Are you an Artist? Or a Craftsman?

We often hear that organizational development work is "an art and a science". I have often wondered what this means from the perspective of a practitioner. How can I be both? when do I show up as an artist and when am I a scientist? Is that boundary made clear?

This week I attended a change management community of practice meeting with members from across three health authorities. I was in a room full of people who understood not only the acronyms of change work, but also the "health-care speak" as I call it. We completed a group activity where we compared and contrasted the way the ACMP (Association of Change Management Professionals) standards of change management and Prosci define working with change sponsors. We looked at what was different, what was similar, and insights that came up. There were four groups of about 5-7 change management professionals looking at the same documents and answering the same questions. In the end, we debriefed with each group, and heard what everyone came up with.

There were a lot of common threads: ACMP tells you what to do and Prosci tells us how, ACMP and Prosci serve a different purpose but with a common goal, both highlight the value of change sponsors, both use some common language but with variation in how stakeholder and sponsor is defined, etc. What I found interesting is how there were also many differences between the groups. The differences in education, professional experience, personal values, proficiency with ACMP and/or Prosci of each individual was manifesting in a collage of interpretations. The "science" was the methodology and and standards, the "art" was the unique interpretation of what that meant for us, our teams, and our organizations.

This all makes me think about how we define ourselves as practitioners, how we see ourselves in this work. I am currently reading a very non-businessy book, Kitchen Confidential by Chef Anthony Bourdain. In the book, while revealing the dark and dirty secrets of the life of a chef, Bourdain also reveals his perspective of his role in a kitchen:

" Cooking is a craft, I like to think, and a good cook is a craftsman- not an artist. There is nothing wrong with that: the great cathedrals of Europe were built by craftsman- thought they were not designed by them. Practicing your craft in expert fashion is noble, honorable, and satisfying."

He goes on to describe that a good cook is there to deliver consistent, high quality meals. Each plate is the same and does not deviate from the head chef's recipe. The customer should be able to order this dish again and again and have the same experience.

Consistency, standardization, and replication are the goals of being a good craftsman and doing good science. However, each of our clients are unique, with unique needs, strengths, gaps, and values. And us, the practitioners, we are also unique in what we bring to the table, what experiences we have had and what models we use to frame our work. This is our art form, I think. To take the complexity of the clients needs and match it to the best of our offering, to add a little of ourselves to the mix. We read between the lines, ask different questions, involve different stakeholders as we identify what we are missing, and combine methodologies when they are complementary. We base our work on research but execute it through our intuition and individual mental models. We are masters of our craft and creative geniuses when we need to be. A problem is an opportunity to go back to our pallet and add another colour, or create a new hue with what we already have.

Sometimes change work, and organizational development work is challenging and we are not always appreciated for the burden we carry, however I think our value is clear. It is one thing to understand how organizations move through change based on current research, and it is a whole different story to translate that body of knowledge to the real world, helping people move through the complex problems that face them everyday, helping them to feel listened to and valued along the way. Organizational development is a science because we use research to help us design best practices, but it is an art because we must take this mass of data and turn it into a transformational masterpiece. Our art, when done well, brings positive change to those we serve, enhancing organizational productivity and outcomes along the way. Our art can help people feel appreciation and happiness in their workplaces.

Powerful stuff.