An Interview With Mary Boone

Introduction by Richard Farson
It is a special pleasure to introduce Mary Boone, one of my very favorite people, and one of the important contributors to our understanding of leadership, especially as it is influenced by new interactive technology. A busy organizational consultant, she is the author of Leadership and the Computer, and Managing Interactively. Mary is well known to many of us from her years with us in the School of Management and Strategic Studies. She is a familiar and valued presence here at WBSI. So a special welcome, Mary.

Mary, you teased us a bit in the final stages of our interview with Mary Catherine Bateson about your interest in the differences in the kind of leadership that is needed depending upon the complexity of the context. Could you expand on that idea?

Mary Boone
It's great to be with you all! I'm looking forward to a very interactive week. The ideas I'm presenting here are in very formative stages, so I encourage all of you to be candid with your feedback. It will be very helpful to me and I hope you'll find the exchange interesting.

I have been working with a colleague, Dave Snowden, who has been studying complexity theory for a number of years. Dave has developed a framework for understanding varying levels of complexity in different contexts. His work spurred me to think about how leaders would/should communicate in these different contexts. Together we have been thinking about how leadership styles might work in different contexts and exploring the question of whether or not leaders are capable of shifting their styles based on context.

To answer Dick's question, an example I gave in Mary Catherine's interview is Rudy Giuliani. Prior to 9/11, Giuliani’s leadership style was questioned by many people. Certainly he had many fans who agreed with his style (including a hard line approach to crime), but he also had many detractors who felt that his top-down, deterministic leadership and communication style was not appropriate in a number of complex situations facing the city.

On 9/11 the whole picture shifted. In a chaotic context, Giuliani’s approach was just what the doctor ordered and he became an instant leadership legend.

Interestingly, if some of you remember, after 9/11 Giuliani wanted to change the election rules to allow him to stay in office and postpone the election. But New Yorkers said "No thanks, we can take it from here." The context had shifted back to complex.

I’m going to try and upload a graphic that depicts Dave’s framework as well as my own and then we can discuss them. But while I figure that out, I’d like to ask you all a couple of questions…

In my mind, one of the most important aspects of leadership style has to do with communication. Do you all agree? What have you observed about the leadership communication styles and the contexts in which our leaders (both public and private sector) are leading today?

Participant
Mary: I have been a fan of yours ever since our whale watching trip many moons ago. You have certainly traveled up the intellectual path at a great rate ever since then!

An opening question: will your session on managing complexity be focused mainly for those of us who are email literate or will it include the average citizen? Or are these two groups already almost the same?

For the immediate future, I believe that a new attempt to move away from sound-bite communication with "we, the people" must be replaced by more intelligent communication. But there are many (maybe an increasing number) who are closet believers in restricting citizen participation to voting for candidates only (and not even referenda).

I know that the above will sound like a bias on the citizen participation. I have such a bias, but don't bring it here. What I am really asking you is to tutor us in different levels of complexity in addressing complexity theory.

Mary Boone
Well, Don, the level of complexity is going to remain pretty high if I don't quickly explain these rather interesting graphics! I always hope that all of the work I do can be understood by the average citizen--that's my job as a communicator. So call me on it if I'm not clear.

Susan Dougherty has kindly uploaded the images I could not which you see above. (Thanks, Susan.)

The left image is Dave Snowden's Cynefin framework. I'm going to invite him to join us this week and I'll let him do the heavy lifting on explaining complexity theory. But for now, let me take a shot at it.

Dave's framework gives us an understanding of complexity in terms of order, cause and effect. I should stress the word framework--Dave intentionally doesn't use the word "model" as I recall--because this is not a prescriptive framework. It is simply used to help leaders make sense of the contexts they're in. The lines are not straight to indicate that contexts don't always fall neatly into a "quadrant" and the squishy middle of the framework represents the contexts that can't yet be categorized.

On the bottom right are the contexts in which there is visible order. Cause and effect are obvious and the leader can sense, categorize and respond.

In the top right you see Hidden Order. This is a context in which cause and effect are discoverable. In this context the leader senses, analyzes, and responds.

On the top left, Complex Unorder, we find contexts in which cause and effect are understandable in retrospect, but not necessarily ahead of time. This is where a lot of us as leaders find ourselves spending a lot of time these days. In contexts of complex un-order things happen more organically. We can recognize patterns but cannot necessarily predict outcomes. This is where real ambiguity arises. (So Mary Catherine is well-equipped to lead in these contexts!) Here the leader probes, senses, and responds. The key word here is probe--a leader who probes doesn't have all the answers and knows they have to consult a variety of sources.

