CHAPTER 1
A New Vessel for
Leadership:
New Rules for a New Age
“The hardest thing is not to get people to accept new
ideas; it is to get them to forget old ones.”
John Maynard Keynes
Our society is just beginning to understand the impact digitalization has
had
and will have on:
• Communication
• Business
• Politics
Yesterday’s questions will not get answered because tomorrow has
become
today sooner than we ever could have imagined
INDUSTRIAL AGE:
•Meant being a good manager
•Guiding one’s subordinates like a good parent
•Directing their activities in the interests of the
organization
•Critical Skills were those required for: POLICE
•Planning
•Organizing
•Leading
•Implementing
•Controlling
•Evaluating
Good performance and a sense of responsibility
Were highly valued, strongly encouraged and heavily
rewarded
Organizational Leaders:
•Used vertical communication and command
strategies
to ensure the workplace
•Stayed focused and orderly
•Work was performed efficiently
•They refined hierarchical mechanisms
•Fostered congruence of workplace behavior
•Approaches to understanding leadership and acting
as
a leader emerged during the century.
NEWTON AND ORGANIZATIONAL DESIGN
Newton’s model of the physical universe:
•Influenced social theorists
•Entrepreneurs and organizational gurus
20th century the focus of work was on performing
the right
processes.
21st century the focus is on obtaining the right
outcomes
•produce products and services of consistently good
quality.
LEAVING THE INDUSTRIAL AGE
Quantum theory, developed and applied during the
middle of the century has helped to create newer
technologies that affect life from the molecular to
the
global levels.
Everything is linked and events in one part of the
universe
have some kind of impact on what happens in
other parts
CHANGE IS:
•Not a thing or an event
•Rather a dynamic that is constitute of the universe
•“Schrodinger’s Box”
The leader’s role is to:
•Engage with the unfolding reality
•Perceive it
•Note its demands and implications
•Translate it for others
•Guide others into actions to meet the demands
of a reality not quite present
•Live fully in the realm of potential reality
•Must anticipate the path of change and then
spell it out
The Transition Between Ages
•The Internet
•Fiber optics
•Information has become highly portable
•Control over any relationship
•Miniaturization
•Globalization
•Transformations are only the beginning
Leaders in health care:
•Must help people end their attachment to the kind of health care system with
which they have become comfortable
•Must try to engage others in the process of making
their own changes
•Complacency will guarantee failure
•May be victims of their own insights and past successes
•Must close the door on Industrial Age leadership models
•Must turn around and view the emerging landscape to develop a workable
vision of the future
•Must be able to communicate to others a real vision of the future with energy
and commitment
•Must communicate their vision through their own behavior
The greatest impediment to future success
is past success
Leaders in health care:
•Must be aware that people don’t hate change; they
just need a reason to engage it
•Must continually set short-term aggregated goals
•Must be aware of the demands regarding work
that exist within a dynamic and emergent culture
QUANTUM AGE RULES
•Linear thinking will be replaced by relational and complexity
models of thinking and acting
•Structure is about creating a context for action
•The value of work represents the goodness-of-fit between
function and outcome
•Technology has changed what people do, how they live and
who they are
•Reformatting health service will be continuous and dynamic
•Health care will be provided differently in the Digital Age
•The context in which leadership is applied is undergoing
changes
•Leaders must replace traditional leadership models with
models that reflect complexity and quantum realities
QUANTUM AGE RULES cont’d.
•Everything is part of one comprehensive system
•A new understanding of planning is needed
•Swarmware and Clockware need to continuously interact
Leaders must find the right balance between stability and
complexity
•Chaos and Paradox are always present in the universe
•Pay attention to the informal network; life is lived there
•Simple systems are linked to create more complex
systems
•Systems do not compete with each other but simply seek
to thrive in a network of intersections and interactions
•The compression of time will affect how work is done
Insert Figure 1-4
Point of Service Systems Design
ALL CHANGE ULTIMATELY
MAKES GOOD SENSE
“Change is.”