The future of management needs hosts
Taholah, Washington
If this article is any indication, the future of management will require more hosts and less bosses. Hierarchies are disappearing, top-down and centralized is giving way to distributed, and organizations are becoming more open and engaging of stakeholders.
That is true everywhere in my experience, including here at the Quinault Indian Nation where we are reframing the tribal government’s strategic plan in several unique ways. First we have established a core team of stakeholders from the government and community who are willing to take responsibility for stewarding the plan. Second, the core team has proposed a new strategic plan model that organizes work not by the departments and programs of the Quinault government structure, but rather by “domains” which are yet to be determined but may end up being things like “prosperity” and “learning.” Organizing the aspirations and preferred futures of the nation this way means that the government departments need to talk to each other and the community to move the Nation forward. And finally the new plan requires engagement with many many people, to bring in the wisdom and ownership of the community so that the plan is theirs. Tomorrow for example we will be hosting an ongoing cafe in the lobby outside the Nation’s general council meeting, where we will be hosting conversations with community members and capturing wisdom with a graphic facilitator.
As a result, our planning sessions are a combination of work and facilitation training because the core team knows that to do this means that they have to talk to people. So we are exploring how to convene conversations that matter and that have an impact.
How is the shift in management changing the way you plan strategy?
Chris, this one really jumped out of the RSS reader. Just what Ive been thinking about.
More and more I find I’m hired to do one thing as a consultant but what the companies really want when I get there, is help devising strategy.
My experience: It seems a lot of companies see themselves as hosts to outside strategists, and keepers to staff. And there’s a self-conditioned lack of ownership among staff that reinforces this image. Some companies are making changes, but others are becoming core entities that manage a brand, with the “real” work being done by consultants/contractors. Kind of like an NHL team. Of course, this is a far cry all round from the holy grail of ‘real’ co-creation.
It’s interesting.
Co-ownership, especially of a strategic plan is critical in my view. IN fact with this client, I almost bailed on the job because there wasn’t shared ownership at the community level. Now we have a core team in place and they are developing really god stuff, and as their work is starteing to be seen in the organization, people are geting excited that something different might be possible. The importance of co-creating and ownsing the strategic plan is that plans like this represent the organization’s story that has yet to be told. Consultants can’t do that…someone or some groups of people at the core of the organization has to do that, otherwise it’s completely in authentic and, in my experience, will sit on the shelf forever, until it’s time to dust it off because people notice that it’s not doing anything…
For me there is something really powerful about supporting strategic infrastructure within organizations that help build the core team first, and from there the strategy flows.
Agreed – this approach is preferable by far – the plan as emergent from the intellectual etc capital within the org.
As for the value of consultants in this process: I think we’re in agreement that they/we do have value (!) – to help draw out and help articulate a plan…
Yes…I think a key value of consultants is that we are able to provide a point of view that is not easily attainable from within an organization. Also, we should be above the fray of the daily politics and “issues” that people have to deal with. I find that I am most useful as a keel rather than as a sail. And then later as an anchor.
Look towards the bottom of the boat…there you will find the good consultants…(getting keelhauled?!)
🙂