From Management Education to Civic Reconstruction From Management Education to Civic Reconstruction provides a unique analysis of how a combination of diverse, culturally based approaches are implicitly or explicitly built into the development of a business or organization. By addressing key issues at the forefront of developmental management, the authors demonstrate methods whereby principles of ecology can be applied to different stages of organizational development at both local and global level. Distinctive features of this work include: • examination of management and organizational development from a post-modern perspective • up-to-date case material from a wide range of organizations, spanning the public, private and civic sphere • development of a transcultural approach to the study of management principles and practices, incorporating practical and theoretical insights from across the globe This text will be of interest to students and practitioners in the fields of organizational behaviour, corporate strategy and management education. Ronnie Lessem is Founder of the Four Worlds Institute. The inventor of the concept of the global businessphere, he is the author of over twenty books including Management Development through Cultural Diversity (1998). Sudhanshu Palsule is Head of Learning and Knowledge Management at Anglia Water and co-founder of the Four Worlds Institute. He is the originator of the concept of a knowledge creating ecology and is co-author of Managing in Four Worlds (1997) with Ronnie Lessem. Managing across cultures: developmental perspectives Series Editors Ronnie Lessem and Sudhanshu Palsule Four Worlds Institute This series is oriented towards the development of managerial and educational principles and practices from across the globe, focusing upon business in America, Europe, the Middle and Far East and southern Africa. It comprises three types of book —contextual, comparative and developmental—set within the context of transcultural management in general, surveying the development and dissemination of business principles and practices that draw upon diverse cultures of our global village. Each title will portray not only such transcultural concepts and their application, but also the way in which they can be cultivated and transferred from within businesses and business schools, as well as management consultancies. From Management Education to Civic Reconstruction The Emerging Ecology of Organizations Ronnie Lessem with Sudhanshu Palsule London and New York First published 1999 by Routledge 11 New Fetter Lane, London EC4P 4EE This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2005. “To purchase your own copy of this or any of Taylor & Francis or Routledge’s collection of thousands of eBooks please go to www.eBookstore.tandf.co.uk.” Simultaneously published in the USA and Canada by Routledge 29 West 35th Street, New York, NY 10001 © 1999 Ronnie Lessem The right of Ronnie Lessem to be identified as the Author of this Work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilized in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Lessem, Ronnie From management education to civic reconstruction: the emerging ecology of organizations/Ronnie Lessem with Sudhanshu Palsule p. cm.—(Managing across cultures) Includes bibliographical references and index. 1. Organizational change. 2. Corporate culture. 3. Organizational learning. 4. Management. I. Title. II. Series. HD58.8.L473 1999 658.4′063–dc21 98–35446 CIP ISBN 0-203-97973-7 Master e-book ISBN ISBN 0-415-18232-8 (hbk) ISBN 0-415-18233-6 (pbk) To all our students and organizations on City University’s Management MBA programme Contents List of figures viii List of tables ix Acknowledgements x PART I Orientation: knowledge creating ecology 1 Knowledge creating ecology: management education to civic 3 reconstruction 2 From business school to learning society: Britain’s role in the 19 twenty-first century 3 Organizational ecology: the dynamics of ecological 39 succession PART II Traditional: from training to learning 4 Ordinary and extraordinary management: reconstruction and 63 renewal at Lloyd’s 5 Work and soul: rounding out the City’s square mile 85 PART III Modern: upgrading intellectual capital 6 Towards the Individualized Corporation: Ford—from 95 rationalization to regeneration 7 From crisis to awakening: IBM’s cycles of history 115 8 The age of business ecosystems: from Sainsbury’s pioneering 137 to its renewal PART IV Post-modern: knowledge intensive services 9 The stories we are: insuring the poetics of learning 153 10 The development spectrum: the Internationales Designcenter 165 11 Information space: Medlabs’ framework for learning 179 vii 12 Spiral dynamics: relational justice at Thames Valley 193 PART V Perennial: civic reconstruction 13 Freeing up societies: Virgin’s simpler way 213 14 Communities at peace: knowledge creation at