An Orderly Transition

An Orderly Transition

by | Jul 2, 2022 | Leading

Is this how change happens?

The Belousov – Zhabotinsky or B-Z reaction is formed by combining several chemicals including a bromine and an acid in a Petrie dish. The solution is unstable, and in a non-equilibrium state it oscillates. The pattern, shown in this photograph, emerges slowly at first little blue dots in a red-brown solution, but accelerates into spirals and curves.

This reaction was so counter-intuitive that in 1951 when Boris Belousov, who first observed it, tried to publish his findings the journal refused saying he must have got something in the experiment wrong. In 1961 Anatol Zhabotinsky, a grad student was able to reproduce these same effects.

The B-Z reaction has now been recreated many times. B-Z is one of several non-equilibrium chemical reactions. The Briggs-Rauscher reaction where a beaker oscillates from clear to opaque blue or black in a pattern that can be precisely modeled mathematically.

Oscillation

Oscillation is feature of change in a non-equilibrium state and not just in chemicals. We are all familiar with what happens when one places a microphone too close to a speaker:  “Screeeeeeeeeeeeeek” – feedback!  The sound waves coming from the microphone are amplified through the speakers and the sound waves from the speakers are picked up by the microphone and so on, wave oscillation heard as ear splitting sound. Electric guitarists use this same principle, but control the gain to make distortion, the “dirty” or “fuzz box” sound of heavy metal music and Chicago blues.

The first law of thermodynamics is that energy can neither be created nor destroyed, it can only be transferred from one form to another. The second law of thermodynamics is that in any closed or isolated system entropy (inevitable decay and decline) always increases. Based upon external input energy (growth) increases, but if the system then remains isolated decline begins. I am not a physicist, but that sounds like a recipe for oscillation.

It says to me that without some external energy input a system’s energy will decline and that system equilibrium requires input-transference balance to avoid a destructive oscillation.

Is this how things break into chaos and how order emerges from chaos? I think so and I think we know this somehow, maybe deep in our DNA. We have expressions like  “two steps forward- one step back” or the depressing inverse “one step forward-two steps back”. We observe “growth spurts”  and “growing pains” in our children, growing things accelerate and level off.

S-curves and fractals

This growth-leveling function is often depicted in a Sigmoid curve or S-curve. After initial input, e.g. water and fertilizer for a seedling, growth accelerates, then levels off.

In thinking about change -say continuous improvement – we attempt to control the inputs the way a farmer controls the water and fertilizer.  We know improvement may level off and so we conceive another project, another solution to start the improvement again. It is never clear if that will happen and there is a period of uncertainty. Will we create a destructive oscillation or will new growth occur?

The B-Z reaction demonstrates what we thought was disarray and chaos has a pattern to it. In 1975 mathematician Benoit Mandelbrot coined the term fractal from the Latin root fractus meaning broken or partial (fractured, fraction) and the extension to geometric reassembly. A fractal is “self-similar,” a geometric shape, structure, or pattern of growth that exhibits the same structure regardless of scale. Examples in nature include tree branching, snowflake crystals, and fern leafing.

Mandelbrot created a set of numbers that modeled the process of fractal geometry and In 1980 working with the IBM Watson Research Center he created stunning visualizations of fractals and the progression or “ordered chaos that they represented.  

(Note: Still photographs do neither the B-Z reaction nor the Mandelbrot set justice, but video of each is available on YouTube and Wikipedia Commons respectively.)

I think that how elements combine and break apart, how things grow and decay, how organisms and organizations self-organize and dissolve, is old knowledge, pre-historic knowledge. My evidence for this is not scientific but artistic.

What did ancient artists know?

Ancient Artistic examples of spiral and wave patterns may indicate knowledge of order-chaos transitions

For more than 7000 years artists have been drawing the spirals and wave patterns found in the Belousov ­- Zhabotinsky reaction and the fractal images of the Mandelbrot set.

The images at the left are of artistic work that is between 2500 and 7000 years old. Somehow these artists knew about the patterns of spirals and waves. Somehow they interpreted nature in ways that mirror the self-similar patterns of the advanced mathematics of fractals and the chemical oscillation of combined unlike chemicals.

What truth about change did these artists access? How much did they know about complex systems, non-equilibrium states, and oscillation?

 

What can we learn from these artists and from the Belousov-Zhabotinsky reaction and the Mandelbrot set to make change in our organizations and ourselves easier?

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It’s Just Business

It’s Just Business

by | Jul 2, 2022 | Leading

“It’s just business, Alan. Don’t take it personally.”

It was twenty years ago. My client, a founding CEO, was informing me that he had rejected my advice on a merger he was contemplating. He was prepared to ignore the people issues I had uncovered in due diligence and follow the investment banker’s counsel: “You can deal with the soft stuff later. Let’s get this deal done!”

I never had a clear bright line between my business and personal point of view. I followed my passion, and my work reflected who I was. I once explained as much to this client and he said, “Wow. You must be miserable a lot of the time. I keep my beliefs, likes and dislikes completely separate from what I do to make money.”

I was privately horrified, but held my peace. I find this sentiment to be quite common in business.

Peter Block, a teacher and colleague in the field of organizational development, once said in a training session that I attended:

Business. It’s such an interesting word. As a noun, there is a lot to like about it –“we do business together” – something a bit more than a transaction, a relationship, or ”getting down to business” – taking action on what’s really important.

But when business is used as an adjective something unfortunate happens. Take ”it’s a business decision” – that means “we know we’re screwing you, but the money made us do it.”

“It’s just business” is all too frequently used to justify taking short-term profit-focused action in the face of known long-term damage to the firm, its customers, employees, or the community at large. It can be a license to ignore possible unintended consequences. “It’s just business” also can rationalize not seeking a solution when that solution is inconvenient in terms of time or money.

Selling Business

I once sold off-the-shelf training programs in Pittsburgh. A large bank, our client, had acquired a large Philadelphia bank. Integration wasn’t going well because the Philadelphia bank had been told that this was a “merger of equals” while the acquiring CEO truly believed it was an acquisition or, more precisely, a conquest. I observed him explode in a meeting of the two firms’ leaders: “When I said that we’d pick the best IT systems, I meant OUR SYSTEMS!”

The training manager called my boss and me in to discuss using one of our training programs with the integration team. The program taught how to get things done when you don’t have direct authority. The training manager was interested, but I kept asking questions when I should have been closing the sale. The training manager began to see that this training program would be window dressing at best and might throw gasoline on a smoldering fire.

We left the meeting. My boss was livid. “You actually talked yourself out of a sale!” she said.

“It wouldn’t solve the problem,” I responded just a tad too defensively.

“Alan, this is business. Not everything works. It probably wouldn’t hurt.”

“But what if it did?”

“That isn’t your problem. And we would have had a $15,000 sale.”

At the time, the steel industry in Pittsburgh was dying (though we didn’t know it) and my training sales were declining. I later left that firm and went to work for a consulting firm that actually wanted to find true solutions to problems. It turned out to be a good move.

I continued over the next thirty years to do business according to what I believed was right. When I worked for large consulting firms this sometimes created conflict. However, working for myself and with colleagues, those conflicts were substantially less.

An Unusual Business

Recently I read Bruce Springsteen’s autobiography Born to Run. Bruce’s first manager, Mike Appel, signed him to an onerous contract that (according to Bruce) essentially made him Mike’s employee. After Bruce’s first hit album began to earn money, the contract came up for renewal. There was a lot of money on the table, but Bruce was, according to the terms of the contract, entitled to very little of it. Bruce objected. Mike made re-signing with him for five years a condition of paying Bruce more money, saying Bruce might be a one-hit wonder.

Bruce left Mike Appel because Mike made the “business decision” of taking most of the money today rather than demonstrate his belief in Bruce for the long term. Bruce then signed with Jon Landau because of his “passion” and “heart.” To date Bruce has made over twenty more albums plus boxed sets.

Leadership Lessons

Most of my work was with large publicly held companies. Some were often driven to do the wrong things for employees, customers, or the community in order to maximize shareholder value. Other executives I knew kept these constituencies in mind. My best projects were working for those kinds of leaders.

Along the way, I became interested in B-corporations and Benefit Corporations, which define their business concept as a force for good. Some give a portion of profits away to charity; others have a long track record providing employee benefits like onsite child care. They structure business to provide real value to customers, employees and the community. Shareholders “do well by doing good.”

I suspect that the leaders of B-corporations see no virtue in a separation between their business and personal values.  Certainly, treating business as an arena where amoral behavior is justified – “It’s just business” – is a non-starter.

Like B-corporations, my point of view about business leadership includes not just attracting followers and making change, but delivering value as perceived by customers, staff, and the community as well as shareholders.

 

As a leader, what you do is who you are. It’s personal. It’s never “just business.”

What is a Mentor?

What is a Mentor?

by | Jul 1, 2022 | Living, Working

What is a Mentor?

People in corporations often ask this question. Some, like me, were blessed with great teachers in their lives or someone who developed and promoted them and they, in turn, want to share that experience. As an employee and as a consultant I worked in companies that instituted corporate mentorship programs. In my experience, they didn’t work too well.

Why is that?

I think these programs didn’t work because there is something about the mentor/mentee relationship that involves mutual choice. The mentor must choose the mentee, perhaps because he or she sees a similarity with the mentor’s younger self or something in the mentee that indicates the mentor can help. Likewise, the mentee must choose the mentor; you can’t guide a stone wall or push a rope. Both mentor and mentee must want to work together for the relationship to succeed. Corporate mandates can’t take the place of choosing to learn and choosing to teach.

I was fortunate to have several mentors in my life. When I was about fourteen an art teacher, Paul Ciano, saw a kid who was struggling. I was having difficulty finding academic subjects that interested me. Socially, I had been first a little introverted, then a bullied kid. When I learned to fight back against the bullies, I somehow got into a self-perpetuating fight cycle. Like the reluctant gunslinger in dozens of Western movies, there was always someone else who wanted to fight me. I had too big a chip on my shoulder to ever walk away.

Paul Ciano took me under his wing. He let me sculpt after school, took me to my first Fellini movie and discussed it with me, and later cast me as Billy Bigelow in Carousel. I still sculpt some – mostly wood carving – and my undergraduate theatre degree helped me understand people in ways that made my work as a “change guy” much better. Most importantly, I stopped hanging out with a crowd that either went to jail or died young.

Mr. Ciano chose me and I didn’t think much about choosing him. In retrospect, he was very cool – a painter, opera singer, theatrical director. I didn’t see that then; I was just grateful for the attention.

Other mentors included David La Camera at Lordly & Dame, who gave me free rein at several startup departments; and Dick Connell at Harbridge House, who made me the “data secretary” (engagement manager) of my first three consulting projects. These were managers who somehow saw potential and dropped me in the deep end. They weren’t surprised when I not only treaded water, but swam passably well.

George H. Litwin.

Perhaps the greatest mentor I ever had was George H. Litwin. In the late 1960s, Dr. Litwin took the concept of leadership climate, just introduced by Kurt Lewin, and combined it with David McClelland’s personal motive needs work. George and Bob Stringer ran an experiment at the Harvard Business School in which they created three remarkably different organizational climates, one driven on power, one on affiliation, and one on achievement. In 1967, they published Motivation and Organization Climate that described the experiment and conclusions.

George worked with the founders of the Forum Corporation in 1971 to design many of that firm’s training and consulting offerings. I joined Forum in 1981 and met George a year later when he came to Pittsburgh to run a workshop for me at US Steel.

