The document discusses leadership in complex systems and organizations. It contrasts complicated systems that can be understood through their individual parts versus complex systems that are unpredictable and adaptive. For complex systems and organizations facing turbulence, the document advocates for leadership that builds networks, amplifies diverse voices, inspires openness, prevents problems, and listens to what is emerging from within the organization rather than imposing external initiatives. The goal of leadership should be developing collective purposes and shared intent, rather than top-down control or direction.

1. Andrew Curry
The Futures Company
Liverpool,
14 June 2005
Some thoughts on
building leadership
capacity

2. 2
Franklin and the North West passage

3. 3
Amundsen’s approach was leaner

4. 4
Complicated vs. complex: bricks and birds
• Complicated
− all components are knowable
and definable
− they can be catalogued
− all relationships can be listed
− cause and effect can be
understood and replicated
− It is the sum of its parts
• Complex
− many interacting agents with
multiple identities
− if you alter an agent the effect is
unpredictable
− cause and effect are intertwined
− it is not the exact sum of its parts
Source: Jake Chapman, Demos

5. 5
The brick school of management
“I only have three
things to do. I choose
the right people. I
allocate the right
number of dollars. And
I transmit ideas from
one division to another
with the speed of light”
(Jack Welch)

6. 6
Engineering assumptions about leadership
•Leaders as head,
organisation as body
•The premise of
predictable change
•The assumption of
cascading intention
Richard Pascale, Surfing The Edge of Chaos

7. 7
The limits of engineering models of leadership
Richard Pascale, Surfing The Edge of Chaos
“Faced with the practical needs for
significant change, we opt for the
hero-leader rather than eliciting and
developing leadership capacity
throughout the organisation… The
evidence for top managementʼs
power to direct large organisations to
change is thin at best”
Peter Senge

8. 8
‘The new leadership agenda’
•Organisations are not machines, but living systems
−Based on complexity theory and ʻnew scienceʼ
•Outcomes are uncertain and unstable, so leaders need
to be adaptive
•Organisations need to agree on purposes – shared
intent is more valuable than rules
•To building capability within organisations you need to
increase
−The size of the ʻnodesʼ or meeting/exchange points
−The number of connections between the nodes
•The balance between ʻdesignʼ and ʻemergenceʼ has to
be found by trial and error

9. 9
“I build up networks, increase the
organisationʼs connectivity, and amplify
the voices of employees who would not
otherwise be heard. As a consequence,
the organisationʼs ability to learn
increases.”
(Angelika Siegmund)
Quoted in Fritjo Capra, The Hidden Connections

10. 10
From classical music to playing jazz
"Then, there was this huge battle space and we knew just about
everything about it … All one had to do was adhere to the tactical
doctrine that flowed from Nato's general defence plans. I was
akin to second violin in a symphony orchestra.
“These days, I have to play jazz."
Air Vice Marshal Brian Burridge, 2001

11. 11
Leadership and managing through turbulence
“When we hit the turbulence,
the conventional planning
tools wouldnʼt work. You could
have done business, but it
wouldnʼt have been good
business”.
(Chris Yapp, speaking of ICL)
Intended
strategy
Realised
strategy/
New insight
Possible
emergent
strategy
Possible
emergent
strategy
Turbulence
Sources: Max Boisot, [1996]; Understanding best practice in strategic futures work, Henley Centre (2001)

12. 12
What leaders should be
•Inspiring
− Create conditions that foster openness and
release energy
•Caring
− Spend more time preventing problems than
fixing them
•Infusing
− Change that seeps in slowly, steadily,
profoundly#
•Initiating
− Listens to whatʼs rising up from the base, rather
than parachuting initiatives into the the
organisation
“The manager is
not the
organisation,
any more than a
picture of a pipe
is a pipe”
Henry Mintzberg

13. 13
“We did not put our ideas together. We
put our purposes together. And then
we agreed, and then we decided”
From the ʻPopol Vuhʼ, quoted
in Adam Kahane, ʻSolving
Tough Problems'

14. Andrew Curry
The Futures Company
e: andrew.curry@thefuturescompany.com
b: http://thenextwavefutures.wordpress.com/
t: http://twitter.com/nextwavefutures