Surrey Police 231 15 Enhancing life through water: Anglian Water’s paths of 255 change 16 Sustainable development: Body Shop meets the MMBA 281 PART VI Conclusion: catalytic zone 17 Entering the catalytic zone: becoming worldcentric 303 Epilogue 317 Index 325 Figures 1 Managing in four worlds 8 2 Towards a learning society 20 3 The knowledge creating ecology 40 4 From colonization to co-creation 45 5 Four worlds of organizational ecology 48 6 Lloyd’s organizational dynamics 72 7 The City of London’s work and soul 87 8 Ford 2000 99 9 IBM’s crisis and awakening 121 10 Stages of development 141 11 The ecosystemic return 142 12 Sainsbury’s business ecosystem 144 13 Re-authorizing insurance 157 14 The United Kingdom in a global context 169 15 The management spectrum 170 16 From market to clan 184 17 From globality to survival 196 18 Dynamic states 209 19 Diversity underlying stability 214 20 From knowledge vision to knowledge creation 237 21 Towards comparative advantage 237 22 Surrey Police’s knowledge vision 240 23 The knowledge structure 244 24 Project based ‘Hypertext’ organization 251 25 From analytic to emergent realities 261 26 Departure and return 279 27 The organizational Medicine Circle 296 28 Alternative realities 308 Tables 1 MMBA as management education 34 2 MMBA as knowledge management 35 3 MMBA as knowledge creation 35 4 Civic reconstruction 36 5 Stages of ecological development 37 6 Stability seeking navigational principles 39 7 The spectral cast of characters 174 8 Psychological functions 175 9 Developmental spectrum of ages and stages 176 10 Four worlds revisited 209 11 Comparative management 248 12 Cangleska Wakan and the Heroic Organization 295 Acknowledgements This book represents an intimate partnership between business, consultancy and academia. From the ‘business’ world, we acknowledge our debt to CEO’s Chris Mellor and Alan Smith, HR Director Clive Moreton as well as former Employee Development Manager David Taylor at Anglian Water; to Ray Mahoney at the Corporation of London; to Professor Ken Mortimore and to Geoff Johnson at Ford; to Mike Millikan and Brian Foss at IBM; to Heide and Makis Werlamis at the Idea Center in Austria, together with Eva Maria Rosenmayer; to Terry Heyday and Terry Webb at Lloyd’s; to Barry Wilding and Duncan Hopper from the insurance industry; to Dr Nabil Nassar, co-founder of Medlabs in Jordan; to Chairman David Sainsbury and HR practitioners Howard Bentley, Judith Evans and Andrew Tanner at Sainsbury; to Chief Constable Ian Blair, Deputy Chief Constables Ian Beckett and Jim Hart, and Andy Thompson at Surrey Police; to Michael Page and Boyd Rodger at Thames Valley Police; and to MD Rowan Gormley and his Deputy Jane-Anne Gardia at Virgin Direct. From the consultancy and academic worlds, within and adjacent to City University, we wish to acknowledge our educators Professors Chris Hendry, Clive Holtham, George Selim and Carole Vielba as well as Lakis Kaiounides at City University, together with visiting faculty, Professors V.S.Mahesh from Buckingham University, Ralph Stacey from the University of Hertfordshire and Paul Roberts from Roffey Park. We also want to acknowledge our debt to our facilitators Wendy Briner, Ann Brocksbank, Alan Clark, Jonathon Cowan, Romy Jenkins, Ann Leeming and Ian McGill. Moreover, the book stands on the shoulders of conceptual giants spread across the globe, i.e. America’s Christopher Bartlett, Don Beck and Chris Cowan, Will McWhinney, Jim Moore, Emmett Murphy, William Strauss and Neil Howe, Margaret Wheatley and finally Ken Wilber; Anglo-Frenchman Max Boisot; Canada’s William Randall; Englishmen Kevin Kingsland and David Whyte; India’s Samantra Goshal; Japan’s Ikijiro Nonaka and Hirotaka Takeuchi; and again South African Ralph Stacey. Finally, we would like to thank Dr Helmi Salaam and Dr Mohammed Mikdashi, co-founders of TEAM in Cairo, our partners in the Arab Middle East, as well as Professor Hugh Murray and Keith Holland at Executive Development in England, Cathy McSweeney, Catherine Butler and Melissa Fisher in the MMBA office, and my editor at Routledge, Stuart Hay, for his sponsorship, support and enthusiasm. Part I Orientation Knowledge creating ecology 2 1 Knowledge creating ecology Management education to civic reconstruction Catalysation is a phenomenon through which a number of ‘tag-on’ processes undermine the existence of the previous ‘conservative’ order of stability and increasing equilibrium. Whether they are the invading bacteria, forest fires or typhoons, these catalysts alter the earlier structure and create new situations in which the energy blocks are removed. In contrast to the ‘de-sensitized’ state of the eco-system at the conservation stage, the system becomes highly sensitized at the catalytic one. Positive feedback loops amplify small changes and push them through the entire system, keeping it in a ‘far-from-equilibrium’ state.