Achieving Action Confidence amid Disruption

In a context of uncertainty, how can teams and individuals act with confidence? This article offers a tested roadmap and shares live feedback from the experience of 140 business students representing a dozen nationalities between 7 January and 14 April 2021. Details of an ongoing example in a tech company in France is discussed (in French) at the following link.

In the current sanitary crisis, teams and individuals have found themselves deprived of many of the signals that have guided our lives and businesses. For these 1st year Masters students of SKEMA Business School, #isolation combines with a mutant professional landscape.

In the context of a class on Organizational Development, students were invited to follow Theory U on two parallel journeys: (1) a personal journey, (2) a fact-finding journey engaging with economic actors around corpus of knowledge (OKRs, Organizational Design, Organizational Patterns, Well Being & Diversity, Continuous & Transformational Change). The videos highlight the first journey only. 60-90-second video sequences illustrate various practices inspired by Theory U from MIT's Otto Scharmer.

The above image captures something of the spirit of Theory U (see also "further reading"): getting from a known Point A to an unknown Point B is not typically a linear path. You may also note that on the left the character is alone, while on the right a team is emerging. Put differently, in order to reach "PERFORMING" top right of the image (by Operating from the Whole), preparation is required including Observation on the left side of the U (Suspending Judgment, Seeing with Fresh Eyes, Redirecting, Sensing from the Field), Presencing at the Bottom of the U (Letting Go, Letting Come, Connecting to Source) and a phase on the right of U including Crystallizing Vision and Intention, Enacting and Prototyping.

Observation Phase (Left Side of the U)

Observation is an acquired skill, so first students were invited to see if they could listen deeply and develop empathy with someone quite different to themselves. Here's Anna's feedback on that experience, where she's pleasantly surprised to succeed in experiencing empathy for someone she didn't know:

Futhermore, students were assigned to groups of 4-6 participants, where they engaged in practices intended to facilitate trust-building as well as to develop Active Listening. Here Lijun offers her feedback on one of two main roles, coach (the other role is case giver):

In parallel, students engaged in an observation exercise with more than 400 international economic actors around their chosen corpus of knowledge.

Presencing Phase (Bottom of the U)

To help identify preferred futures (and associated actions) today, instead of using Scenario Planning, Strategic Planning or Brainstorming, students were invited to follow an exercise called "Stepping into the Field of the Future", here shared by Antoine:

Notice in the video, how Antoine is both surprised by all that he has discovered and more serene about the next steps ahead.

Crystallizing Vision and Intention (Start up the right of the U)

Whether as a corporate board, or as an individual, gaining serenity can be helpful. But to achieve which vision exactly? Students were invited to write a letter, either from the "Future Self" experienced in the previous exercise to current self, or the more classic exercise of writing to one's future self. Justine here gives feedback on the second option:

Notice how in the video, Justine both evokes with clarity a specific career path and remains open to future possibilities as they may arise. Perhaps even more surprising and valuable is to experience the exercise in the other direction, to connect with a imagined Future Self and allow that persona to write back to you from a preferred future to give you advice today as Ruiya shares here:

Finally, students prototyped what their futures could look like, received feedback and took first steps.

Promising Outcomes

52% of respondents to an anonymous survey of participants describe the course as "Life changing: new and deep perspectives, which I plan to put into practice", while a further 21% report "substantive theoretical AND practical learning"

In terms of likelihood to actually follow-up on learning and take action, a total of 97% of respondents indicate that they are "Likely" (40%), "Very Likely" (51%) or "Committed to Action" (6%):

Here Ranveer shares his feedback on Organizational Development, which he describes as a journey:

Perspectives

As currently designed in the context of a semester at a Business School, no follow-up is planned with students. It could be interesting to imagine mechanisms to accompany and track implementation in a second time period.

In the corporate world, any such implementation would include follow-up at regular time frames, like the quarterly follow-up for the #OKR implementation at the Tech company mentioned in the introduction.

Your feedback

The participating students and I would appreciate your feedback in comments on any point of resonance, your own suggestions or if you have questions: Have you implemented similar or different strategies in the face of similar challenges?

Acknowledgements

Many thanks to the #students and #leadership team at SKEMA Business School, including Mike Hanson, Guillaume Ferrante, Christophe Dispa, Katrina Panchout, Aida Jebali Karaoud, Hélène Duranton, Tatiana (Pekarskaia) Dauxert, Anke Middelmann, Amine Ezzerouali, Kirsty (Walker) Paoli, Geneviève Poulingue, Raluca (Rusu) Sandu, Isabelle Jauny, Joakim Sinniamourd, Mélanie Ouvry, Philippe Monin, Fabien Seraidarian, Patrice Houdayer and Alice Guilhon for their confidence, as well as Samuel Brown, Corinne (Descamps) Merlino, Sarah Occelli, Florence Degoulet, Albane Parmentier and Coralie Ghesquier Jude.

I am deeply grateful to the work of Otto Scharmer and the team at the Presencing Institute, including Eva Pomeroy, Antoinette Klatzky and Florentina Bajraktari.

Further reading

Books:

● Scharmer, C. Otto: The Essentials of Theory U. Berrett-Koehler, 2018.

● Scharmer, C. Otto: Theory U: Leading from the Future as It Emerges, 2nd ed. Berrett-Koehler, 2016.

● Scharmer, C. Otto, and K. Kaufer: Leading From the Emerging Future: From Ego-system to Eco-system Economies. Berrett-Koehler, 2013

Articles:

Pomeroy, E., Herrmann, L., Jung, S., Laenens, E., Pastorini, L., & Ruiter, A. (2021). Exploring Action Research from a Social Field Perspective. Journal of Awareness-Based Systems Change, 1(1), 105-117.

Wilson, P. (2021). Sensing the Social Field through Action Research: What’s Important, What’s Valid: A Commentary on Pomeroy, et al, “Bringing a Social Field Perspective to Action Research”. Journal of Awareness-Based Systems Change, 1(1), 119-124.

Desmond McGetrick aims to accompany Teams and Individuals to reach their Highest Future Possibilities.

• DMCG Consulting, Deliver Margins - Create Good (www.dmcg.paris)
• Visiting Faculty at SKEMA Business School, France, and FH Kusftein, Austria

Additional Videos

For those that would like to hear additional student perspectives, here are two more.

Hear Justine's perspective on the value of listening to someone without judgment (during Empathy Walk):

And enjoy Elliot's enthusiastic share on the exercise of Stepping into the Field of the Future, as well as his book recommendation: