Facilitating Change
Identities in Motion
Every being, every organization is an identity in motion, creating itself in the world and creating its world simultaneously. —Margaret J. Wheatley, Ph.D., Leadership and the New Science
Cultural identity begins with a vision of the founding members of organizations. Times passes. New territory is formed. Companies often bring in skilled facilitators. I was gifted to work internationally with CEOs and other C-suite executives and their teams to birth and rebirth individual and corporate identities. Our work together was not about branding! We were midwives who supported the unfolding development of people in the work settings with methodologies that allowed them to become creators and shapers of a cultural environment that nourished the workers.
Leaders are also on the continuum of evolving. Evaluating projects through the rearview mirror, the most common feedback from participants had a theme. “Why didn’t I find out sooner who I really am?”
Organizational Paradigms
My team of consultants observed similar narrow structures within our client organizations. Early in our projects we saw four main metaphorical patterns.
Family: The patriarch/father will take care of us; mother will take care of us (obedient)
Military: We will protect you and keep you safe requiring loyalty (double bind) (submissive)
Sports: Winners over losers, binary; either/or (competitive)
Technological: We have the/your answers (blind trust)
Coming from an exploratory point of view that the organization had their own answers; we were there to set a stage of what is not seen or understood by their frozen structures. We examined alternative organizing patterns such as ones that mirrored nature, or the science of self-organizing systems and metaphors that embody tenets of well-being and wholeness.