assumptions
To explore what underlying assumptions might mean in practice we can draw upon two sources:
Frederic Laloux – Reinventing Organisations
W. Edwards Deming – Systems Thinking and Performance
Reinventing Organisations - Laloux
Laloux has an excellent video that sets out a progression of organisational models/metaphors. For now we can focus on the three most pertinent (although there are five stages of evolution in his model of organisational culture). These three are:
Machine - planning, measurement, control
Family - empowerment, values, purpose, fun
Ecosystem/living being - nature, interconnected, wholeness, higher purpose.
The Machine model is the dominant management mindset, although it is rarely defined as such because the ideas are so pervasive. This thinking has its roots in the Industrial and scientific revolution; in the 20th century it is synonymous with Frederick Taylor & Taylorism.
Each of these mental models creates a lens through which leaders/managers view the world and determines how they operate. In the video Laloux tells the story of Buurtzorg (a home nursing organisation in the Netherlands) to illustrate the impact of the shift from the Machine model to the Ecosystem – and the dramatic change in thinking, performance, results, and staff fulfilment/satisfaction.
These mental models determine the meaning we attribute to key management terms and thus how we value, measure, and optimise them. The word ‘performance’ in a Machine model has a radically different application than in an Ecosystem.
Systems Thinking and Performance - Deming
Another area of underlying assumptions is related to people and performance. Traditional thinking is imbued with the notion that to improve performance managers need to optimise the work of people (and related to this is the idea that people are a problem that need to be fixed).
In contrast, let’s consider the Deming Principle. Deming states that the system people work in (and the interaction with people) accounts for 90-95 percent of performance.
Deming called for the elimination of the annual performance appraisal as part of dismantling a culture of fear. He understood the appeal of evaluation of performance. He just verified what went on in the world, and saw that the appeal was not matched by success in practice.
Improvement efforts should focus on systems, processes, and methods, not on individual workers.
Conventional management practice would ask: Whose area is this? Who is supposed to do this? We don’t ask ‘why’ we ask ‘who’ and this is often related to a search for ‘accountability’ i.e. who is at fault/who can we blame.’ We don’t look for causes in the system, we look for culprits in the work force. Performance appraisal is a ‘who-based’ approach to management.
Another underlying assumption to explore is around ‘busyness’ and working practices. One organisation explored their culture and uncovered an implicit belief that working long hours equated to ‘dedication and commitment’. This discovery prompted a revaluation of work-life balance and wellbeing.
To uncover these hidden assumptions leaders need to consult – and consult deeply i.e. really inviting input and listening to the people across the organisation - without judging or trying to deflect what arises.
It’s hard for leaders and founders to give up the illusion of control, but for the brave that walk this new path they may find that something infinitely more exciting lies beyond the boundaries of ‘control’.
