In any complex systems, there is no neutral position. We cannot take a neutral stance in a complex system like a team, group, organisation, or with a partner.When I am part of a system, I will have influence on this system, whether I intend it or not. Even if I try to place myself ‘outside’ the system, or stand on the sidelines, or “just watch”, I’m still part of the system. “Standing on the sideline” will influence the others, usually with unintended consequences.
Doing nothing is doing something
As I wrote in The subtle art of non-intervention, not acting can also be an intervention. So deciding to do nothing will have consequences, whether we intend it or not.
As a consultant or facilitator, I might think I’m standing on the sidelines, observing the team, now and then prodding them to bring about change. In practice I become part of this system. I need to be part of a system to have influence. So I’m in, even if I’m pretending to be standing on the outside. So when I think I’m “just observing”, I am already changing the system dynamics.
We have impact on a (complex) system by engaging with it, and only by engaging. We will become a part of that whole, for some time. Being too much on the sideline means we will not have lasting impact.
Influence is reciprocal
The system will also influence me! The influencing is mutual. Gerald M. Weinberg wrote about this in Secrets of Consulting, as “Prescott’s Pickle Principle” - consultants are like cucumbers in a jar of organizational brine ;)
Cucumbers get more pickled than brine gets cucumbered. A small system that tries to change a big system through long and continued contact is more likely to be changed itself.
“Change is for other people” we sometimes joke as consultants, pretending we’re independent and it’s just the organization that needs to change. But we know that change is as much for us consultants as well.
The system touches us. Whatever is happening, it will affect us. We will feel this. It can be exhausting (drowning in other people’s problems), but if you learn to regulate this, it can provide a lot of information.
To close, two more quotes (cited by Abeba Birhane in her In defence of uncertainty presentation):
Objectivity is a subject’s delusion that observing can be done without him. Invoking objectivity is abrogating responsibility — hence its popularity.
– Heinz von Foerster
Without the observer, there is nothing.
– Humberto Maturana
Credits: Photo © 2017 Ananth Pai - sliced cucumber and green leafy vegetables in container with moist
Subscribe to our RSS feed