In the lower left, we have Chaotic Unorder. This is true chaos where there is no perceivable cause and effect. Here the leader needs to take action and then figure out what's working and do more of it. We don't want leaders in a crisis to gather people around the water cooler.

I'm surely not doing the framework justice...Dave will be here to give us more information (including what the little pyramids are because I can't remember). But for now let's go with my description. In my next comment, I'll explain my model on the right and the relationship to Dave's.

At the left of the circle, you see an arrow pointing downward. This represents broadcast communication (e.g. memos, speeches, directives). The arrow on the far right pointing upward represents feedback--i.e. communication from people upwards to the leader.

The arrows on top pointing outwards represents lateral communication. Leaders do this with their peers and they create environments which encourage people at other levels to communicate with each other. Lots of leaders forget to do this often enough.

The arrows pointing directly at each other at the bottom represent interpersonal communication. This can be one on one or in small groups.

The arrows on the circle in the middle represent intrapersonal (or reflective) communication. Leaders need to communicate with themselves (or reflect) before they communicate with others.

What I'm hoping to do with this model is to help leaders think through all of the forms of communication they might need instead of just sticking with the ones they're comfortable with. And different contexts require different communication approaches.

I'm in the process of working with Dave to see how these models overlap. Intuitively, I know that certain types of communication are more appropriate for certain contexts. For example, if you are in the bottom right context where things are known, you can do a lot more broadcast communication. But if you're in the top left (Complex Un-order) lateral communication and feedback become much more necessary. I'd love to hear people's thoughts on how they think the models overlap or how they apply to current leadership situations.

One other quick point of clarification, the reason for the "fold" at the bottom of the framework is that the boundary between visible order and chaotic un-order is always a catastrophic one. We are at most risk of catastrophic failure when our world appears at its most certain - another word for this is complacency.

Participant
Understanding Order and Unorder--an illustration and metaphor

Imagine organising a birthday party for a group of young children. Would you agree a set of learning objectives with their parents in advance of the party? Would those objectives be aligned with the mission statement for education in the society to which you belong? Would you create a project plan for the party with clear milestones associated with empirical measures of achievement? Would you start the party with a motivational video so that the children did not waste time in play not aligned with the learning objectives? Would you use PowerPoint to demonstrate to the children that their pocket money is linked to achievement of the empirical measures at each milestone? Would you conduct an after action review at the end of the party, update you best practice database and revise standard operation procedures for party management?

No, instead like most parents you would create boundaries to prevent certain types of behaviour, you would use attractors (party games, a football, a videotape) to encourage the formation of beneficial largely self-organising identities; you would disrupt negative patterns early, to prevent the party becoming chaotic, or requiring the draconian imposition of authority. At the end of the party you would know whether it had been a success, but you could define (in other than the most general terms) what that success would look like in advance.

Participant
What leaders manage (and by implication what they have to communicate about. Most current approaches to leadership (including a lot of the discredited approaches based on behaviourism) where they have validity are based on the assumptions of order.

In unorder we have to find "ordered" aspects of an unordered system to manage. That means we do not focus on the end point (other than as an inspirational attractor) but on the conditions around which patterns of order emerge. That means focusing on five things (In the Cynefin pantheon this is the ABIDE framework):

Attractors - what are the focal points around which markets, staff etc are coalescing, what are their nature (single point, multi-point or strange--that is to say naturally evolving)? Can they be changed, should they be changed, how would we monitor the impact of change?

Boundaries - what boundaries limit behaviour or provide velocity? What is their nature (brittle, elastic, permeable)? Can they be changed, should they be changed, how would be monitor the impact of change?

Identities--not necessarily individuals or aggregations of individuals, but the identities in play in the space (this is a very big subject). What is their nature (role/individual, permanent, contextual) Can they be changed, should they be changed? How would be monitor the impact of change?

Dissent/Diversity - what is the level, should it be increased (exploration) or decreased (exploitation)?

Environment - a range of issues such as proximity of agents, reward criteria, attribution of success (Axelrod and Cohen's book on complexity has a good summary of these)

Participant
A most helpful elaboration, Dave, of the point Mary is making. The conversation that is most missing, in my experience with top executives, is that inner dialogue that Mary mentions. If leaders had the time and inclination to think about their approaches, they might be able to assess situations and their own motives and abilities, leading to a more appropriate response to situations they face. But studies show that they work longer hours than anyone, and shift tasks every eleven minutes. And even within one task, they could be having a phone conversation, chairing a meeting, talking to someone in the hallway on the fly, dictating a memo, writing an email, etc. And sixty percent of the time they are not even dealing with operational issues in their own organizations, but are dealing with community responsibilities, government relations, industry-wide issues, etc. So where is the time for intrapsychic explorations and designing separate approaches to situations after an analysis of its complexity? Mary, Dave...help!

