"empowerment" is a disempowering concept

[Toni Petrinovich]

Paul,

Though were you were addressing Harrison in your response, I am moved to
write.

In my frame of reference, the situation you are talking about (and indeed
most environments) suffer from one malignancy - fear.  Fear drives the
thoughts that if there is change, they will loose tenure.  Fear is the
motivator behind the ego personality's perception that what is good for me
is only good for me and not good for you.  It is so many small, hidden,
subconscious messages that separate each of us everyday in all that we do.

So, I too, ask - where is the carrot? How do we open the space wide enough,
create enough invitation to transform the fear into the energy of passion
and desire for the common good?  Good question and I deLight in reading
answers.

Blessings,
Toni Petrinovich
www.sacredspaceswa.com

----- Original Message -----
From: "Paul Roberts" <proberts at SPIRALPARTNERS.COM>
To: <OSLIST at LISTSERV.BOISESTATE.EDU>
Sent: Monday, May 20, 2002 7:41 AM
Subject: Re: "empowerment" is a disempowering concept


> Harrison -
>
> Thanks much for the extended reply.  I think you hit the nail on the head
> in your diagnosis.  Right now I'm in the middle of "Leading for Change" by
> John Kotter.  I'm not sure if the two of you would agree on the solution,
> but you both seem to be articulating a lot of the problem in the same way.
>
> Kotter makes the point that, the 20th century, in response to the
evolution
> of the social organism, required great managers to lead high performing
> organizations.  Enter the MBA program and it's apostles.
>
> >From Kotter's perspective, as I understand it, this became a double-edged
> sword...an Achilles heal as you say: most corporate organizations have
> little or no leadership and way too much management.
>
> The result is a company that gets to be superb at doing it's thing...but
> very poor at adapting to the inevitable demands for change.  He mentions,
> as do you, the emergence of arrogance as one of the kinks in the pipe (of
> Spirit, or Tao) that prevent the flow into new forms.
>
> One of the questions that intrigues me, and around which I am doing my
> work, is how to engage this system:  where do we locate the carrot, as we
> work alongside the corporation (or inside it...not my personal preference
> at this point in time)?  How can the corporate structure make the
> transition into a new, more open structure that reflects evolution on the
> Spiral?  I know Ken Wilber is addressing about the same things in his
> Integral Institute...and so does the Apostle Paul, in talking about his
own
> stealth strategy of missionizing:  being wise as a serpent, and harmless
as
> a dove.
>
> In SD terms, the generic recommendation  for optimal faciliation
(midwifing
> if you prefer) for an organization stuck in a level and experiencing the
> negative chaos that stuckness leads to calls for relating to the
> organization from half a step up on the Spiral.  Relate from too much more
> than that, and the facilitation is rejected as too weird, too far out, too
> impractical.  That's the "prophet" problem.  Most C-level people would
> simply turn off anyone who goes into them talking about a corporate morph
> into chaordic or interactive.  Sure, Dee Hock did incredible things
> starting VISA...but try selling that to the board at Citigroup.  As Dee
all
> but admits in his book, you probably couldn't even sell it to VISA at this
> time.
>
> So where do we locate the carrot?  How do we present the kind of growth
you
> are talking about as a doable option...in such a way that the
> organization's managers will become leaders, and give up their addiction
to
> command/control in response to the leading of spirit.   How do we frame
> this as an elephant that can actually be eaten one bite at a time?
>
> As an Episcopal priest, I'm sure you relate to the story of the emergence
> from Egypt of Moses and the 40 year wandering in the promised land.  The
> question is:  Is it really necessary for everyone (Joshua and Caleb
> excepted) to die off before transition into the new place is possible?
>
> I speak in terms of mythos, but the reality of that inability to adapt in
> our generation is terrible personal cost for many many good people who
> depend in very practical ways on our corporations.  Ike wasn't far off
when
> he said in the '50's that what's good for General Motors is good for the
> USA.
>
> When the company fails, the company town shuts down.  People are radically
> displaced, families collapse, children suffer abandonment.  Some people
> might think that there is no other way...that the cycle of life requires
> total destruction of one form for the emergence of the next to occur.
>
> I am not so convinced...
>
> Last summer my partner and I visited a beautiful intentional community
here
> on the east coast.  It was seeded from a well known, influential community
> in another part of the world.  On the weekend I was there there were about
> 10 or so visitors from other communities looking to trade ideas, etc.
>
> The community happens to be located right next to FIVE major colleges and
> universities.  And yet when I asked the community's founder about how much
> interaction they had with these colleges, the answer was very little
indeed.
>
> That's the gap that both fascinates and disturbs me...the itch I want to
> scratch:
>
> Here is a change wizard of no small vision and accomplishment.  Yet he
> admitted to me that he had no clue how to work in his backyard as a Spiral
> Wizard...influencing young people who are not interested in making a
> radical transformation personally into that kind of life, but might carry
> some of his values into a more "conventional" life:  people who would find
> themselves working in just a few years at GE, Accenture, etc.
>
> The disconnect comes as well in his having little or no ongoing dialogue
> with the engineering/business/law/poly sci professors in these who
> currently do work with the institutions that define much of our culture,
> not just economically, but socially too.
>
> Any Spiral Wizards got the calamine lotion?
>
> Final thoughts:  Right now I am in the middle of a conversation on the
> Yahoo Spiral Dynamics list about this topic: what pathology is about on
any
> of the levels of the spiral...why does it exist...are there any common
core
> components (which I like to think of as the fractals that create unhealthy
> complexity from simplicity)...and (ultimately) what can be done to
optimize
> the path (create the space if you will) from pathology to health.
>
> You mention arrogance.  I like the Greek term hubris...but, either way,
> that strikes me as one of the fractals.  Fear might be another...shame a
> third.
>
> Best,
> Paul Roberts
>
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