BOOK REVIEW: Finding Our Way: Leadership For an Uncertain Time (By Margaret J. Wheatley, Berrett-Koehler, 2005, ISBN #978-1-57675-317-0)

“...how to pump energy into this lifeless mass (of employees). Once the pump is primed, they (i.e. managers) must then rush hither and yon to make sure that everyone is clanking along in the same direction, at the established speed, with no diversions”

• Impose performance standards
• Measure everything possible
• Present mission statements, values and visions that everyone must conform to
• Create organizational charts, formal reporting relationships, and job descriptions
• Expect conformity and compliance
• Relax only when things seem to be under control (whenever that is...?)

• Accept that fact that too much control over behavior will quash your people’s creativity, adaptiveness, and very spirit at work. You will get resistance or, at the very best, compliance.
• Understand the three ingredients of successful self-organizing systems:
1. A Sense of Purpose, collectively shared, seldom imposed
2. Information, the nutrient of a living system.
3. Relationships: by means of which information is transmitted and exchanged, decisions are made and actions are taken at the local level.
• Organize your people around a clear purpose that in which they can find meaning. Claude Taylor, when he was CEO of Air Canada, used to remind employees that they were in the business of uniting Canadians with one another and with the world.
• Facing a complex issue? To the degree possible, invite in everybody who is affected. Listen to the diverse perceptions, ideas and concerns. Look for a unifying center among all the views.
• Maintain and foster connections among members of the organization and provide them with as much information as you can to help them do their job, to stimulate their creativity, to help them see how their job fits into the larger picture, etc. In short, ensure there are clear, meaningful goals around which to coalesce their effort. Then delegate, as much as you can, the “how” they do their work.

1. Take care of yourself.
2. Take care of each other.
3. Take care of this place.

1. Organizations are machines. People need to be moved around, directed, programmed, retooled, etc., like parts of the machine.
2. Only material things are real. This, of course, devalues vital intangibles such as commitment, accountability, values, teamwork, organizational culture, knowledge and–especially–trust.
3. Only numbers are real. So, once you assign something a metric, you can relax; you’ve got it pegged.
4. You can only manage what you can measure. So, don’t bother attending to other elements you can’t tabulate or concretely measure.
5. Technology is always the best solution.