Participant
To what extent is the approach not designed but instinctual, situation determined? Wouldn't most leaders quite "naturally" treat a routine staff meeting differently than a massive disaster? Doesn't the situation shape our behavior as leaders more than the other way around? Do leaders ever consciously choose an approach? I guess so, if they are politicians running for president!

Mary Boone
Great questions, Dick. I totally agree about executive multitasking and I think it's a big problem. A friend of mine who does a huge amount of executive coaching says he teaches his clients to schedule in "white space" in their calendars. Just because they are busy doesn't mean they can't create time to reflect.

And your question about approaches being instinctual is of course right on target. Not every response is "designed"--but the problem is that some people have one leadership or communication style that they are comfortable with and stick with it even when the situation calls for something else. (e.g. my Giuliani example). What Dave and I are exploring is the possibility that we can teach people to consider different contexts, offer them some alternatives in terms of communication and leadership approaches and then when they're faced with a context that doesn't match their "normal" style; they can make a more informed decision about an appropriate response.

Dave Snowden
I think the key thing you need to take account of here is pattern entrainment. All humans (and executives are no exception) make decision based on a first fit pattern with past experience (which can be personal or narrative based) which they then rationalise. So the patterns triggered by a crisis are obviously different from a staff meeting.

One of the main purposes of the Cynefin framework to alter people to the need to gain new perspective, to disrupt patterns. So if I am in a domain I know what my starting point should be (in complex I probe, in visible order I apply best practice etc) and if I am approaching a boundary then I need the reflective time and more diversity. In other words, it’s about information processing efficiency as much as anything else.

Participant
Mary, it is very good to be in conversation with you. But I have to start by being cantankerous, and I had better explain why. Most of my experience, and most of my writings about leadership, have been the product of life experience--the analysis coming after the experience, and consequently not being very logical, indeed somewhat chaotic, and usually not reducible to charts and diagrams.

So when I look at the diagrams you and your colleague have presented here, I find the graphics much less blurry than the reality. Even the line drawn between "visible order" and "hidden order" is not nearly blurry enough to correspond to my experience. I appreciate that you've noted that the line between "visible" and "hidden" is "not straight" and indeed might be "squishy." But in my experience the squishiness is of the essence; no real world problem fits entirely in either category. I have tried hard to think of a situation in which I've found myself where cause-and-effect is "obvious" in the same way to all the relevant participants--and I come up empty.

Even in retrospect, which you suggest clarifies cause-and-effect in "Un-order," the clarifications are quite likely to vary according to the varying points of view. And in the case of "chaotic un-order," it surely isn't true that there is "no perceivable cause-and-effect." Indeed, every participant in a "chaotic un-order" is likely to perceive causes and effects from his/her standpoint, which is precisely what makes the situation seem rather chaotic to those involved, and even more so to outside observers.

In these comments I may be arguing more with Dave Snowden than with you--though you can't wholly escape, since you uploaded that diagram into this conference. So let me argue gently with your diagram, too. Its underlying philosophy seems hierarchical--the leader is on top, the "people" somewhere below.

Note the phrasing in your 14:6: "...feedback--i.e. communication from people upwards to the leader." That is surely too vertical an image to convey the idea that on some issues some people lead and others follow, but on other issues different people lead and the former leaders follow--which strikes me as the way things often work, and certainly ought to work in a true democracy.

I guess what I'm saying is, Beware of diagrams that make too clear what is necessarily fuzzy. In the last paragraph of your 14:6, you accept the "bottom right context where things are known" as the basis for assuming "you can do a lot more broadcast communication." But "things" are never "known" in just the same way by each person in any community.

So even "broadcast communication" has to take account of those differences--which means it would be wise, by unremitting consultation, to diagnose the differences in the community before broadcasting a "one size fits all" top-down doctrine that may not "work" because the prospective leaders in that community (who were assumed by der Fuhrer to be always followers) disagree with it.

I will have some comments on Comments 7 ff., but this is probably enough for one night..... Thanks, Mary, for stimulating our juices.....

Participant
As usual, I am about to make a comment that is way beyond my experience and does not properly recognize the credentials of Harlan and Mary especially, and others with comments above.

BUT: I strongly believe that quoting from experience today fails to recognize the tremendous (in my perception at least) changes that strangely enough match in time the changes from the 20th to the 21st century. As a society (if not a species) we desperately need to be as inventive in decision making as we are in the sciences that make these decisions so critical.