“Do you know what the largest company in the US was in 1882?” George asked the gathered steel executives. “The National Harness Company. Their chief product was buggy whips.”

Several executives stood up and yelled,

“WE ARE STEEL! NOT SOME DAMN BUGGY WHIPS!”

Pandemonium ensued. I think we were lucky to get out with our lives.

George had told me beforehand what he was going to do and I had pleaded with him not to go down this path. ”They are NOT ready for this message,” I counseled. This was, after all, US Steel, the US Steel that had been the largest company in the world in 1902 when Elbert Gary combined Andrew Carnegie’s mills with those of other steel titans, financed by J.P.Morgan.

In retrospect, George was right about the steel market. Mini-mills from companies like Chaparral and Nucor made steel out of scrap. Multi-supplier service centers, originally distributing big mill overproduction to smaller customers, became distributors for the mini-mills and cheap Korean and Japanese steel. Unbeknownst to these executives, mini-mills and service centers had already made enough inroads to begin the eclipse of the big fully integrated mills. And at the time of our workshop, US Steel executives had just learned that their 1982 market share of domestic steel consumption had dropped below 40%.

“We’ve always calculated steel consumption by taking the production of the Homestead Works and dividing it by .12 because Homestead has had 12 percent of the market forever. Apparently, it doesn’t anymore.”

In fairness, the Forum Corporation didn’t know that the steel industry had begun to decline either. The next year, my sales were in the toilet. What is clear now is that the steel industry as we knew it finally died in 1984 and all Forum clients in Pittsburgh- steel companies and the banks and heavy manufacturing firms that supported them – stopped buying training. I couldn’t sell anything in Pittsburgh so I began driving a 1,500-mile loop every week around Ohio and Kentucky to sell training. So while it’s clear now what caused this, then I was the salesman who turned a $1million territory into a $250,000 territory in one year. I lost my job.

Then George Litwin chose me. He offered me a job at his small consulting firm, HRI. Given my experience with him I was reluctant to choose him. What won me over was him saying: “You said they were NOT ready to hear that message and you were right. I should have listened.”

That year, HRI won the British Airways turnaround project. In fact, many of the signature consulting projects of my career – BA, Short Brothers, Interep, TD, Royal Bank, Citibank, General Motors – I worked on with George or because he recommended me.

I learned a great deal. But, man–oh-man, I was the world’s most difficult mentee. I didn’t listen, and thought I knew best. Several times he just let me fall into the bottomless pit I insisted on falling into. I learned much of what I learned from George the hard way – “Don’t just say ‘Yes,’ think about what’s already on your plate. Don’t compromise because you want to be nice. When you are selling a project go sit down with client and don’t just send the proposal. If someone says you should rethink an approach, don’t just reject it out of hand. Listen! They might know more than you do. In fact, they probably do know more than you.”

George didn’t pull punches, but was gentler with me than I sometimes saw him be with others.

I did some of my best work with him. And when he asked me to produce a video training exercise based upon his 1967 HBS experiment, I wrote the scripts and managed a team who produced what I still believe is one of the best pieces of training material I ever worked on.

When it came time to move on, I went to Gemini Consulting. I had intended to tell him I was leaving, but a mutual colleague saw an opportunity to gloat so told George before I had the chance. George was gracious. “I figured you would tell me eventually.”

I saw George at his eightieth birthday energetically dancing to a DJ until the wee hours. Seeing  him caused me to think about what a mentor is:

  • A teacher, a guide, someone who promotes your interests and development
  • Someone who chooses you
  • Someone you choose
  • Someone who gives you opportunities to perform and to learn
  • Someone who lets you fail if failure will promote learning
  • Someone who, when it is time to move on, graciously sends you on your way
  • Someone whom you can never really pay back, but can only pay forward by mentoring others

Thank you, George, for choosing me, and for all that followed.