IS SYSTEMS THINKING A HOLLOW RITUAL

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IS SYSTEMS THINKING A HOLLOW RITUAL?
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The Leaders New Work Building Learning
OrganizationsPeter Senge

• Current Management System
• Let the leadership do the thinking
• Leadership by control
• Leadership by force of rewards or will
• What is needed is a System which
• Depends on superior learning
• Can think at all levels not just the highest

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LEARNING CATEGORIES

• ADAPTIVE
• Coping by responding to the environment
• GENERATIVE
• Expanding our capability, it is about creating
  not just coping.

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GENERATIVE LEARNING

• Different ways of looking at known problems
• Grasping systemic source of problems not just
  symptoms
• Leaders responsible for everyones learning
• Leader creates tension between where you are and
  where you need to be.

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NEW ROLES FOR LEADERS

• DESIGNER
• Clarify visions, values and purpose
• design policies, strategies and structures
• Create learning processes
• TEACHER
• Help people gain insight into current reality
• STEWARD
• Serve first
• Create opportunities for people to contribute to
  organizational purpose

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NEW SKILLS

• BUILDING SHARED VISIONS
• SURFACING AND TESTING MENTAL MODELS
• Leaps of abstraction
• balancing inquiry and advocacy
• Distinguishing theory from application
• Recognizing defensive routines
• SYSTEMS THINKING
• Seeing Relationships, moving beyond blame,
  distinguishing types of complexity, focus on
  right areas, and avoiding symptomatic solutions

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The Many Faces of the Corporate CodeLisa H.
Newton

• A code must meet three specifications
• Creation through participation
• Must be consistent with general ethical
  principles and dictates of conscience (respect
  for individual, commitment to justice, sensitive
  to rights of all affected) validity
• Must reflect the actions of senior managers and
  leaders. authentic

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CODES FAIL WHEN

• They are created in a vacuum
• Do not seem valid to those asked follow them
• Do not seem authentic

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Managing for Organizational IntegrityLynn Sharp
Paine

• CLEAR AND PRESENT NEED FOR CORPORATE CODE OF
  ETHICS
• Business is perceived as incapable of ethical
  conduct
• Market requires efficiency not ethics
• Board of Directors and top management responsible
  for balancing conflicting demands

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WHY CODES ARE VIEWED AS VIABLE

• Academic skepticism
• View as created by a power elite
• Subject to bias of senior officers
• Rules to not apply to those at the top

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CREATION OF CODES THAT WORK

• PRINCIPLE OF PARTICIPATION
• Developed through maximum involvement
• PRINCIPLE OF VALIDITY
• Must be consistent with accepted dictates of
  conscience
• PRINCIPLE OF AUTHENTICITY
• Code must be followed by senior management

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MANAGING FOR ORGANIZATIONAL INTEGRITYLynn Sharp
Paine

• COMPLIANCE BASED CODES OF ETHICS
• Use legal compliance as the standard. This mark
  is to low
• Compliance overemphasizes the threat of detection
  and punishment but does not foster moral
  discipline

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Hallmarks of an Effective Integrity Strategy

• Guiding values make sense
• Senior leaders are committed, credible and
  willing to take action
• Values are integrated into culture
• Company systems and structures reinforce values
• Managers have the skills and ability to make
  ethical daily decisions
• Note Page 538 for difference in compliance and
  integrity