Both Harlan and Mary seem to rely on getting participants to accept new procedures that may be urged upon them (correct me if I am mistaken). But of course if it were a matter that has gone to court--a set of hugely complex procedures that once were "new" and in the inventing stages--the views of the individual participant have little impact on the mandatory processes of the courts.

I am not suggesting that we can expect this kind of acceptance on new procedures today, but I AM suggesting that in discussions like we are having here we should not be overly hampered by concern over their "acceptance". What is needed is encouragement to experiment with volunteers in perfecting those processes which early experimentation has already proven some hope regarding their improvement over current decision-making and educational efforts.

Again I am far from an expert on this, but the one "experiment" in my experience is that of Carolyn Lukensmeyer of Amreicaspeaks - (www.americaspeaks.org ). I have mentioned this before, but there are many others on the drawing boards with various track records. Once again I suggest that this is an area of exploration which I would like to hear the more experienced and up-to-date members of this group discuss.

Mary Boone
Harlan and Don--Thanks for such great comments. I'm running out the door, but want to record a couple of reactions immediately and then will enter more in a few hours.

First of all, Harlan, thanks for being "cantankerous"--this is exactly what I need to sharpen the ideas. You're right, I shouldn't use "leader" in a hierarchical sense. In fact it should almost be "communicator"--we all broadcast to and get feedback from others--regardless of where we sit in terms of formal power. So more on that after I ruminate about it a bit.

Secondly, you've really added a lot to my thinking on the broadcast--I talk about the need to tailor messages to audiences in the book, but I need to emphasize that when I present the model. Perhaps the visual should be a dot with a bunch of arrows emanating out from it to indicate that different "broadcasts" are going to different audiences--narrowcasting I think they call it.

Don--I need to think more about your answer but the experiments are definitely part of this model. In the model above where I talk about lateral communication, this is where I recommend the use of large group interventions including the type that Carolyn gets involved in.

More to come. Thanks to you both for joining us and taking the time to put in such interesting comments.

Participant
While I don't think that either you or Dave intend for your frameworks to lead to "communication skills," my guess is that the interpretation by others will lead to such technique oriented communications. I'm pretty sure you are advocating that the leader take a somewhat different posture for each condition than learn a set of skills, or specific communications. But the "technology of leadership" advocates will push the skills.

My view is that the more important a relationship (and leadership is one of the most important) the less skills matter. Indeed, even the idea of a posture, if it conveys that the leader remains in charge, invulnerable, in complete possession of himself or herself, can in a paradoxical way be self defeating. My own informal research would indicate that the moments that employees appreciate most, that they will identify as the most important in the history of their relationships to their bosses, is when the boss is revealed as a genuine person, vulnerable, not in total control, acting spontaneously, any façade-cracking. But would that be appreciated in a crisis? I'm not sure. But I would think it would be more likely to happen then.

Whatcha think?

Mary Boone
Yes, Dick--this is not a "technology" of communication. We're not trying to say use this tool or this technique every time you're in a particular situation. But what we are saying is that if you find yourself in a context that seems complex, it's highly likely that an interactive approach (e.g. a large group intervention) would prove a valuable thing to do. Of course they'd have to use their judgement to see if that's so. It has to do with the type of context they're facing and how it differs from other contexts.

I think our ability to handle a leader's vulnerability in a crisis would depend on the circumstances. But what we do look for in a leader in a crisis is action. The key notion is that the leader needs to recognize when it's a real crisis. Take Alexander Haig's "I'm in control here" as an example. When the President was shot, there was already a "known" context--the VP becomes president. So there wasn't really a "crisis"--certainly it was a serious situation, but not a crisis.

It's interesting, I think, that corporate leaders may be allowed more latitude in terms of the vulnerability issue. Perhaps employees do value seeing the "human" side of leaders. But as a country we don't seem to value it very much in our political leaders. We didn't enjoy seeing Bush Sr. fall victim to the flu at the Chinese dinner table; we were less than impressed with Clinton's sexual escapades; we didn't want to hear Cheney curse to another Senator we didn't want to see Dean screaming during a campaign speech, etc. All of these actions showed them not in total control, acting spontaneously and with their facades cracking, so to speak. So, I know what you're getting at, but interestingly I think this brings us back to the topic of compassion. We want to know that a leader understands what it is to be human but we're not sure that we want to see all the grisly details of how they gained that wisdom. There's a big difference between saying "I don't know" and "losing possession of yourself".

Participant
Re 14:15--Don, I would be glad to argue about, even defend, what I did try to say, but I get disoriented when I'm cited as saying something I didn't. In the third paragraph of your 14:15, you say I "seem to rely on getting participants to accept new procedures urged upon them." I don't find anything I have said, here or elsewhere, that sounds anything like that. Indeed, I share your admiration for Carolyn Lukensmeyer, and for her efforts to get large numbers of people involved in processes by which they make up their OWN MINDS about a current complexity (such as Social Security).

Participant
Mary, in comment 14:18 you cite Alexander Haig's famous announcement that "I am in control here" as having been out of context. If the President is shot, there is a Vice President waiting in line to take over, so by your definition there was no crisis. (Of course, whether there is a crisis depends partly on who's doing the thinking and talking; the 1981 headline-writers certainly thought it was a crisis.)

My reaction at the time was that it was a more fundamentally foolish statement than that. It "produced [I then wrote] neither reassurance nor anger from the American people but nervous laughter, as in watching theater of the absurd. We the people know by instinct that in our pluralistic democracy no one is, can be, or is even supposed to be 'in control.' By constitutional design reinforced by the information-rich conditions of work, we live in a nobody-in-charge society."

In his 1984 memoir "CAVEAT: Realism, Reagan and Foreign Policy, "Haig discredited the television news with editing and editorializing to make the comment look worse than his intent. Ted Koppel of ABC, he says, spread the word that Haig had gotten the presidential succession wrong. But Haig wasn't making a declaration about presidential succession. He knew perfectly well that as Secretary of State he was fifth, not third, in line; that’s the sort of information a presidential appointee is not likely to forget. Within the executive branch, for the management of a crisis (which he and most of his listeners thought it was) and with the Vice President away from Washington, Haig was the senior officer present. So he was right about that. But that didn't mean he was "in control."

CBS's editing also contributed to Haig's trouble--on purpose, he later told me. Haig had said he was "in control . . . pending the return of the vice president." On Dan Rather's evening newscast, Haig says, the softening latter part of the sentence was snipped off.

Maybe, Mary, you were listening to CBS: the "context" you thought he was out of (the presidential succession) was quite different from the context he thought he was in (who's the senior officer present in Washington just now) when he made his announcement.

In sum: I wouldn't fault Alexander Haig for stepping up to the microphone at the White House at that moment in time. My quarrel was, and is, with the word he then used ("control") to describe his role in the situation--crisis or not.

Participant
Mary, your thoughtful and compelling response to my concerns made me realize that I would need to explain more carefully my point about vulnerability. The examples I got from interviews with employees were in response to the question, "Can you describe any experiences that you feel were especially important in your relationship with your boss?" So the vulnerability was relevant to that particular relationship. I think that's the way it is in all human relationships. We want our loved ones to be vulnerable to us, but not to others.

Participant
Harlan, I am sorry, but not surprised, that I misquoted (or misunderstood) some of your message. You will note that I also was unsure and ended with "(correct me if I am mistaken)". So thank you for correcting me.

The only reason I am taking up space here is that my principal concern also seems to have been missed or misunderstood. Or it may also seem to most of you not related to our topic here.

But I feel strongly enough about it to make one more try:

I strongly believe that in the "modern world" of increased complexity AND large scale impacts of poor decisions that we need to invent new decision procedures to match the new advances made by explosive science.

My perception (and again I would appreciate contradiction with explanation) is that our traditional decision making procedures are primarily based in adversarial /winning skills rather than understanding/persuasion skills and procedures. As our population grows and the average citizen becomes increasingly remote from the centers of decision making, it seems to me that IF democracy is to survive it demands new decision making procedures and attitudes.

Where we both seem to agree, the experiments of Lukensmeyer and Americaspeaks seem to be an important area of experimentation. Do these concerns belong in this conference?

Mary Boone
Harlan, Don, and Dick--thanks so much for the comments. As usual, Harlan, you make me think. You're right about Haig's comment and I'm glad you pointed it out before I wrote something in an article about it. Certainly the part that was left out by CBS was critical.

First of all, let me say that I am in violent AGREEMENT with both you and Don. We've got a no one in control society. And we also need more inclusive procedures for decision-making and communication. Both Dave's and my framework aim to support these ideas rather than refute or undermine them in any way, so we just need to be clear about how we agree with you.

First of all, Don, I think democracy needs to survive not only in the country, but also in organizations. The types of procedures I recommend in the book are highly interactive. But I also recognize that in some circumstances (e.g. 9/11 in New York City) we wouldn't want to have a meeting that very day led by Carolyn. Her perspective would be invaluable once things were not so chaotic as they were that very day or a meeting of that type could be fantastic for helping to prepare for a crisis.

