| Organizational Design and Development Associates |
|
Helping People Work Together Better
Welcome to the launch of our quarterly newsletter, a digital communication to keep you updated on new work and events at ODDA as well as share with you ideas and information from other sources that we think you'll find engaging. Visit us online and join our conversation about Organizational Life on our blog. |
|
The Abundance Leadership and Organizational Health Model
Laura Freebairn-Smith, MBA, PhD  | Abundance leaders see the possibilities in all situations,
share power, share credits, and work from an optimistic standpoint. Scarcity
leaders see the world as an inherently difficult place without enough
resources. They tend to hoard information and power. Research shows that
abundance leaders have healthier organizations in which team work, conflict
resolution, communication, and other key organizational attributes are much
stronger.
Laura Freebairn-Smith has developed an instrument to
evaluate leadership style on the spectrum of abundance versus scarcity. This
instrument includes a survey to evaluate a leader's orientation based on data
collected anonymously and confidentially from subordinates and peers. This
information is presented in an individualized, 24-page report that
provides a basis for discussing the pros and cons of each stance and for
looking at ways to use the better aspects of each model to lead staff. The
instrument can also be used as the nucleus of a leadership development program,
as a 360º feedback instrument, or as a means for determining the link between
an organization's leaders and the organization's overall health.
> Information about in-house workshops
> More information about the Abundance Leadership model
|
Thinking in Systems
How One Small Shift Can Solve Big Problems
Available from Amazon.com  | In her book Thinking
in Systems, Donella Meadows explains systems thinking, a method of thinking
and analysis that can be implemented for both large-scale and individual problem
solving. Meadows describes the complex ways that feedback loops operate to
create self-organizing systems, both in ecosystems and in organizations.
Additionally, she explains interventions that can be implemented to repair
broken systems. She proposes 12 leverage points, places within a complex system
where a "small shift in one thing can produce big changes in
everything."
Places to intervene in a system
(in increasing order of
effectiveness)
© The Sustainability Institute 1999
12. Constants, parameters, numbers (such as subsidies,
taxes, standards)
11. The sizes of buffers and other stabilizing stocks,
relative to their flows
10. The structure of material stocks and flows (such as
transport networks, population age structures)
9. The lengths of delays, relative to the rate of system
change
8. The strength of negative feedback loops, relative to the
impacts they are trying to correct against
7. The gain around driving positive feedback loops
6. The structure of information flows (who does and does not
have access to what kinds of information)
5. The rules of the system (such as incentives, punishments,
constraints)
4. The power to add, change, evolve, or self-organize system
structure
3. The goals of the system
2. The mindset or paradigm out of which the system - its goals,
structure, rules, delays, parameters - arises
1. The power to transcend paradigms
> Access a collection of 15 years of essays from Donella Meadows' column "Global
Citizen" at The Donella Meadows Archive.
> Thinking in Systems is available from Amazon in
paperback and on Kindle.
> Contact us for
more information on how to use systems
thinking in your organization: telephone (203) 288-6688 or email.
|
|
|
|
|
Got a Management Muddle? Ask the expert.
Would you like to receive expert advice on clarifying your
organization's strategic direction, reform a dysfunctional management team or
just get a different point of view on your management challenges? Submit a
question to our blog and receive expert advice.
Laura Freebairn-Smith will respond to your question and, with your permission,
we'll post the Q&A to our Management Muddle blog. You'll be able to follow
the discussion as others respond.
To post your question,
visit our Management Muddle blog. |
Help us reduce our carbon footprint:
Join us online!
Our website is hosted by 100% wind energy  |
In
an
effort to reduce the amount of paper waste we generate, we'd like to
invite
you to join us online. We're now posting on Twitter. Follow us: our
username
is ODDA123. And use #ODDA to tag tweets that are
related to us. We also now have company pages on LinkedIn and Facebook.
Follow us to receive
information about upcoming workshops and other events.
  
|
Brenda Adelson, Marketing Director
Brenda Adelson joined ODDA as Marketing Director in March. She is responsible for marketing and communications as well as general office management. Previously self-employed as a graphic artist in Durango, Colorado, in 2008 she received an MBA in international management from Thunderbird School of Global Management and recently returned from an assignment in Mali, where she worked with the Global Sustainable Tourism Alliance to promote tourism investment in the Dogon Country region.
|
|