And Harlan, I've thought more about your earlier comments and what I'm trying to get across is not the notion of a hierarchical leader, but the notion that anyone who is trying to communicate about anything needs to consider different communication approaches such as the one I use the circle for. I'm going to change the up and down arrows to reflect a lack of hierarchy visually. Is there anything else about the model that any of you see that needs revision?

Thanks!

Mary Boone
Dick--of course, I agree with you that we want our leaders to show their humanity, but I also think that you've made a great point--we're not so sure we want a leader's vulnerability to be perceived by others. I really think it depends on how you define vulnerability--the word humanity keeps coming to mind. We want our leaders to "Get Over Themselves" as I say in the book. We don't want arrogance, we want human beings who are compassionate and real to help us chart our direction.

So it's ok for Clinton to play the sax, or Reagan to ride a horse (even though the press mavens got him to ride Western when he usually rode hunt seat), or for Edwards to admit the pain he and Elizabeth experienced when losing a child.

Participant
I don't think those are examples of vulnerability or even humanity in those contexts, although I guess playing the sax could collapse into one! They are pretensions to humanism, and therefore just the opposite. Beware pretensions to humanism.

Vulnerability is when you can't defend or control, when you are revealed involuntarily, usually by the actions of someone else toward you. It is what we all try desperately to avoid, but discover when we get through it that it usually creates bonds with another that are stronger than before. It is how a group breaks through to a defensive member and gets past an impasse, embracing the member. It's how and why couples fight--to create vulnerability in the other, the feeling that you can indeed have an impact on your partner. It is not possible to make oneself vulnerable, any more than one can make oneself happy or sincere or have a good time. Vulnerability is a transaction. It generally requires another. So much of what is important in a leader's communication is not within his or her control. People learn what we are, not what we say.

Participant
Mary, I wanted to go back to your perceptive and pertinent point about Rudy Giuliani pre-, during, and post-9/11. You expressed perfectly the journey we took with him: dubious, grateful, then thanks a lot and if you’ll step aside we need to move along. That augurs well for the ability of the led to discriminate their needs in one context as opposed to another when it comes to leaders. (An analogous example is Winston Churchill whose party was voted out of office after World War II, when voters perceived a new set of priorities.) How would you assess George W. Bush in this context: his leadership style, the changing context of the Bush presidency, and the way he’s perceived by the electorate in those changing contexts?

Participant
Richard, regarding your 14:25: That's the best analysis of vulnerability I've ever heard or read anywhere. Maybe it's helpful for a professional psychologist, or indeed any disciplinary scholar to mix with ordinary people like us in a dialogue like this. It encourages exposition of what might otherwise be abstruse concepts in wonderfully plain language--of which your clarification of vulnerability is a superb example. "Vulnerability is a transaction." Bull’s eye!

Participant
Mary, I'm glad you take in such good spirit my suggestion to avoid the hierarchical implication in your original diagram. I guess I've never tried drawing a diagram about "different communication approaches" (your 14:23) because there is such a multiplicity of options--depending on who I'm communicating with, about what, who else will be listening, and dozens of other variables. A realistic diagram would have to be so complicated as to get in the way of thinking about the particular relationship that needs to be communicated about.

Apropos hierarchy: If there's an overriding principle, I suppose it is always to avoid treating other people as "below" me, even if that's the way they seem to feel. And the clue to my acting this way is not to regard any relationship as determined by a hierarchy, even if my attitudes and actions seem to mess up the organization chart that some expert on organization has hung up on the wall.

Participant
At a board meeting with a long rectangular table it's easy to tell who the leader is, but at a smaller round table with the same group it's much more difficult. The patterns of interaction are completely different; the comments are at a more personal level, there is a kind of informality and shared responsibility that characterizes the meeting. The situation is determining. To some extent management is the design of situations that predictably elicit different kinds of communication--setting ground rules, for example.

I guess what I'm suggesting, Mary, is that not only does a leader analyze situations, but often designs them. Proactive rather than reactive.

I thought I was paying close attention during the aftermath of 9/11, but I must have blinked, because I never saw the magnificent, Man of the Year quality, leadership from Rudy. I'm sorry I missed it because I never know what anyone is talking about when they use it as an example of great leadership.

Participant
Mary, you are always so adept at bridging the theoretical and the real. Coming in at this point in the interview, I am a bit overwhelmed by the complexity of discussion going on. So while I try to digest and understand it, I have a question about how you see this model operating for the leader who takes a strong stance about an important but controversial issue in a time of stress but not chaos. How, in this circumstance, can a leader make use of the model to enable the organization to have the necessary communication to move forward? At what point does the model predict that the leader moves too fast or too slowly or too radically or too timidly and what might be the consequences of each scenario? Can this model help a leader make those predictions and, if so, how?

Mary Boone
Thanks for all of the wonderful input, everyone! Let me try to take each one in turn.

I second Harlan's applause of Richard's definition of vulnerability and I think it is essential. Leaders will not create environments for interactive communication if they are unwilling to be vulnerable. This is why it is often challenging to get leaders to encourage lateral communication in their organizations--they often don't want to be vulnerable and they often don't want to share power. They want to have the "answers" instead of asking questions and allowing the group to help make many determinations. So thanks, Richard, for that contribution.

And Richard, in 29, you state, much more eloquently, the exact point I am trying to make. I'm talking about designing and hoping that I can create a framework to help leaders be better "communication designers."

Mary Boone
Harlan--thanks for your continuing input. I'm genuinely appreciative of what you're saying because the hierarchy issue has bothered me for a while. I totally ascribe to your philosophy that no one is in control.

The whole point of the model is that anyone in an organization could use it at any time. Anyone who is trying to communicate or encourage communication can use it to remind themselves of the general types of communication they can employ.

I'm going to keep all of your observations in mind as I try to recreate the framework. You are right, communication is a complicated thing and it can't be reduced artificially. But I think it is also true that some people are naturally good at it and that others can learn to be better at it. The framework can never be exhaustive but it can be informative (at least if I get it to be clearer!). Does that make sense?

Mary Boone
Ralph--thank you so much for jumping into the conversation because you've pointed out something obvious that I hadn't really thought through well before and that is the ability of the "led" to help determine the context. I'm going to chew on that some more and ask Dave to weigh in on that too if he can.

As for Bush, my perception is that he frequently acts as though he is in a chaotic or known context when in fact he is often in a complex one. He's more comfortable with certainty than uncertainty and I think a lot of voters feel the same way. (Of course there are also a lot who don't!) The interesting thing is that I perceive this as the main schism in the country right now which is why Mary Catherine's comments were so important.

When you are in the bottom right or bottom left context, it is easier to simply tell people what direction we're going. I think Bush is more comfortable with this than with a more interactive style which might cause him to experiment with the type of meetings that Don Straus has been describing that Carolyn and I both run. I ran a 3000-person meeting that was designed to allow the entire leadership of a gigantic organization to share ideas with each other and with top management on a critical strategy issue. This type of interactive communication happens only when a leader realizes that a situation is complex and that they don't have all the answers. I don't think that Bush believes he personally has all the answers, but I get the impression that he thinks his team does and to ask voters to give input in anything more than a simple poll I think is unlikely to happen under his watch.

Mary Boone
Gloria--thanks so much for the question. I think Dave could give you some richer answers, but let me take a first shot at it.

First of all, I think you're a step ahead of the game to recognize that the situation is not chaotic but rather "stressful" and it seems to me complex. My input on the communication side would be that this would be a time for building coalitions, for holding meetings like the one I just described above where there is a lot of lateral communication and search for agreement on common ground. All of this would take place before the leader presents the results of these dialogues. In fact, I think the way that PPFA went about developing the vision is a perfect example of a good way to address a complex circumstance.

Perhaps some really good large group dialogues among a coalition of likeminded people could produce an inter-organizational position that would be powerful.

Am I getting at the right stuff?

Mary Boone
By the way, everyone, I hope you'll stay with us through tomorrow! Richard is leaving, but we'll still be here and I'd like to try and get Dave to join us once again if I can. Thanks...

Mary Boone
Question for you guys: What book would you recommend that really does a good job of describing FDR's presidency? I have a hunch that he was really good at reading contexts. For example when the country was in such terrible economic shape, his idea was to try a bunch of things and see what worked and then do more of that--which would follow Dave's model perfectly. And anyone who led for that long must have been able to read shifting contexts well.

And the Fireside Chats were a wonderful communication mechanism. I'd like to read more about them and the impact they had.

Suggestions?

Dave Snowden
Harlan, the Cynefin framework evolved from practice (especially in the policy and intelligence fields) and then interacted with theory (complexity science) to produce its current form.

The model is not an absolute one but is socially constructed in use. That recognises the phenomenological aspects of human sense making (your point about some people imputing cause in chaos would mean that they would define the complex boundary in a different way).

Similarly, the boundaries can be drawn (or rather constructed) in different ways: some groups will make them fussy, some sharp, and it is interesting to see how different groups do this.

We did a recent project using the framework in Singapore around SARS to show the different cognitive biases of ministries (i.e. the way they constructed the framework differed radically. This is now used to help explain different interpretations between ministries

Dave Snowden
Mary asked me to make some comments in the complex context, particularly with respect to difficult political situations. This relates to work we are currently doing (based on narrative) to identify ways in which intelligence analysts can brief politicians on complex foreign policy issues in limited timescales in such a way as to resonate with the concerns of those politicians. It is a similar issue to that in policy/strategy issues in large companies and NGOs. This is a huge subject and I do not have the time or space to write them up (although it will be a chapter in the book). I think it’s worth establishing the principle on which we are working:

- Humans make decisions not on rational grounds, but on the basis of a first fit pattern match with previous experience (which is then justified in terms of the dominant ideology).

- A few thousand years ago it would have been "a tree spirit spoke to me"; these days it’s "I considered the options and made a rational decision". Both have the same relation to reality—that is, very little. Interestingly, this insight from recent work in neuroscience and linguistics builds on early insight on patterns and habits in Mary Douglas's and others’ work.

- Patterns arise from either personal experience or the collective narrative of the context in which the decision maker leaves. Those patterns are more informed by failure than success (avoidance of failure is a better survival strategy in a complex system.

- In consequence managing decision-making is a question of managing patterns through the management of attractors and boundaries (see my earlier post).

- So, communication must either resonate with existing patterns or disrupt those patterns.

We are doing interesting work in the latter, for example, using evolved patterns of alternative history of the War of 1812 shortly after 9/11 to get policymakers to see those events from an Islamic perspective.

Mary, I hope that helps.

Participant
Mary, this has been fascinating to read.

Is it worth considering that there are some basic leadership styles that have been around for millennia? Might it be that different leaders have some personal inclination toward a particular style? For example:

1. Authority - Maintaining control relies on the obedience of those being led

2. Democracy - Leading by serving the majority

3. Anarchy - Seeing beyond a need for permanence in structured leadership

4. Abdication - Leadership in the highest integrity that stands aside if found to be unpopular

5. The General - In crisis, everyone looks to the natural leader

6. Administration - The sensible delegator

If there is any validity to that possibility would it be worthwhile to consider that what a leader needs to do at any point in time might depend upon what their style is? Or even to consider that perhaps the style that will best serve in any given situation depends upon the situation itself?

Mary Boone
Dave, thanks for those clarifications and examples--the examples really help.

Kip, I think your final statement is the hypothesis Dave and I are working on—i.e., that the style that will best serve in any given situation depends upon the situation itself. And if that is true, then leaders need to be able to adapt their styles to a given context. The question is, are leaders able to do this? Can they be taught to do it?

Participant
OK, I understand more clearly now where you're going. A quick question, though, about the other half of the equation: the followers. Will they have to be taught to adapt to changing leadership styles? A democratic leader who suddenly becomes authoritarian won't do well unless the followers are clear about their new role of obedience. Or an authoritarian leader who suddenly embraces anarchy.

Mary Boone
Kip, great point. My sense is that "followers" will recognize the appropriateness (or inappropriateness as the case may be) of the leadership style for the context (e.g., no one wanted to gather around the water cooler on 9/11). But your question relates back to Ralph's really great comment about the notion that the "followers" should be helping to determine the context. This is something that is certainly making me think and that will be fun to discuss with Dave once we're offline. Thanks for your comment.

Mary Boone
We're at the end of our discussion and I just want to thank all of you for participating. I really enjoyed it and as usual all of you made terrific points that will help further the frameworks. A special thanks to Dave Snowden for joining and helping to explain the excellent work he is doing.

If any of you think of further comments or questions, I'd love to hear from you in an email.

Participant
Let me add my thanks to you, Mary. You have been a most responsive and generous interviewee, and opened some new doors for us into leadership issues. We are indeed grateful to you as well as to you, Dave, for a wonderful augmentation of Mary´s interview.

Participant
Ouch. Too late. My time has been spent on reflection on the question and the early responses. My concern is that with additional complexity the desire for strong centralized authoritarian solutions becomes more acute. The people want them and leaders will emerge. Perhaps we need to discuss how complex a situation human nature can handle without loss of local autonomy.

But those leaders are always self-serving, accruing more of the power and resources to themselves and the network that supports them and the rest be damned.

So in the world today business leaders are "efficiently" leading toward greater wealth concentration, and political leaders are leading toward systems that are unsustainable, but pay off within the generation (or career tenure) of those who lead.

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